Andrew Kissner Wins 2023 Kathi Pugh Pro Bono Service Award

Andrew Kissner is the 2023 recipient of Morrison Foerster’s Kathi Pugh Pro Bono Service Award.

Andrew is an of counsel in the firm’s New York Business Restructuring and Insolvency Group and has made pro bono an integral part of his legal career since he started as a summer associate in 2015.

Andrew’s pro bono service began with assisting in the firm’s “debtors’ prison” case challenging gratuitous fines and fees that were imposed on impoverished litigants by the Arkansas court that handled all bounced check cases for the Little Rock area. He later leveraged his Spanish language skills to respond to the Trump administration’s family separation policy by representing a father who sought to be reunited with his son after they were separated at the border. Andrew represented the father in preparing for a credible fear interview and applying for asylum.

Andrew has applied his bankruptcy skills to creating a new area of pro bono practice involving collaborating with legal services lawyers when their cases with low-income clients are tangled in increasingly complex bankruptcy proceedings. Andrew’s dedication to these clients and his creativity have led to important successes in ensuring that the protections afforded by the bankruptcy system do not swallow up important legal rights of those affected by a debtor’s wrongful actions.

He assisted a Brooklyn resident who developed disabilities that required her to use a wheeled walker or cane, making it difficult to navigate to her fourth-floor apartment. She worked with Legal Services NYC (LSNYC) to request a reasonable accommodation for a lower-floor apartment, which went unanswered for years and then the building owner filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Andrew represented the woman, intervened in the bankruptcy case, and won the owner’s agreement to provide her a newly renovated ground-floor apartment at her current rent.

The New York Bar Association recognized Andrew with the President’s Pro Bono Service Award in the First Judicial District, recognizing his dedication and skill in providing pro bono legal services. Andrew was also invited to speak on a panel about pro bono at the National Conference of Bankruptcy Judges 2023 meeting, an honor for him as well as for the firm.

“I’m grateful for the firm’s unwavering support of my pro bono practice and to be recognized with the Kathi Pugh Award,” said Andrew. “The work I have done since the onset of the pandemic on behalf of low-income tenants alongside LSNYC has been among the most gratifying and rewarding of my career.”

The winner of the Kathi Pugh Pro Bono Service Award has the opportunity to direct a $10,000 contribution to a legal services organization of their choice, jointly funded by Morrison Foerster and The Morrison Foerster Foundation. Andrew has chosen Legal Services NYC to receive this contribution. Legal Services NYC is comprised of nearly 600 dedicated staff members who deliver legal services to low-income New Yorkers, including preventing foreclosures, securing safe environments and financial stability for victims of domestic violence and their children, and working to stabilize immigrant and other families.

“Legal Services NYC is tremendously grateful for this generous donation and for our ongoing partnership with Morrison Foerster,” said Matthew Latterner, a senior housing attorney at Legal Services NYC. “Morrison Foerster has been instrumental in helping our clients, recently representing tenants in bankruptcy court after one of the worst landlords in New York City declared bankruptcy. The team, led by Andrew, won these tenants hundreds of repairs, recovered their stolen security deposits, and obtained over $1 million in financial relief – much of which would have been impossible (or taken years) in another forum. We are so thankful to Andrew for choosing Legal Services NYC to receive this donation and to Morrison Foerster for their continued support of our work.”

This is the 10th annual Kathi Pugh Pro Bono Service Award. The firm’s prior honorees include San Francisco associate Camila Tapernoux, Washington, D.C. associate Chris Gloria, New York of counsel Tushna Gamadia, London associate Mercedes Samavi, New York of counsel Adam Hunt, Washington, D.C. partner Natalie Fleming Nolen, San Francisco partner Alfredo Silva, and former MoFo attorneys Christian Andreu-von Euw and Ruth Borenstein.

The Kathi Pugh Pro Bono Service Award was established by MoFo in 2013, when Kathi Pugh retired after two decades of running the firm’s pro bono program. It recognizes the values, enthusiasm, and compassion that Kathi brought to the pro bono program and celebrates the remarkable ways that lawyers like Andrew proudly carry out Kathi’s pro bono legacy.