Daniel John Homick

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I first “joined” the ABA during my final year in law school as a “student member” and then for real upon graduation in 1978… and never looked back. The key attraction for me was becoming involved in its various Sections and Forums, especially my home within the ABA, the Section of Real Property, Trust and Estate Law (RPTE). I joined this Section as a substantive committee member and a few years later was asked to chair one of it’s subcommittees!

Since then I have had the honor of serving two years as co-chair of the RPTE’s standing committee on membership, three years as supervisory council member and one year as group chair of the six committees that form the investment in real estate and mortgages group. I also served six years as chair of the securitization committee and one year as chair of the mortgage insurance subcommittee.

But the major involvement for me came in 1993, when my Section chair, Morty Fisher, took a chance and encouraged me to co-chair RPTE’s first international conference, “The Evolving Worldwide Legal and Regulatory Climate for Securitization,” held in Brussels. Fortunately, I had the full support of my employer, GE, and a great co-chair based in Brussels at the time, Robert Paul. It was a huge success with over 200 attendees from across the world.

Still later I was asked to co-chair the RPTE special committee on in-house counsel. But my involvement didn’t end there. Currently, I am chair of the Section’s four committees that form the practice management group and I am co-chair of the communication committee’s social media subcommittee. Two years ago, the Section published an article I wrote on social media and honored me with an award from its magazine, “Probate and Property.”

Bottom line, I quickly discovered that getting involved in an ABA Section is really very, very, very easy and makes membership so much more beneficial. Becoming an active member by joining a committee, networking at national meetings, offering your services as a CLE speaker, or as an author of one of our numerous publications, is a great way to not only become an active member, but also to promote your career as an attorney as well as your law firm or company. GE understood this in my case. They said, go for it!

Of course, none of this would have been possible for me, including all the life long friends and contacts I made over the years, if I had not joined and became involved with the ABA in the first place. You can do this too, but the first step is in joining. After you join, I hope to see you at our Annual Meeting!

….and oh, I almost forgot, you don’t even have to be an attorney to join the ABA. Did you know that? Associate memberships are also available for non-attorney members. So why didn’t someone mention this to me before I took the bar exam?

…and one more thing, be sure to join our RPTE group on LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter too. See you at our next ABA meeting! I’ll be looking for you!