Effective Record Building Before the Administrative Tribunal and in any Internal Appeal 2026

The legal career of Judge Lori A. Dumas has spanned over 30 years. She served on the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas for 19 years before being elected to the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court in 2021. While on the Court of Common Pleas, she served in every major trial division and immediately prior to her election to the Commonwealth Court, she was assigned to the Civil Trial Division where she presided over civil jury and non-jury trials with an extensive caseload, including, but not limited to, Contracts, Property Disputes, Equitable Title Issues and Real Estate Transactions. Since taking her seat on the Commonwealth Court in 2022, Judge Dumas has had several of her Opinions published. She was also appointed by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court to serve on its Judicial Ethics Advisory Board. Judge Dumas is a graduate of Duke University and North Carolina Central University School of Law. She completed the Fels Institute of Government at the University of Pennsylvania, DiverseForce Board Governance Program and is also a Georgetown Fellow, specializing in Crossover Systems. Judge Dumas also holds an Executive Certificate in Diversity and Inclusion from Cornell University.

MaryAnne Wesdock was appointed to the Environmental Hearing Board by Governor Josh Shapiro in December 2023 and is based in Pittsburgh. Prior to her appointment, she served as Senior Counsel to the Board and former Chief Judge and Chairman Thomas W. Renwand. Judge Wesdock serves as the Board’s liaison to the Environmental Hearing Board Procedural Rules Committee and is a co-editor of the Board’s Practice and Procedure Manual which is relied on by practitioners before the Board. She was instrumental in developing the Pennsylvania Bar Association (PBA) Environmental and Energy Law Section Pro Bono Program. She also supervises the Board’s internship program and serves as a mentor to law students through the PBA Environmental and Energy Law Section. In 2006, Judge Wesdock was awarded the prestigious Environmental Law Lifetime Achievement Award by her peers in the PBA Environmental and Energy Law Section in recognition of her work at the Board and her contributions to the Section. Judge Wesdock is the Past Chair of both the PBA Environmental and Energy Law Section and the Allegheny County Bar Association Environmental and Energy Law Section. Prior to joining the Board, she served as Assistant Corporate Counsel to Hanover Foods, Inc. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from Indiana University of Pennsylvania, where she graduated summa cum laude as valedictorian. She received her J.D., with honors, from the University of Pittsburgh School of Law.

Administrative Law Judge William Guzy earned his undergraduate degree from Carnegie Mellon University where he studied International Relations, as well as Ethics History, and Public Policy. He earned his Juris Doctorate from the University of Pittsburgh School of Law, where he completed a specialization in civil litigation. Following law school, ALJ Guzy earned a Master of Liberal Arts (ALM) in Extension Studies in the field of Journalism from Harvard University, as well as a certificate in Negotiation and Leadership from the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School. Most recently, ALJ Guzy earned his certification in Administrative Law Adjudication Skills from the National Judicial College. ALJ Guzy began his tenure with the Bureau of Hearings and Appeals (BHA), in 2019 as a hearing officer in the Central Region of BHA . Judge Guzy promoted into the Attorney Examiner (AE) position for BHA’s Western Region in 2021, where he spent the next five years as an ALJ conducting formal hearings. While at BHA, Judge Guzy has been a member of various committees and has conducted statewide training sessions for BHA. On September 28, 2026, Judge Guzy began his new role as the Regional Manager for BHA’s newly formed Northeast Region. ALJ Guzy is a member of various professional organizations including: the National Association of Hearing Officers, the Association of Administrative Law Judges, the American bar Association, and the Pennsylvania Bar Association.

John H. Pietrzak is an Administrative Law Judge with the Office of Administrative Law Judge for the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board. He presides over administrative hearings to adjudicate citations brought by the Pennsylvania State Police, Bureau of Liquor Control Enforcement against liquor license holders for violations of the Liquor Code and various other laws. Prior to his appointment as an ALJ in 2019, John served as Assistant Counsel for the Governor’s Office of General Counsel, assigned to the PSP, Bureau of Liquor Control Enforcement for 15 years, where he prosecuted citations brought under the Liquor Code. John worked in private practice with the law firm of Reager & Adler, P.C. for five years, where he specialized in business and commercial litigation. He has been a member of the James S. Bowman American Inn of Court since 2003, serving as Inn President from 2016-2018. He earned an undergraduate degree in Sociology from Duquesne University in 1992, a JD from Widener University Commonwealth Law School in 1996 and an L.LM. in Trial Advocacy from Temple Law School in 2003.

Deb is the Chief Hearing Examiner with the PA Department of State where she oversees the adjudication of adminstrative agency cases for more than twenty different state agencies. She is recognized as an expert in Pennsylvania appellate practice and has been a CLE presenter over the years with the PBI, the Commonwealth Court and the Office of General Counsel.She has also published several scholarly articles on administrative agency law and Commonwealth Court jurisdiction.She was honored in 2017 by OGC as one of its attorneys of excellence. Her Commonwealthexperience as an attorney, which spans more than 40 years, also includes over twenty years as a law clerk and staff attorney for the Commonwealth Court and sixteen years as a litigation attorney with the Department of Corrections, focusing on Section 1983 civil rights cases and First Amendment issues. She has appeared before the Third Circuit, the Middle District of Pennsylvania, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court and the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania. She is a graduate of Alfred University and the Dickinson School of Law. In her “prior life,” Deb was high school English teacher in her beloved Warren County.

The Hon. Stella M. Tsai was elected to the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania in 2025.She previously served as a judge of the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas to which she was appointed in 2016 then elected in her own right in November 2017. Judge Tsai has served in the Family Court, Trial, and Orphans’ Court divisions of the First Judicial District. She also has served as an election court judge in primary and general elections. She was appointed to serve on the Pennsylvania Judicial Ethics Advisory Board by the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania and the Education Committee of the Pennsylvania Conference of State Trial Judges. Before joining the bench, Judge Tsai was a business litigation partner in the Philadelphia office of Archer & Greiner, PC concentrating in regulatory compliance, land use, and ethics. Judge Tsai also served as Chair of Administrative Law at the City of Philadelphia Law Department, where she managed the attorneys who represent the child welfare and social service agencies and those who handle labor and employment matters on the City’s behalf. Throughout her career, Judge Tsai has been actively involved in charitable activities and public service. Judge Tsai has also provided countless hours of pro bono representation and advocacy for low-income individuals in a wide range of matters including custody and support disputes and voting rights cases. Judge Tsai earned her B.A. in political science with honors and distinction from The Pennsylvania State University in 1985.She earned her J.D. in 1988 from the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School, where she has served as an adjunct professor and a Board member of the Penn Law Inn of Court.

Mr. Whitaker combines expertise in administrative and regulatory law with extensive litigation, trial and appellate experience, and he recently was appointed by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court to serve as pro bono counsel to represent an indigent litigant before the Court. Currently, he is Of Counsel in the Appeals and Regulatory Law Practice at HMS Legal LLP (HMS) in Harrisburg and is part of HMS’ Cannabis Law PA medical marijuana practice and its renewable energy practice, HMS Renewable Energy. He also serves as an adjunct professor of law at Widener University Commonwealth Law School. At HMS, Mr. Whitaker represents clients in a broad cross-section of matters addressing issues as varied as the constitutionality of legislation and regulations, public water suppliers and the interplay between the Pa. PUC and Pa. DEP jurisdiction, water allocations by the Susquehanna River Basin Commission, defamation, insurance licensing and 5th Amendment takings. Mr. Whitaker is the only person to have been appointed as chief counsel to both the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection and the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, and he also served on the Environmental Hearing Board Rules Committee. During his nearly 28 years of Commonwealth service, he litigated and argued complex cases at trial and on appeal before administrative tribunals and state and federal courts, prosecuted selected criminal matters as a Special Deputy Attorney General, developed expertise in Pa’s Right to Know Law, Section 1983 actions, the 11th Amendment and regulatory takings, and authored amicus briefs before the Third Circuit, the Sixth Circuit, the Pennsylvania Supreme, Superior and Commonwealth Courts and the courts of common pleas. Mr. Whitaker is the 2025 recipient of PBA’s Bowman Award, given to a lawyer making a significant impact on the practice of administrative law and demonstrating leadership in mentoring administrative law practitioners, and has been appointed to PBA’s Amicus Curiae Brief Committee. He is a past President of the Pennsylvania Bar Institute and a past chair of Administrative Law Section, was a member of the Environment and Energy Law Section Council, and frequently serves as a planner and faculty member in CLE programs. Mr. Whitaker published an article in the July 2025 PA Bar Quarterly which discusses the development of administrative agency appeals practice in Pennsylvania and highlights current issues in addressing deference to agency statutory and regulatory interpretations. His article in the Ohio Northern University Law Review, Interdisciplinary Aspects of Seminole Tribe v. Florida: Environmental Law, 23 Ohio N.Univ.L. Rev. 1441, Vol. XXIII, No. 4, 1997, discusses 11th Amendment and immunity and state sovereign immunity in the context of environmental law after the U.S. Supreme Court’s Seminole Tribe decision. Mr. Whitaker discussed the practical and the tactical uses of amicus briefs in Courts should have more friends in Pennsylvania published in the Central Penn Business Journal (Mar. 15, 2019) and in Lehigh Valley Business (Mar. 25, 2019). He has prepared CLE materials and presented on subjects including Administrative Warrants under the 4th Amendment and the PA Constitution; Hearsay and the Legal Residuum Rule; Administrative Finality; Commonwealth Court Original Jurisdiction Practice; Practice Before Administrative Tribunals; Mining Law; Attorney’s Fees in Litigation with Government Agencies; Right to Know Law; Navigability and Commonwealth Submerged Lands; Preemption of Local Ordinances by State Statutes; Development of Agency Appeals Process, Scope and Standard of Review/Deference on Appeal, Deference at the State and Federal Levels after Loper Bright, and Nationwide Injunctions After Trump v. CASA. Mr. Whitaker clerked for Commonwealth Court Judges Joseph T. Doyle, Bonnie Brigance Leadbetter and Renee Cohn Jubelirer. He received his J.D. from the Dickinson School of Law and his B.S. in Man-Environment Relations (regional planning option) from the Pennsylvania State University, and he holds a certificate in Regulatory Analysis and Decision-Making from the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School.

Attorney Daniel J. Siegel is a nationally recognized authority on legal ethics, technology, data protection, cybersecurity, civil litigation, workers’ compensation, and law-practice workflow management. He is the principal of both the Law Offices of Daniel J. Siegel, LLC and Integrated Technology Services, LLC, where he addresses the complex legal, ethical, and operational issues that frequently challenge lawyers and law firms. Dan’s practice is multifaceted. He defends attorneys in disciplinary matters, provides professional responsibility and ethics counsel, and serves as appellate counsel in high-stakes matters. He also represents individuals in estate planning, workers’ compensation, and personal injury cases, bringing a deep understanding of both trial and appellate advocacy. A leader in techno-ethics, Dan advises solo, small, and mid-sized law firms on the ethical and practical implications of technology, including cybersecurity, data protection, and the responsible use of emerging tools such as artificial intelligence. He also helps firms and businesses improve efficiency through workflow optimization and paperless office systems. Dan is the author of 16 books, a legal columnist, and a frequent national speaker on ethics, technology, and law practice management. He served as Chair of the Pennsylvania Bar Association Committee on Legal Ethics and Professional Responsibility from 2019 to 2025 and as Co-Chair of the Pennsylvania Bar Association Technology Committee from 2023 to 2025. He is currently Past-Chair of the American Bar Association’s Law Practice Division. Widely respected for combining practical experience with deep subject-matter expertise, Dan is often called upon to address the most challenging issues facing lawyers today. He can be reached at [email protected].