Eight years ago today, I wrote the following post: NAPIA annual meetings and celebrating my first public adjustment speech 30 years ago.Since NAPIA will be holding its annual meeting this week in Nashville, Tennessee, I thought of this post, noting:
It’s funny how thirty years in a career can seem to fly by. NAPIA’s 2015 Annual Meeting will be held at the Broadmoor in Colorado Springs. My first NAPIA meeting was the 1985 Annual Meeting in Carmel, California. I knew few people at that meeting except former president Ira Sarasohn, who somehow convinced NAPIA to have a young attorney give a presentation on “Proofs of Loss and Examinations Under Oath.”
; The only other attorneys in the room were public adjusters who no longer practiced law and NAPIA’a general counsel, Paul Cordish.It was not unusual for public adjusters to be former lawyers. Cordish warned them then and always warned all public adjusters not to practice law at every State of the Public Adjusting Union address he gave annually….
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In 1985 I was a very inexperienced insurance attorney. The only thing I remember about the speech was Harvey Goodman grilling me with question after question. I think he was testing me to see if I knew what I was talking about. I learned that by teaching and writing I learn much more about a subject than I would otherwise. After giving hundreds of speeches and presentations on property insurance law, I am much better for it.
I noted Brian Goodman in this morning’s post, NAPIA’S Good Shepherd. Goodman wrote a guest blog post on NAPIA in The history of NAPIA and its importance to the public adjustment profession. Paul Cordish was NAPIA’s general counsel during the growth of the profession, noted by Goodman. Goodman also noted that NAPIA honored Corish’s memory:
NAPIA has also, throughout its history, developed scholarly articles on relevant and hot button issues affecting public adaptation. We have issued white papers on UPPA, valuation and insurance terms that exclude an insured’s right to hire a public adjuster. The Cordish Competition at the University of Maryland School of Law, named in honor of my predecessor, generates each year a scholarly paper in a field relevant to public adjusters. NAPIA’s own code of ethics is contained in the model proposal and has consequently been adopted in several state laws on licenses for public regulation.
The Cordish Award website says in part:
The Paul Cordish Memorial Foundation was established in 2006 in memory of the late NAPIA Executive Director and Advisor, Paul L. Cordish, Esq., to ensure the future of the Association and the profession he nurtured and served so well. Each year, the foundation funds a prize, award or scholarship for students at the University of Maryland School of Law who successfully compete in a writing contest or other competitive process based on criteria developed in consultation with NAPIA and approved by the law school. Participants in the competition can choose any topic they want as long as it focuses on adaptation of public insurance.
To enter the contest, authors must have completed the first year of the full-time or part-time program at the University of Maryland School of Law or have been accepted as a transfer student at the time of submission. All applicants must be currently enrolled as candidates for a JD degree and in good standing at the school at the time of submission. No document previously published in any form will be considered.
Paul Cordish has a full Wikipedia biography that notes some of his interests and legal career outside of NAPIA:
After law school, in 1932, he founded the Cordish Law Firm and in 1933 joined the Baltimore-based family real estate firm Cordish Company, founded by his father Louis Cordish in 1910. Cordish Law serves as the legal arm of the Cordish Company. In 1934, Cordish was elected to the Maryland House of Delegates to represent the 4th Legislative District in Baltimore City. He became the leader of what was then called the liberal bloc. From 1940 to 1941, he was chairman of the House Committee on Intergovernmental Cooperation. He voted against the formidable lobby representing bar and saloon owners and sought to strike out the requirement that witnesses and jurors profess belief in God. From 1963 to 1966 he was president of the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society. In this position, he was able to collect $3 million from the West German government for Nazi victims of the Holocaust in Baltimore.
Paul Cordish had an important role in establishing public adaptation. His story is one that all public adjusters should know and appreciate.
Thought for an afternoon
The most beautiful things are not associated with money; they are memories and moments. If you don’t celebrate them, they may pass you by.
— Alek Wek
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