- Ethical Dangers of Isolation in the Legal Profession
- CLE Credit: One ethics on-demand CLE credit has been approved, 2/21/2025 - 2/21/2027 (#523849). Registration
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Speaker: Jon Tynjala, Client Services Director, Lawyers Concerned for Lawyers
Description: Loneliness and isolation present an urgent public health challenge, prompting the U.S. Surgeon General to issue a public health advisory to urge the nation’s immediate awareness and action. As lawyers, we have been identified as the loneliest workers in America, and our isolation presents a significant risk to our mental and physical health and our ability to conform to our professional obligations. This program explores some of the causes and effects of isolation, the impact on our professional responsibilities, and ways we can address both causes and effects of isolation by building a culture of connection and mutual care in the legal profession.
- Presentation materials.
- Mental Health and Substance Use in the Legal Profession and the Practice of Law
- CLE Credit: One mental health/substance use on-demand CLE credit has been approved, 10/31/2024 - 10/31/2026 (#515785). Registration
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Speakers: Joan Bibelhausen, Executive Director, Lawyers Concerned for Lawyers, and Jon Tynjala, Client Services Director, Lawyers Concerned for Lawyers
Description: This course is designed to educate attorneys to identify, understand, and to from the legal profession and from the practice of law biases against persons because of disabilities related to mental and chemical health issues. Powerful stigmas remain attached to both chemical health and mental health related disabilities, and the ABA study clearly shows that barriers to seeking help included “not wanting others to find out they needed help” and “concerns regarding privacy or confidentiality.” Because of those stigmas, discrimination occurs both to impaired lawyers and by lawyers toward impaired clients and potential clients. By educating attorneys about the misconceptions surrounding chemical health and mental health issues, they will be better positioned to eliminate barriers to hiring, retentions, professional development, and full participation of attorneys disabled by chemical or mental health issues. They will also be less likely to discriminate against their clients or potential clients with chemical dependency or mental health related disabilities.
- Presentation materials.
- The Minnesota State Competency Attainment Board
- CLE Credit: One standard on-demand CLE credit has been approved, 10/8/2024 - 10/8/2026 (#514755). Registration
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Description: During this presentation Ryan Flynn, Minnesota Competency Attainment Board Chair and Kim Larson, Program Administrator share information about the efforts and reasons behind the creation of
Minnesota Statute 611.40-
611.59 and the progress toward establishing a statewide, independent competency attainment system.
- Presentation slides.
- Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo
- CLE Credit: One standard on-demand CLE credit has been approved, 9/5/2024 - 9/5/2026 (#512369). Registration
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Speaker: The Honorable Colette Routel, Judge, Hennepin County District Court
Description: In
Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo (and a companion case), the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the long-standing
Chevron doctrine, which for the past 40 years had required courts to defer to federal agencies' reasonable interpretations of ambiguous statutes in most circumstances. This presentation provides an overview of this decision and explains its likely impacts.
- Presentation slides.
- The State of the State: Civil Access to Justice in Minnesota
- CLE Credit: One elimination of bias on-demand CLE credit has been approved, 5/2/2024 - 5/2/2026 (#506167). Registration
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Speakers: Bridget Gernander, Legal Services Grant Program Manager; Judge Thomas A. Gilligan, Jr., Second Judicial District Court; Emily Froehle, Assistant County Attorney, Dakota County; and Anna Beadle, Executive Director, Minnesota Justice Foundation
Description: Civil legal service programs, private attorneys, and the court system work together to meet the basic legal needs of Minnesotans of limited means, seniors, veterans, people with disabilities, the LGBTQ community, and Black, Indigenous, and People of Color. Few professionals in our state have a full idea of how the needs of low-income Minnesotans are met through the state's civil justice system. This program will educate attorneys about how the civil justice system functions, how it seeks to provide access to justice, who it serves, and how they can contribute. This program is a project of the Minnesota State Bar Association Access to Justice Committee.
- Presentation slides. Handouts: MSBA Model Policy on Pro Bono for Public Attorneys.
- Managing Ethics, Negativity and Stress
- CLE Credit: One ethics on-demand CLE credit has been approved, 2/6/2024 - 2/6/2026 (#499829). Registration.
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Speakers: Judith M. Rush and Chase Andersen, Lawyers Concerned for Lawyers
Description: As lawyers, our duties under the Rules of Professional Conduct underpin our service to clients. We are accustomed to quiet withdrawals, transfers of representation, and serving clients well, even when clients are at their most difficult. We work in the midst of looming deadlines, mountains of cases, negativity, and other stressful conditions. Our duties as advocates frequently put us in the line of fire with difficult parties and opposing counsel, while requiring us to maintain the integrity of the profession and respect the rights of others. Learn how stress, negativity, and ethical duties interact and how we can better manage our practice, our lives, and our ethical obligations.
- Presentation slides. Handouts.
- The Evolving Practice of Racial Exclusion: How White Minnesota Residents Adapted to State and Federal Court Decisions and Legislation During the 20th Century
- CLE Credit: One standard on-demand CLE credit has been approved, 9/26/2023 - 9/26/2025 (#492692). Registration
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Description: Whites living in Minnesota during the 20th century had many ways to exclude African Americans from their neighborhoods, towns, and cities, but over time the legal methods they employed were affected by various state and federal court decisions and legislation. Sometimes the decisions and laws affirmed and strengthened the tools Whites had and sometimes they weakened or banned them altogether. White residents adapted to this shifting legal terrain, however, and managed to keep their communities racially homogenous, or largely so, and that is part of the historical background for understanding the state's racial disparities in the present day.
- Presentation slides.
- Reducing Stigma to Avoid Burnout
- CLE Credit: One elimination of bias on-demand CLE credit has been approved, 8/28/2023 - 8/28/2025 (#491125). Registration
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Speaker: Judith M. Rush, Outreach Manager, Lawyers Concerned for Lawyers
Description: In serving clients, the profession, and the system of justice, lawyers bring intellect, passion, and skill to their work, carry significant workloads, and work long hours in close relationship with others solving difficult problems. Lawyers seek not only justice and successful resolution for clients and others, but also fairness, meaning, and intrinsic and external rewards for themselves. These aspects of a lawyers’ work can cause chronic stress, resulting in burnout, poor physical health, or other health challenges such as anxiety, depression, substance use, addiction, and mental illness. Effectively managing workplace stress is critical to lawyer health, competence, and ethical responsibility. The stigma attached to burnout and other physical or mental health concerns as well as implicit and explicit bias can make it difficult for lawyers to get help. This program explores what burnout is, how our work as legal professionals contributes to burnout, and how to head off burnout, break the stigma, and get help for burnout to regain our spark and enjoy our lives.
- Handouts: CLE Materials Packet. Slides Handout.
- Mapping Prejudice and Racial Covenants in the Twin Cities
- CLE Credit: One standard on-demand CLE credit has been approved, 6/30/2025 - 6/30/2027 (#531543). Registration
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Speaker: Kirsten Delegard, Project Director, Mapping Prejudice Project
Description: Professor Delegard highlights current efforts to remove restrictive covenants from modern leases and titles and discusses the impact these covenants have had on the Jewish community and communities of color in the Twin Cities and surrounding areas.
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Note: This CLE was previously approved for one standard on-demand CLE credit, 7/7/2023 - 7/7/2025 (#488040).
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- Suicide Awareness and Prevention
- CLE Credit: One elimination of bias on-demand CLE credit has been approved, 1/22/2025 - 1/22/2027 (#521441). Registration
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Speakers: Joan Bibelhausen, Lawyers Concerned for Lawyers, and Faith Amdahl
Description: The stress lawyers face is a predictor for depression, and untreated depression is the #1 predictor for suicide. Lawyers must also deal with the fact that clients have been suicidal. This program will help you understand the facts and myths about suicide; recognize signs and indicators for clinical depression, anxiety, and suicide; and provide resources and a protocol for offering and seeing help to prevent suicide.
- Presentation Slides. Handouts: Suicide Prevention: Every Lawyer's Opportunity; Suicide Risk Factors; Lawyers Concerned For Lawyers - How Can LCL Help?; LCL Resources; LCL Supplemental Resources: Suicide Prevention
- Note: This CLE was previously approved for one elimination of bias on-demand credit, 2/3/2023 - 2/3/2025 (#480143).
- Trust Accounting: The Important Ins and Outs of Compliant Trust Account Recordkeeping
- CLE Credit: 1.5 ethics on-demand CLE credits have been approved, 11/6/2024 - 11/6/2026 (#516607). Registration
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Speakers: Susan Humiston, Krista Barrie, and Annette Winrick, Office of Lawyers Professional Responsibility
Description: Safekeeping client money is a fundamental ethics obligation of lawyers. The ethics rules contain several requirements to ensure you correctly safekeep and account for those funds. This session covers the requirements of Rule 1.15, Minnesota Rules of Professional Conduct, and the rule's Appendix 1, so that you can ensure that your procedures and recordkeeping are compliant. This session, taught by the Director of the Office of Lawyers Professional Responsibility, the Senior Assistant Director in charge of the Office's trust account overdraft program, and the Office's Auditor, also covers common errors that people make in managing their trust account. If you are a lawyer responsible for a trust account or staff member that keeps the books, be sure to make time for this presentation. You will be glad you did!
- Presentation Slides. Handouts: Other People's Money: Operating Lawyer Trust Accounts; Is Your Trust Account in Order?; Safekeeping Client Property; Your Ethical Duty of Supervision.
- Note: This CLE was previously approved for 1.5 ethics on-demand credits, 11/18/2022 - 11/18/2024 (#476661).
- Stress, Addiction and Mental Health: An Ethical Perspective
- CLE Credit: One ethics on-demand CLE credit has been approved, 11/6/2024 - 11/6/2026 (#516606). Registration
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Speakers: Chase Andersen and Joan Bibelhausen, Lawyers Concerned for Lawyers
Description: For lawyers, missing deadlines and failing to communicate or complete projects may be the tip of the iceberg when it comes to excessive stress and addiction, and mental health issues. Those same issues and others may be present in clients. When a client is impaired, the lawyer has both obligations and opportunities. There are obligations when the lawyer is impaired, but fortunately, there is also help available. This program looks at professional responsibility aspects of impairment from both the client and lawyer perspective.
- Presentation Slides. Handouts: Well-Being Ethics Rules, LCL Well-Being Materials 2022, How LCL Can Help 2022.
- Note: This CLE was previously approved for one ethics on-demand CLE credit, 11/15/2022 - 11/15/2024 (#476124).
- Appeals from Start to Finish
- CLE Credit: One standard on-demand CLE credit has been approved, 9/27/2024 - 9/27/2026 (#513981). Registration
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Speaker: Eric Caugh, Attorney, Zelle LLP
Description: Have you ever wondered what happens when a judge's decision is appealed? This CLE covers the basics of appealing a district court case to the Minnesota Court of Appeals, what the Court of Appeals can review, and what happens after the Court of Appeals makes a decision.
- Presentation Slides.
- Note: This CLE was previously approved for one standard on-demand credit, 10/5/2022 - 10/5/2024 (#473159).
- Jurisdiction in Indian Country 101
- CLE Credit: One standard on-demand CLE credit has been approved, 7/8/2024 - 7/8/2026 (#509018). Registration
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Speaker: Judge Colette Routel, Fourth Judicial District Court
Description: Do state and/or federal laws apply with Indian reservations in Minnesota? Do tribal laws apply to the activities of persons who are not tribal members when those activities take place in Indian country? This presentation covered the basics of civil jurisdiction in Indian country and provided participants with suggestions for resources to consult when these issues arise in practice.
- Presentation Slides.
- Note: This CLE was previously approved for one standard on-demand credit, 7/8/2022 - 7/8/2024 (#467045).
- Domestic Violence: Four Contemporaneous Proceedings a Child Abuser May Face
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CLE Credit: One standard on-demand CLE credit has been approved, 1/12/2024 - 1/12/2026 (#498424).
Registration
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Speaker: Jason Brown, Barna, Guzy & Steffen
Description: In this CLE, Mr. Brown discusses the four avenues that cases go down after a parent is accused of harming a child: (1) protective services; (2) order for protection; (3) criminal charges; and (4) divorce (custody) implications.
- Presentation Slides.
- Note: This CLE was previously approved for one standard on-demand credit, 2/1/2022 - 2/1/2024 (#439757).
- Mental Health and Well-Being in a Post-COVID Environment
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CLE Credit: One ethics on-demand CLE credit has been approved, 12/8/2023 - 12/8/2025 (#496750).
Registration
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Speaker: Joan Bibelhausen, Executive Director, Lawyers Concerned for Lawyers
Description: Life and work during the COVID pandemic have been challenging for many people, including legal professionals. These challenges are multifaceted and, at times, seemingly unrelenting. While a post-COVID world may seem distant right now, current circumstances give rise to unique stressors. This session discussed the ethical implications of the current state of affairs while also offering perspectives and tools for coping.
- Presentation Slides. Handouts: How Can LCL Help 2021. LCL Resources. LCL Supplemental Resources - Return to Work Post-COVID. LCL Well-Being Materials 2021. Post Traumatic Growth - The Hennepin Lawyer. Well-Being Ethics Rules.
- Note: This CLE was previously approved for one ethics on-demand CLE credit, 12/22/2021 - 12/22/2023 (#429040).
- United States v. Cooley
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CLE Credit: One standard on-demand CLE credit has been approved, 7/26/2023 - 7/26/2025 (#489532).
Registration
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Speaker: Colette Routel, Professor and Co-Director, Native American Law and Sovereignty Institute, Mitchell Hamline School of Law
Description: In
United States v. Cooley, the U.S. Supreme Court held that tribal police officers have the authority to interrogate and briefly detain persons suspected of committing crimes within the boundaries of an Indian reservation, even though they are not tribal members. This presentation will discuss the Court's June 2021 decision in depth, and address its implications for Minnesota.
- Presentation Slides.
- Note: This CLE was previously approved for one standard on-demand CLE credit, 8/10/2021 - 8/10/2023 (#397489).
