At the American Heart Association, we know this is a busy time for all of us, so as we look forward to 2021, we want to thank the following people for being part of the 2021 Lawyers Have Heart Executive Leadership Team.
We truly could not do it without them.
While this year’s Lawyers Have Heart campaign may look different, our mission is more important than ever. Members of the ELT raise crucial funds to help fight heart disease and stroke.
This allows the American Heart Association to educate families across Greater Boston on the importance of living a healthy lifestyle, fight to ensure communities have the highest quality of care, find cures for heart disease and stroke and lessen susceptibility to other illnesses like COVID-19.
Mark Giese
Managing Director, StoneTurn
Years Volunteering with Lawyers Have Heart: 4
What made you want to get with the American Heart Association and Lawyers Have Heart?
For me it was initially really enjoying the event itself, and the next year I got involved in helping to engage other officemates to register and fundraise for the event, which I have done ever since. Given that experience, when the opportunity arose to join the Executive Leadership Committee, I thought it would be a great way to get more involved and impact a cause that I have personal connections to, as do many of my colleagues and clients in the legal profession. I’ve really enjoyed learning more about the mission and being part of the event’s growth since joining the committee.
What do you hope to accomplish this year as an Executive Leadership Committee member?
I’m looking forward to working with my colleagues to identify and positively affect a cause that aligns with both StoneTurn’s and the American Heart Association’s values. In pursuing that goal, I hope to fully engage StoneTurn’s Boston office and capitalize on our unique culture to change the Greater Boston Community in a meaningful way.
Brian Christie
Managing Director, FTI Consulting
Years Volunteering with Lawyers Have Heart: 8
What made you want to get with the American Heart Association and Lawyers Have Heart?
I know the stress of my career and believe that simple messaging around heart health is critically important. The race brings awareness to a silent killer in my line of work.
What do you hope to accomplish this year as an Executive Leadership Committee member?
Really starting to understand how the American Heart Association helps our community and make sure that message is spread loud and clear such that my contacts see the benefit of financial contributions
What excites you the most about this year’s campaign?
I believe it connects the fundraising goals and mission of Lawyers Have Heart with the community benefit. The more we give the more our community benefits.
Greg Naviloff
Partner, RSM
Years Volunteering with Lawyers Have Heart: 10
What made you want to get with the American Heart Association and Lawyers Have Heart?
Healthy lifestyles as well as more heart research targeting younger professionals.
What do you hope to accomplish this year as an Executive Leadership Committee member?
Help successfully raise funds to support the American Heart Association’s mission, particularly equity-themed initiatives.
What excites you the most about this year’s campaign?
Greater interest and involvement by others in my firm in the cause and focusing on those who need help the most.
John Rearick
Principal, Choate, Hall & Stewart
Years Volunteering with Lawyers Have Heart: 4
What made you want to get with the American Heart Association and Lawyers Have Heart?
It seemed like a fun way to get involved at my firm, support fitness and raise some money for a great cause. I did pretty well with fundraising and it snowballed from there!
What do you hope to accomplish this year as an Executive Leadership Committee member?
I’m hoping to focus our time and resources on improving health and livelihoods across the community. Showing people they can trust the systems and institutions that bring this about is another goal, and a tough one.
What excites you the most about this year’s campaign?
I’m hoping that our colleagues will be able to see and feel change happening.
Clifford V. Pascarella II
Attorney, CMBG3 Law LLC
Years Volunteering with Lawyers Have Heart: 5
What made you want to get with the American Heart Association and Lawyers Have Heart?
I first became involved with Lawyers Have Heart approximately 10 years ago when I was working for another firm located in seaport near the Blue Hills Pavilion. Through my yearly participation as a team captain, I learned a lot about the American Heart Association and the importance of Lawyers Have Heart to the AHA’s mission. For personal family reasons, I seized on opportunities to become more involved with LHH to honor my family members.
What do you hope to accomplish this year as an Executive Leadership Committee member?
I hope to promote a greater awareness of the many neighborhoods and communities in the Greater Boston area that lack access to nutritious food and help identify and resolve the problems that prevent those neighborhoods and communities from having such access.
What excites you the most about this year’s campaign?
One of the core values of my firm is community mindedness. Accordingly, my firm is involved in many charitable and pro bono causes. Lawyers Have Heart lends well with the holistic approach that my firm takes regarding its core value of community mindedness. It excites me thinking of the potential for collaboration between the American Heart Association and my firm in this regard.
Rob Sparkes
Partner, K&L Gates LLP
Years Volunteering with Lawyers Have Heart: 6
What made you want to get with the American Heart Association and Lawyers Have Heart?
My participation in Lawyers Have Heart started in 2010, when I served as captain of the K&L Gates team. The team that year was small, and I am not sure we raised much, if any, money (although we did have three people finish in the top 10 of the race that year!).
I served as a team captain in 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014, and I quickly fell in love with the event. As a runner, involvement in a lawyer-based road race was a natural fit for me, and the event quickly became a popular event within the firm.
Each year my recruitment and fundraising participation increased as the K&L Gates team grew. Then, in August 2014, my uncle, Steve Howard, passed away suddenly of a heart attack at age 53. Steve was an attorney at Nutter McLellan & Fish at the time of his death. Steve was also an active athlete and in better shape than most 53-year-olds. It was a real shock for me and my family.
Shortly after Steve’s passing, Josh Coller (then the chairman of the Captains Committee) reached out and invited me to join the Captains Committee. It was an easy decision for me. I knew I loved the event (as did many at K&L Gates) and with Steve’s passing, the American Heart Association’s mission took on a very important place in my heart. Once I began working with the then-small Captains Committee, I was hooked. Everyone involved in Lawyers Have Heart, from the AHA team to the volunteers, are great people with whom I feel fortunate to get to work. For that reason, I am grateful for the opportunity to support a great organization with a critical mission and do so with people whom I consider friends.
What do you hope to accomplish this year as an Executive Leadership Committee member?
My primary goal is to help the American Heart Association promote health equity in the Greater Boston community. Over the past several months, I have become much more aware of the social determinates of health and the lack of opportunities that many in our community have to receive the most basic of services, like competent health care, access to healthy food and awareness of resources and information. My wife is a nurse practitioner that works with vulnerable populations and the COVID-19 pandemic has really highlighted these disparities, as many people do not have access to technology, WiFi, and other resources to engage in virtual medical appointments.
For many of us, the advent of virtual health care has been a real revelation that allows us to continue to get care without taking unnecessary risks. However, for many, many others in our community, that type of care just is not available to them and, as a result, they go without basic, potentially life-saving screenings and other somewhat routine checkups. Similarly, many people in our community do not have the information, knowledge or resources to afford and pursue healthy lifestyle choices, in terms of nutrition, food, exercise, and other things that many of us take for granted.
I think the best way for me to help support the AHA’s health equity initiatives is to continue to work on expanding our participant numbers and, more critically, the number of participants that donate. I believe that by spreading the message, focusing on what each donation can do for people in the community, and really hitting hard that this isn’t a one-day event but a year-long effort to help people in tangible and critical ways, we can driving the participation and fundraising numbers up in 2021.
What excites you the most about this year’s campaign?
I think my long-winded answer from number 3 probably covers this question too. Suffice it to say that Lawyers Have Heart’s specific focus on health equity, social determinates of health and working to alleviate the struggles of more vulnerable populations in the Greater Boston Community is a priority that both my wife and I think is of critical importance. I think it’s a focus and a message that most of our LHH participants can probably get behind and affirmatively want to support through active fundraising and personal donations. The current pandemic has laid bare so many of the inequalities in society, both locally and nationally, that I think this focus will resonate and be a strong vehicle to encourage participation, fundraising and hopefully more year-round engagement from the race participants.
Grace Roessler
Associate, Mirick O’Connell
Years Volunteering with Lawyers Have Heart: 1
What made you want to get with the American Heart Association and Lawyers Have Heart?
I believe health should be a No. 1 priority for individuals, especially lawyers.
What do you hope to accomplish this year as an Executive Leadership Committee member?
I want to spread awareness in our communities about the importance of health and the inequality of good health in the Greater Boston area.
What excites you the most about this year’s campaign?
When I saw that the average lifespan of someone living in the South End was significantly higher than someone in Dorchester/Mattapan/Roxbury, it moved me. It shows that there are major discrepancies in health/lifestyle within our small city, and our new focus on equity will assist to level the playing field of health and wellness.