BALI │ Bay Area Legal Incubator
BALI │ Bay Area Legal Incubator
Founded by the Alameda County Bar Association with a belief that there are NOT too many attorneys, just too many attorneys chasing the wealthiest 1% with outdated business strategies, losing money and opportunity while promoting inequity.
Where the Magic Happens.
New-er attorney and founder of a new legal business looking for a coaching incubator community that offers camaraderie of peers building affordable law practices, accountability to push business growth, access to legal technology tools, and training on legal business innovations and best practices. BALI's formal one-year incubator program provides coaching, accountabilitystructure, and resources to accelerate launch of sustainable, affordable law practices serving people of middle and lower incomes.
Life Learning at Its Best.
Experienced attorneys looking to reinvent their professional identityand launch a new/improved legal business venture with the help of a coaching
incubator community offering cross-generational camaraderie of peers building affordable law practices, accountability to push business growth, access to legal technology tools, and training on legal business innovations and best practices. These Incubator attorneys take part in the one-year incubator program.
Graduate Fellow
Keep the Magic Flowing.
Attorneyswho completed the BALI 1-year incubator program and want to continue actively participating in the program and the community, adding opportunities to coach and be coached in substantive law and/or law business management.
Attorneys in Residence
The Perfect Alchemy of Curious and Wise.
Experienced attorney looking to relocate an existing legal business into an environment that provides cross-generational camaraderie of peers interested in using the law to have social impact, opportunity to coach and be coached in law business management and the law, access to legal technology tools, and training on legal business innovations and best practices. BALI is founded on the belief that success is community made - we believe legalentrepreneurs benefit from career-long access to community, shared learning, and new ideas and technology. Therefore we encourage cross-generational learning and coaching within BALI by providing opportunity for more experienced solo attorneys to benefit from and contribute as attorneys in residence to our community of legal entrepreneurs. If you’re looking for a reduced overhead place to evolve, learn, collaborate, counsel, and make the shifts in your own practice with like-minded attorneys seeking to make impact by serving peoplehistorically disenfranchised from legal representation, then BALI is for you.
Wise Elders Among Us.
Attorneys with expertise in substantive law and/or business development that contribute to the community by hosting monthly coaching groups and
advising the development of the incubator. By invitation only.
Natalia@acbanet.org
Natalia “Natasha” Ventsko is a licensed California and Louisiana attorney. Her legal experience started at the Juvenile Justice Project of Louisiana (JJPL) where she advocated on behalf of juveniles in secure care facilities state-wide. Additionally, while at JJPL Natasha worked on impact litigation strategies which included various matters ranging juvenile life without parole to barriers accessing education/school to prison-pipeline disputes.
In 2018 Natasha joined the Bay Area Legal Incubators (BALI) as a participant to widen her scope to tax and mediation. While at BALI, Natasha launched a tax practice and takes immense pride in her ability to empower her clients to address their tax matters. Natasha’s motto is “I will not just talk tax at you- I will talk tax with you!” Natasha also uses her practice as a vehicle to collaborate with other attorneys and community organizations to lend her skillset to address social inequities that she is deeply passionate about. Most recently she has collaborated with other
stakeholders on supporting survivors of forced sterilizations access reparations. As the director of BALI, Natasha looks forward to leveraging her experience to support BALI’s participants launch and sustain successful practices that provide affordable and accessible legal services.
Natasha’s credentials include an LL.M in Taxation from the University of San Francisco (2018), Master of Social Work from Southern University of New Orleans (2013), Juris doctorate from Loyola College of Law (2009), and Bachelor of Social Work from San Jose State University (2006). Natasha is also a certified mediator.
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BALI Coordinator
charlie@acbanet.org
Carlos is the rock behind the magic at BALI. He manages the administrative side of BALI - coordinating trainings and legal technology presentations, ensuring our members are supported in onboarding and contributing to the community, and generally helping to run the ship.
Senior Associate District Attorney and Policy Chief, Alameda County District Attorney's Office (and Founding Director of BALI). Cynthia Chandler is an acclaimed attorney, change agent, and social entrepreneur with demonstrated success tackling some of the most pressing social issues of our time. Her innovations include launching the first organization advancing the rights of HIV+ women in prison; creating the compassionate release process and statutory structure in California and nationally allowing for the safe release from prison of terminally ill and incapacitated people; co-founding the Eviction Defense Center in Oakland, CA; and co-founding Critical Resistance and Justice Now, early prison abolitionist organizations influencing the Black Lives Matter network. She has an extensive record of coaching to success BIPOC nonprofit and corporate founders and regularly is brought in as a change manager for organizations seeking significant reorganization, growth, or culture shift. She runs monthly BALI coaching groups on branding and delegation.
Mediator, ADR Services. Geri Green, Esq. is a full-time mediator and discovery referee. She has successfully mediated and presided over nearly 1,000 disputes in the areas of Personal Injury, Medical Malpractice, Business, Employment, Real Estate, Landlord-Tenant, Insurance Coverage, Civil Rights & Disability Rights, Police Misconduct, Probate, and Elder Abuse. Geri runs a monthly BALI Alternative Dispute Resolution coaching group.
Founder and Principal, Covington May Law P.C. and Family Wealth Manager. R. Terese May, is a licensed attorney with the California State Bar. She earned a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration (Finance) from California State University East Bay and a Juris Doctor from the Loyola University Chicago School of Law. She holds the Charter Financial Consultant® (ChFC®) designation from the American College of Financial Services and is a member of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA), holding Series 7, Series 63, and Series 65 licenses, among others. Becoming an attorney was not a casual decision for Terese. After two decades of helping client’s amass wealth, her only professional frustration was the inability to protect their autonomy, as they aged. It was disheartening to watch how easily a client’s wishes could be completely unacknowledged, even in moments of clarity, once it was evident they had entered a state of decline. Terese runs BALI's Trust and Estates Study Group.
Founder and Principal, Law Office of John Douglas Moore. John Moore is a legal stragegist with over 40 years of experience in civil litigation and wills and trust litigation. He also enjoys helping small businesses grow the next step to medium-size and has brought this passion to his work supporting BALI law business founders grow their firms. In addition to his litigation work, John has special expertise in recycling and discard management, and he has been at the forefront of the recycling and sustainability movement internationally. John runs BALI's Civil Litigation Study Group and provides litigation coaching to the community.
Founder and Principal, Law Office of Cinthya Tyler. Cynthia Tyler is BALI attorney with over 8 years of experience in immigration law, including removal defense and asylum. She focuses her practice primarily on cases for immigrant youth and families. She also enjoys working with other attorneys to navigate their cases and come up with strategies to win. Cynthia provides coaching in immigration law and small business development.
Founder and Principal, E-Justice Project, APC. Ms. Phillips is a California licensed attorney. Ms. Phillips earned her law degree from American Heritage University of Southern California, School of Law.
She established her legal careerinterning for California Rural Legal Assistance (CRLA), an organization committed to the fight for justice and individual rights. At CRLA, Ms. Phillips participated in civil rights legal advocacy, which included litigating school to prison pipeline matters, and working with the Housing Authority of the County of Kern to establish a legally compliant Language Access Plan.
After her time at CRL, Ms. Phillips went to work as an attorney for one of California’s largest plaintiff side labor and employment law firms - zealously advocating for the rights of employees. Ms. Phillips has represented hundreds of clients in claims ranging from wage and hour issues, wrongful termination and retaliation, sexual harassment, discrimination, FMLA/ADA violations, and other employment related disputes.
Most recently, Ms. Phillips launched her own labor and employment law firm, E-Justice Project, APC in 2020. EJP is committed to providing advocacy for California workers, particularly those within the justice gap.
BALI is a project of the Alameda County Bar Association in collaboration with 5 California law schools and our county law library. Our sponsoring law schools sponsor a limited number of alumni annually to participate in BALI. If your alma matter sponsors BALI membership, please complete a BALI application and contact your BALI school representative provided for more information on their sponsorship selection criteria.
Berkeley Law, University of California, Berkeley
Associate Director for Public Interest Programs Lucy Benz-Rogers
Hastings School of Law
Director of Employer Relations, Fairuz Abdullah OR Assistant Dean of the Career Development Office
Amy Kimmel
University of San Francisco School of Law
Adjunct Professor and Interim Director, Office of CareerServices Karren Shorofsky
BALI│Bay Area Legal Incubator
125 12th Street, Suite 100-BALI
Oakland, CA 94607
bayarealegalincubator.org
BALI│Bay Area Legal Incubator is a project of the Alameda County Bar Association
bayarealegalincubator@gmail.com, 125 12th Street, Suite 100-BALI, Oakland, CA 94607
acbanet.org, 548 Market Street, PMB 22692, San Francisco, CA 94104-5401
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