From the April 24, 2001 Women's Bar Association Press Release:

WBA GIVES PRO BONO AWARD TO ATTORNEYS GAIL E. HOROWITZ AND ELLEN K. WADE

Boston, MA -- Elder law attorneys Gail E. Horowitz and Ellen K. Wade of the Brookline law firm of Wade & Horowitz LLC are this year's recipients of the Women's Bar Association and Women's Bar Foundation Pro Bono Award. As founding Co-Chairs of the Elder Law Project, Attorneys Horowitz and Wade have been instrumental in launching a unique effort to provide free legal services to low income elders in their own communities in the areas of simple wills, durable powers of attorney, health care proxies and homestead declarations. Until the advent of the Elder Law Project, which is administered by the Women's Bar Foundation (WBF), these on site services were unavailable to elders who were without the resources to pay a private attorney.

Attorneys Wade and Horowitz enlisted the assistance of the Councils on Aging in Brookline, Cambridge and Quincy, and through their auspices, provided services to over 65 clients in the Project's first year of operation. The Elder Law Project has trained volunteer attorneys who leave their private practices at large law firms or small practices to visit the local communities - at Senior Centers, Elderly Housing and at Quincy City Hall - in order to meet with the elder clients. Due to the outpouring of demand for these services, the project is expected to expand its service area to other local communities, including Boston itself, in the upcoming year. Tremendous support for the Elder Law Project has also been provided by Greater Boston Legal Services, the Attorney General's Office and the law firms of Goodwin Procter and Ropes & Gray.

The 2001 Pro Bono Award was given at the Annual Meeting of the Women's Bar Association on April 24, 2001 at the Boston Copley Marriott. Special thanks were given to representatives of the Brookline, Cambridge and Quincy Councils on Aging.

The WBA was established in 1978 and currently has more than 1100 members, making it one of the oldest and largest associations of women attorneys in the country. The WBF was organized in 1993 as a tax-exempt organization to implement the charitable and educational goals of the WBA. The WBA and WBF are committed to the full and equal participation of women in the legal profession and in a just society. To that end, the WBA focuses on legislative and social policy-making in Massachusetts, and on providing access to justice for indigent women and children through the WBF's pro bono programs.