by Robert M. Paolini, Esq.
PRESIDENT’S COLUMN Interview with Amber Barber
On July 31st this year, VBA Executive Director Bob Paolini sat down with incoming VBA president
Amber Barber at the Downs Rachlin Martin offices in Burlington.
Bob Paolini: I am with Amber Barber, who, by the time our members read this, will be the president of the Vermont Bar Association. Welcome Amber, and thanks for doing this. As I was driving here today, I realized that the first time I did this was 1999, just before John Eggleston became president. I have been doing it every year since then with incoming VBA presidents, just as an opportunity for you and I to have a conversation so members in other parts of the state that don’t practice near or with or against you will get to know a little more about you. We have already said that we are here at DRM. How long have you been part of this firm? Amber Barber: Our practice
group
merged with them in 2004. BP: What do you mean by our practice
group? AB: I was with another firm, Schoenberg & Associates. We became the Downs Rach- lin Martin Family Law Group at the time.
BP: So let’s go back to the beginning, I know you are a native Vermonter, right? AB: Yes. I am from West Dover, Vermont, which is in the Mount Snow area. I grew up down there and graduated from Wilm- ington High School. For a brief moment, I thought the grass was greener on the oth- er side, so I decided I needed to leave Ver- mont and explore something new. I went to St. Lawrence University in New York, and then to Albany Law School.
BP: You practiced in NY for a while,
didn’t you? AB: I actually spent time as a law clerk
there, during law school. I worked in a number of areas of the law, including the Albany County District Attorney’s office as a clerk for a while, then I started working for a family law practitioner, and that is how I began my career in family law.
BP: But you are admitted in New York? AB: Yes, but as soon as law school was done, I decided I wanted to relocate to Washington DC. I went down there, and I became admitted in Maryland and started practicing in a litigation firm in Bethesda,
www.vtbar.org
MD, which is right outside of DC. I learned a lot about litigation and thought it was a really great experience.
BP: Litigation. You mean something oth- er than family law? AB: Other than family law. Everything but family law: wetlands regulations, UCC article 2, sales and leases, contracts, signif- icant medical malpractice cases. We were doing a lot of large-scale litigation. That was a really good learning year, or year and a half. Then I realized that I really didn’t want to live in the city, and I didn’t want to live out of Vermont. I realized the grass re- ally wasn’t greener so I decided to return to Vermont. That’s when I found out that Vermont had a three-month clerkship rule.
BP: Did you have to take another bar
exam? AB: At the time, I had to take the Ver-
mont portion of the exam. So I did that, I did my clerkship, and I started practicing family law in Vermont with Schoenberg and Associates.
BP: Give me a time frame for that. When was that, you said you merged here in 2004? AB: I came back and took the Vermont portion of the bar exam in 1998 … well, I was admitted in 1998, so I may have taken the exam in late 1997, but there was a pe- riod before the next swearing in. I had al- ready been doing my clerkship while I was awaiting the results. I started working for Schoenberg & Associates having known Debra from when I was working in the Al- bany area. She was practicing in Saratoga, New York, at that time. When I needed a clerkship, I called her up and told her she should hire me, and she agreed.
BP: So you came back and were doing
pretty much family law exclusively? AB: Yes.
BP: Since that time? AB: Since 1997 when my clerkship be-
gan. BP: So let’s talk about family law before THE VERMONT BAR JOURNAL • FALL 2012
we talk about the VBA stuff. You have been doing family law in Vermont for fifteen years, all since the family court was creat- ed in 1990. AB: Yes.
BP: How have you seen things change in the fifteen years that you have been active in the family court? AB: They have changed quite dramat-
ically during the time that I have been in practice here. Primarily, there are more and more pro se litigants; about 80% of the litigants are pro se now. There is a good chance that you will have someone that represents themselves on the other side of your case now, which was not as usual in the earlier years of my practice. More and more pro se litigants are using the judiciary website and the forms. Many decide that because of the cost of litigation they will represent themselves even though the pro- cess can be very emotional and difficult— and they don’t always do it successfully. It can be a tough area of law to represent yourself because there are high emotions, and it can be very difficult in those situa- tions to advocate for yourself or to negoti- ate a resolution.
BP: How does that affect your side of the case when you are representing someone? AB: Well, it affects my side in a number of ways. One problem is figuring out how to work with somebody who is pro se and does not necessarily know the law when you cannot give them legal advice. I try to be very conscientious that they may not un- derstand what I am saying, so I try to be very straightforward about what I am pro- posing to them or what I am requesting of them. I do most, if not everything, in writ- ing, so they have the opportunity to look it over and digest it and hopefully reach out to an attorney, and ask questions, or at least have an opportunity to really go over it. Also, mediation has been really helpful in a lot of those cases, because if you can get in and have a mediator working with
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