Honoring Dana Breslin's Decades of Board Service
This year, we are proud to honor Dana M. Breslin for her extraordinary commitment and service to our organization. Dana served on PHLP’s Board of Directors for more than 30 years before stepping down earlier this year. Since PHLP’s founding, Dana has played an instrumental role in the development of our organization and in shaping the vision and direction of our work through the years.
From the very beginning, Dana brought a wealth of experience, a passion for PHLP’s mission, and a deep understanding of the impact our work has on the community. A graduate of Villanova University School of Law, Dana began her career in 1975 at Delaware County Legal Assistance Association (DCLAA). She was hired to establish the Senior Citizens’ Project, wherein she contracted with Delaware County’s Area Agency on Aging to train retired volunteer attorneys to go out into the community to assist older adults with legal questions. Dana’s innovative work became the model for other legal services programs across the state. She was the first attorney within the Legal Services Network (now the Pennsylvania Legal Aid Network) to manage an Elder Law unit. In the course of her work on the Senior Citizens’ Project, Dana trained more than 50 volunteer attorneys and reached more than 20 community sites. In 1978, Dana brought Mike Campbell, PHLP’s eventual co-founder, to DCLAA as a Vista Volunteer Attorney. As part of her practice, Dana regularly represented nursing home residents, giving them a voice in cases involving reductions of care or relocation due to facility closure.
In the early 1980s, when Ann Torregrossa (another eventual PHLP co-founder) took over as DCLAA’s Director, Dana supported the program’s efforts to increase its health law work in cooperation with the Bucks County Legal Aid Society where David Gates and Nancy Schuster were working at the time under David Tilove. In particular, Dana helped brainstorm and develop the federal class action lawsuit Troutman v. Cohen, 661 F. Supp. 802 (E.D. Pa. 1987), which successfully challenged state efforts to reduce institutional nursing care to older adults.
Later, when Mike Campbell, Ann Torregrossa, and David Gates decided to take the leap and establish PHLP as a nonprofit public interest law firm, they asked their long-time friend and colleague Dana to serve on PHLP’s first Board of Directors. At that time, Dana was in private practice at her Delaware county-based law firm Pappano and Breslin—now Breslin Murphy & Roberts—and a rising star in Pennsylvania’s Elder Law Bar (she later went on to serve as Chair of the Elder Law Section of the Pennsylvania Bar Association.) Always generous with her time despite the demands of running a law practice and raising two daughters, Dana agreed to serve as the first Vice President of PHLP’s board. She joined Mark Schwartz of Regional Housing Legal Services, who was then incorporator and President of PHLP’s Board, and Steve Frankino, Dean of Villanova University School of Law and Secretary-Treasurer of the Board.
In 1996, Dana became one of the first ever attorneys in Pennsylvania to become a Certified Elder Law Attorney by the National Elder Law Foundation. She helped develop the Pennsylvania Chapter of the National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys, helping Pennsylvania’s Elder Bar to quickly respond to pending state legislation and work to amplify the voices of older adults.
During Dana’s decades-long service on PHLP’s board, she remained a voice of encouragement and practical wisdom for PHLP leadership and staff on matters such as fundraising and case priorities. She was a legal resource for attorneys and paralegals on staff on a wide range of health law issues involving older adults. At board meetings, which she very rarely missed in all her tenure, Dana was laser focused on two main issues: (i) how to maximize PHLP’s limited resources to best meet client needs; and (ii) how to support, grow, and retain an excellent staff of attorneys, paralegals, and administrators.
As Dana concludes this remarkable chapter of her tenure on PHLP’s Board, we wish to extend our deepest gratitude for the countless hours, thoughtful leadership, and vision she has generously given to help shape PHLP into the organization that it has become. Thank you, Dana, for an extraordinary 30+ years of leadership and dedication. Your impact will be felt for decades more.
With deepest appreciation,
PHLP’s Board of Directors, Leadership, and Staff
A special thank you to PHLP's Board of Directors, especially Mike Campbell, for assisting with this tribute.
