Rob Kepple
I hope that you will all take the time to read Tom Krampitz’s tribute to an Association and Foundation great, Dan Boulware. (It’s on page 10.) I met Dan when I came to TDCAA and was thrown into my first Legislative Session in 1991. There were big issues in play and many perils for prosecutors that year, but I was confident that we would come out OK because Dan, TDCAA’s president that year, had taken the lead for prosecutors at the Capitol. He was The Guy that session, and to this day we as a profession benefit from his leadership all that time ago. And when it came time to create the Foundation, Dan stepped up, took the lead, and got us started.
Dan was instrumental in the creation of the Texas Prosecutors Society. Having been a past Chair of the Texas Bar Foundation, he understood what Tom talks about: planting trees for the sake of the shade which you will not enjoy. In that spirit, Tom Krampitz has donated $250 to the Texas Prosecutors Society endowment fund in memory of Dan, and he challenges all who wish to honor Dan with a matching donation to reach $2,500. I’m already in, and I hope you will be too.
Annual Report available
The Foundation’s Annual Report for 2015 was sent to donors a few weeks ago. (If you’d like one, email the editor at sarah.wolf @tdcaa.com to request a copy, or download the PDF below.) It explains how the Foundation has been supporting TDCAA’s training efforts over the past year, thanks our donors and corporate sponsors, and goes into detail about what to expect in the year ahead.
Management training in the development phase
In March, TDCAA completed its first management retreat in Fredericksburg. This retreat, a three-day event which included presentations, discussions, and planning exercises, was facilitated by Bob Newhouse, a management consultant in Houston who understands and appreciates the challenges prosecutor offices face in guiding attorneys into the world of solid leadership and management. Bob is a lawyer, but he cut his teeth in management in the oil field business, where he experienced challenges in management similar to what prosecutors face—after all, moving an oilfield engineer into a supervisory position can be a lot like promoting a good trial lawyer into that same spot. (Just because you excel at the former doesn’t mean you know how to do the latter.)
In the next few months, the first phase of implementing our management institute will be completed. At the end of this phase, we will have interviewed and surveyed prosecutors from all around the state to identify the core training that will serve as the foundation for this curriculum. In the next phase (during the summer), we will design the curriculum and identify how best to deliver sustained training to prosecutors all over Texas. By the end of the year we intend to launch some pilot training for testing and feedback purposes. Thanks to Devon Anderson, District Attorney in Harris County, for allowing us to use her office as a pilot program and for giving us access to her staff for development and feedback. The current plan has us on schedule to launch a training course in 2017.
This is great stuff. I want to thank the Foundation Board for its vision and support, without which this effort would not be possible. If you want more details or want to get involved, just give me a call at 512/474-2436. I would love to talk with you about it.