Foundation to honor McLeroy, Gay with Medal of Honor Award
Foundation to honor McLeroy, Gay with Medal of Honor Award
Tampa attorney Kathleen Schin McLeroy and nonprofit CEO Kevin Gay of Jacksonville have been selected to receive The Florida Bar Foundation’s 2016 Medal of Honor Awards, the Foundation’s highest honor.
A shareholder with Carlton Fields and a member of the Florida Commission on Access to Civil Justice, McLeroy is being honored for her ideas to increase IOTA revenue, her efforts to preserve county funding for legal aid, leadership of organizations supporting pro bono at the national, state, and local levels, as well as more than 20 years of direct services to pro bono clients.
“Kathy’s advocacy begins at home and extends throughout the United States,” said Maria Henderson who served with McLeroy on The Florida Bar Foundation board and who, like McLeroy, is a past president of the Foundation.
McLeroy has chaired Carlton Fields’ pro bono committee since 1999; served four three-year terms on the Bay Area Legal Services board, including two terms as president; chaired the ABA Business Law Section’s Pro Bono Committee; served on the ABA Commission on Interest on Lawyers’ Trust Accounts; and was a liaison to the ABA Standing Committee on Pro Bono and Public Service. She currently co-chairs The Florida Bar Standing Committee on Pro Bono Legal Services; serves on Bar’s Vision 2016 Commission; and chairs the inaugural board of directors of the Florida Justice Technology Center, a statewide nonprofit dedicated to increasing access to justice through the innovative use of technology.
“The fact that she was chosen to head this critical and cutting-edge organization is a recognition of her abilities, knowledge, and dedication to finding creative solutions to these issues,” wrote McLeroy’s law partners Gwynne Young, a past Florida Bar president, and Sylvia Walbolt, a past Foundation president and Medal of Honor Award recipient.
Bay Area Legal Services Executive Director Dick Woltmann and former Florida Bar Foundation President Drew O’Malley noted McLeroy’s critical role in bringing about a change to the Florida Bar rule governing Florida’s IOTA Program that has yielded tens of millions of dollars in additional IOTA revenue in Florida.
“Kathy, a former banker with an MBA, determined that banks were placing IOTA funds in accounts with interest rates far lower than those offered commercial customers. Banks were profiting, and The Florida Bar was missing an opportunity to increase the funds available for much-needed legal services,” they wrote. “Kathy’s proposed changes to The Florida Bar rule on trust accounts included a requirement that lawyers deposit the funds only into accounts that provide interest comparable to what the bank’s commercial customers receive. Essentially, she redefined what qualifies as an IOTA account.”
After proposing changes to Florida’s rule on trust accounts, McLeroy spoke at conferences about Florida’s rule change and consulted with IOTA and IOLTA program representatives from various states. As a result of these efforts, 35 states modeled their rules governing their respective IOTA and IOLTA programs after Florida’s, which resulted in millions of dollars in additional revenue in those states.
Woltmann and O’Malley also noted that McLeroy helped lobby the Florida Legislature to retain county funding for legal aid and enlisted former Gov. Bob Martinez in the successful effort, preserving approximately $8 million in annual funding for Florida legal services programs.
Judge Catherine Peek McEwen, of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Middle District of Florida, remarked about McLeroy’s constant efforts to improve existing pro bono and self-help efforts, including her efforts to secure funding from the ABA Business Law Section to improve a Foundation-funded “Bankruptcy Basics” video and her ideas that led to a Tampa-area judicial summit on pro bono.
Kevin Gay
Gay is CEO and founder of Jacksonville- based Operation New Hope, and will receive the Medal of Honor Award in the nonlawyer category.
Gay left the corporate world and founded Operation New Hope in 1999 to help rebuild Jacksonville’s challenged urban communities and give ex-offenders the opportunity to successfully transition home and lead productive lives.
“Kevin has demonstrated both great commitment and success in providing aid to those in our legal system who need it the most,” said Wm. J. Sheppard, who nominated Gay and was the recipient of the Foundation’s 2004 Medal of Honor Award in the lawyer category.
Operation New Hope is a faith-based nonprofit with a two-pronged business model that includes the development of affordable housing and workforce development focusing on the reintegration of ex-offenders. In 2003, President George W. Bush selected Operation New Hope as the pilot site for the Ready4Work program, a prisoner re-entry program that has since been introduced in 16 U.S. cities.
Participants attend a comprehensive four- to six-week career development training course featuring employment and life skills and are partnered with a case manager who provides guidance and support, referrals for community assistance, life coaching, and follow-up drug screening.
While recidivism rates are nearly 70 percent within three years nationally, Jacksonville’s Ready4Work program has a recidivism rate of less than 35 percent.
Operation New Hope has helped more than 3,700 ex-offenders reenter their communities and workforce and has indirectly served their 7,200 children.
The organization’s Breaking the Cycle program provides training, counseling, and support for the family members of those who have been incarcerated.
In just over a decade, Operation New Hope has restored or built close to 80 homes in the urban neighborhoods of Historic Springfield and East Jacksonville.
Gay is also a founding member of Reconcile Jacksonville, an organization promoting interracial community interactions, and has served on many community boards.
“As a Jacksonville native and influential community leader, Kevin serves with a genuine spirit of compassion for our city and people,” Mayor Curry wrote in his support letter for Gay’s nomination.
The Medal of Honor Awards, sponsored by Florida Lawyers Mutual Insurance Company, will be presented at The Florida Bar Foundation’s 40th Annual Reception and Dinner June 16 at the Hilton Orlando Bonnet Creek during The Florida Bar Annual Convention. Tickets can be purchased at for $125 per person.
