Ms. Buck is the executive director of SeniorLAW Center and serves as the Center’s CEO responsible for the organization’s achievement of its mission, its financial stability, and overall supervision of the Center’s staff of attorneys, legal assistants, volunteers and support staff. Ms. Buck earned her law degree from Villanova University School of Law, where she served as chair of the Moot Court Board, and is a proud graduate of the Bryn Mawr Nonprofit Executive Leadership Institute program and the Pennsylvania State University, where she was among the first graduates of the University Scholars Program (now Schreyer Honors College), with a senior thesis on 18th century English literature. Prior to joining SeniorLAW Center in 1997, Ms. Buck was in private practice, focusing on complex commercial litigation and representing children, individuals and families as a pro bono attorney. Ms. Buck has over 25 years of nonprofit leadership and advocacy experience, as an executive director, board member, volunteer attorney, child advocate and mentor, and teacher of English as a Second Language to adult immigrants and refugees. Ms. Buck is passionate about equal access to justice for the poor and vulnerable communities. She has proudly served in many leadership positions promoting access to justice, including as member of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court’s Advisory Council on Elder Justice and its Elder Law Task Force, the ABA Commission on Law and Aging, co-chair of the Delivery of Legal Services Committee of the Philadelphia Bar Association, and chair of the National Association of Senior Legal Hotlines and Helplines, promoting senior legal services across the U.S. During her tenure at SeniorLAW Center, she has led the launch of new programs for senior veterans, victims of domestic violence, abuse and exploitation, older homeowners and tenants, and the statewide SeniorLAW HelpLine, increasing the Center’s budget from less than $400,000 to over $5 million. She serves on many local, statewide and national boards and coalitions addressing poverty, justice, aging, voting and civil rights and advocates to pursues systemic change in these areas, including testifying before the U.S. Senate. She is recipient of several honors including the Andrew Hamilton Award from the Philadelphia Bar Association, the Alumni Association Award for Public Service from Villanova Law School, a Distinguished Child Advocate Award from the Support Center for Child Advocates, and the Philadelphia Bar Foundation Award for public interest lawyering. She was awarded the Independence Foundation Senior Attorney Fellowship Sabbatical and traveled to Iceland, Japan, Australia and New Zealand to learn and share about elder justice, poverty and access to justice issues from a global perspective.

Mr. Feldman holds B.A. (1974) and J.D. (1981) degrees from Temple University. Recognized both locally and nationally as a leading authority on planning and health care for the elderly, he practices law in the Philadelphia area firm of Feldman & Feldman. He served as an Adjunct Professor of Law at Temple University, Beasley School of Law from 2000 through 2015. He has been appointed as a Special Assistant Attorney General for the state of North Dakota to represent its Department of Human Services in the appeal of Geston v. Anderson, reported at 729 F.3d 1077 (8th Cir. 2013), and he is the former Executive Director of the Senior Citizens Judicare Project (now the Senior Law Center), a program established by the Philadelphia Bar Association. Mr. Feldman currently serves on the Board of Directors of the Federation Housing, Inc. of Philadelphia. He has served on the Advisory Panel for the National Institute on Aging’s Alzheimer’s Disease Education and Referral Center (ADEAR), the Board of Directors of the Senior Law Center, where he served as Chair and Secretary, the Alzheimer’s Association of Delaware Valley, where he served as Vice President. He previously served as President of the Board of Directors of the Alzheimer’s Association of Southeast Pennsylvania, and as Treasurer of the Board of Directors of Community Legal Services. He also formerly served on the Board of Directors of the Center for Advocacy for the Rights and Interests of the Elderly (CARIE) and the Long Term Care Advisory Board of the Philadelphia Corporation for Aging (PCA), the Philadelphia Area Agency on Aging. Mr. Feldman was the first chair of the Philadelphia Task Force on Elder Abuse and a draftor of the Pennsylvania Protection of the Elderly Act. Significant litigation as lead counsel includes: Lewis v. Richman, et al., 501 F. Supp.2d 671 (E.D. Pa. 2007) (Motion to Dismiss); Lewis v. Alexander, 276 F.R.D. 421 (E.D. Pa. 2011) (Merits) aff’d in part and rev’d in part, 685 F. 3d 325 (3d Cir. 2012), cert. denied 133 S. Ct. 933 (2013); Wagner v. Fair Acres, 49 F.3d 1002 (3rd Cir. 1995); Cleary v. Waldman, 959 F. Supp. 222 (D.N.J. 1997), aff’d. 167 F. 3d 801 (3d. Cir. 1999), cert. denied 528 U.S. 870 (1999); Hurly v. Houstoun, et al., Civ. Action No. 93-3666 (E.D. Pa.); Chalfin v. Beverly Enterprises, 745 F. Supp. 1117 (E.D. PA 1990); Buck v. Com., Dept. of Public Welfare, 566 A.2d 1269 (Cmwlth. Ct. 1989).

Valerie L. Snow, Esquire is a Staff Attorney at SeniorLAW Center, where she leads the “Access to Justice in Guardianship” project. She was selected as a 2020-2022 Independence Foundation Public Interest Law Fellow and as a 2022-2024 Borchard Foundation Center on Law & Aging Fellow, and is grateful to the Foundations for supporting her work at SeniorLAW Center.  In addition to policy advocacy and community education, the Access to Justice in Guardianship project provides legal advice through the statewide SeniorLAW Helpline (1-877-727-7529) and direct representation—including representation for older adults facing or under guardianship in the Philadelphia Orphans’ Court. Valerie also serves as a member of the First Judicial District’s Elder Justice Committee and as the Community Service Liaison for the Philadelphia Bar Association’s Probate and Trust Law Section. She is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School and Haverford College.

Dr. Emily Largent is the Emanuel and Robert Hart Assistant Professor of Medical Ethics and Health Policy at the University of Pennsylvania. She holds a secondary appointment at Penn Law and is a Senior Fellow at the Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics. Dr. Largent is co-leader of the Penn Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center’s Outreach, Recruitment, and Engagement Core. Her work focuses on improving the wellbeing of the millions of persons at risk for or living with Alzheimer’s disease and their caregivers. Dr. Largent seeks to support individuals and caregivers across the Alzheimer’s trajectory through her work on biomarker disclosure, dementia-friendly social policy, and supported decision making. Additionally, Dr. Largent’s scholarship addresses ethical and regulatory oversight issues in Alzheimer’s disease research and aims to reduce barriers to research participation and improve the experiences of participants and their study partners. Dr. Largent received her doctor of philosophy in health policy from Harvard University and her juris doctor degree from Harvard Law School. Prior to that, she received her bachelor’s of science in nursing from the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing and completed a fellowship in the Department of Bioethics at the National Institutes of Health.

David Godfrey JD, is Director of the ABA Commission on Law and Aging in Washington DC. He is responsible for the managing the research, training, and policy work of the Commission. Prior to joining the Commission, he was responsible for elder law programming at the Access to Justice Foundation in Kentucky. Mr. Godfrey earned his B.A. with honors at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida, and his J.D. cum laude from the University of Louisville School Of Law in Kentucky. He served on the board of the National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys – and was named a Fellow of the Academy in 2019. 

Judge Murphy has been serving the Court of Common Pleas in Montgomery County since January 2010 and succeeded the Honorable Stanley R. Ott as Administrative Judge of the Orphans’ Court Division in January 2015. The Orphans’ Court Division approves adoptions and hears a wide variety of matters including terminations of parental rights, guardianships, will contests, trust and estate matters, and matters related to minor’s estates and non-profits. Judge Murphy is a member of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court’s Advisory Council on Elder Justice in the Courts and serves as the chair of the Orphans’ Court Section of the Pennsylvania Conference of State Trial Judges. Judge Murphy graduated from Harvard College in 1984, magna cum laude and Harvard Law School in 1987, cum laude. Judge Murphy served as a law clerk to the Honorable George C. Pratt of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, then served as a trial and appellate litigator in the Civil Division of the United States Department of Justice, and then as in-house counsel to a national non-profit organization advocating for women’s rights. Judge Murphy practiced law at Morgan Lewis in Philadelphia and at Heckscher, Teillon, Terrill & Sager, in West Conshohocken, Pennsylvania. She is a frequent lecturer on topics including guardianships, access of justice for older adults, end of life decisions, Orphans’ Court practice and procedure, and the Pennsylvania Uniform Trusts Act.