The Academy of Special Needs Planners (ASNP) hosted its 2010 Annual Meeting in Charleston, South Carolina March 18-20, 2010. More than 100 special needs attorneys participated as well as nine exhibitors. MassMutual Financial Group was the program sponsor.
The timing of the ASNP 2010 conference was historically significant. It followed by less than one month NAELA's Special Needs Summit and occurred just days prior to enactment of United States Health Care Reform (Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act) on March 23, 2010.
Topics and Speakers
- "Living with Autism" study - Joanne Gruszkos introduced a new study about autism, conducted by Easter Seals with sponsorship from MassMutual. The study addresses family issues and challenges related to life care planning for autistic individuals.
- Special needs trusts - Professor Jeffrey Pennell deconstructed a typical third party special needs trust from a tax and trust attorney perspective, then joined a panel including special needs attorneys Michele Fuller and Kevin Urbatsch to reconstruct the same trust from a more holistic viewpoint. Evan Krame discussed how to fix trusts to make them qualify for special needs purposes and also offered guidance in using pooled trusts. Krame's handout materials included a useful guide titled "25 Questions to Evaluate Pooled Trusts".
- SSI and SSDI Updates - David Lillesand summarized developments impacting Social Security including extensive and valuable reference materials featuring charts, diagrams and recent regulatory rulings.
- Marketing for Special Needs Attorneys - Harry Margolis and Vincent Russo discussed traditional and non-traditional methods for special needs attorneys to market their expertise. Margolis' non-traditional analysis complemented an earlier NAELA webinar by ASNP COO Mark Miller. Margolis provided an introductory overview of web 2.0 including recommendations about specific social networking tools.
- IRC 468B Qualified Settlement Funds - Jason Lazarus re-introduced QSFs emphasizing practical applications as well as expanding professional opportunities for special needs attorneys in settlement planning. Lazarus addressed current political issues impacting the use of QSFs in single claimant cases.
- Special Needs Advocacy and Litigation - Patricia Harrison spoke generally and summarized historically federal and state based special needs litigation. Saundra Gumerove spoke more specifically about special education advocacy and litigation.
- Additional topics - Sanford Mall spoke about Military and Veterans benefits as increasingly important for special needs planning. Mall separately addressed how to obtain and coordinate funding for healthcare. Dr. Harriett Mall discussed the psychology of poverty.
Congratulations to ASNP 2010 program co-chairs Frank Johns and Franchelle Millender for continuing ASNP's high standard of educational excellence. In addition to interesting topics and speakers and valuable handout materials, ASNP conferences are also characterized by their well-qualified attendees and informative exhibitors with whom ASNP provides substantial opportunities for interaction.
Prior S2KM blog posts about the Academy of Special Needs Planners (ASNP) - which are also accessible on S2KM's structured settlement wiki:
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