​Staff

Tom Gordon, Executive Director

Tom Gordon is one of the nation's leading experts on access to the legal system, innovation in legal services, and regulation of the legal industry. He has testified many times before state legislatures, federal administrative panels, and the American Bar Association. His commentary has been featured in national media, including the Wall Street Journal and USA Today, Tom has worked on behalf of consumers of legal services for nearly two decades, including several years as Senior Counsel and Policy Director at HALT. In 2017, Tom was named to the Fastcase 50 as one of "the law's smartest, most courageous innovators, techies, visionaries, and leaders." 

Tom received his law degree from Northwestern University School of Law and his B.A. from the University of Pennsylvania. He is admitted to practice law in Maryland and the District of Columbia.  

​Board of Directors

 Steve Crossland

Steve Crossland has been practicing law as a small-town sole practitioner for nearly 50 years. He is a 1969 graduate of Stanford University with a degree in Political Science. Lewis and Clark College, Northwestern School of Law in Oregon conferred a JD in 1973. The Washington State Supreme Court appointed Steve to Chair the Limited License Legal Technician Board in December 2012. Steve was President of the Washington State Bar Association (WSBA) in 2011 and also served on the WSBA Board of Governors from 1995-1998. In 2002 he received the Award of Merit from the WSBA, which is the highest award conferred upon a lawyer in the association. Evolving over the years, his practice now focuses on real estate, estate planning and business law. Over the past 30 years, he has served on a variety of boards, committees and task forces dealing with the unauthorized practice of law, access to justice, succession planning and related subjects

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Sonja Ebron

Sonja Ebron is chief executive and cofounder at Courtroom5, an automated legal toolbox for pro se civil litigants handling complex claims. She is a PhD electrical engineer and former college professor with a background in utilities and artificial intelligence. Sonja has represented herself in court many times and has made it a personal mission to empower others in their pro se litigation experiences. She serves on the Leaders Council of the Legal Services Corporation, the nation's primary funding source for legal aid programs. ​

Goldie Heidi Gider

Heidi is the Senior Director of Development at Young Invincibles, a national nonprofit organization headquartered in DC, whose mission is to amplify the voices of young adults in the political process and expand economic opportunity.  Prior to her work at YI, Heidi worked at Alliance for Justice as their Director of Development.  A seasoned resource development professional, Heidi previously worked at the National Women's Health Network, Equal Rights Advocates in San Francisco, as well as the Society for Women’s Health Research and the Legal Aid Society of the District of Columbia. She is a co-founder of a DC-based firm, The Rainmakers Group, which provides development services to small-to-mid-size nonprofit organizations. She has presented at the Bridge Conference, the Center for Nonprofit Success, Direct Marketing Association (DMA), and Merrill Lynch.

Richard S. Granat

Richard S. Granat is the Co-Chair of the eLawyering Task Force of the American Bar Association’s Law Practice Management Section and Founder/CEO of DirectLaw, Inc., a virtual law firm platform provider to solos and small law firms, and Founder/CEO of SmartLegalForms, Inc. Richard created the first virtual law firm in Maryland in 2003, which was the foundation for DirectLaw, Inc., and was the founder of The People’s Law Library of Maryland, a state-wide legal information resource for Maryland’s citizens. He also serves on the ABA’s Standing Committee on the Delivery of Legal Services and is a Fellow in the College of Law Practice Management.

​Richard has been involved in developing innovative legal services delivery systems for over 30 years, first as part of the initial working group that created the National Legal Services Program, then as Director of the Center for Legal Studies at Antioch Law School in Washington, D.C., the nation's first clinical law school, and later as President and Dean of the Philadelphia Institute for Paralegal Training, the nation's first paralegal school. Richard was named a "Legal Rebel" by the American Bar Association Journal in 2009, and was awarded the Louis M. Brown Lifetime Achievement Award for Innovation in the Delivery of Legal Services in 2010. In 2013, he received the American Bar Association’s James Keane Award for Excellence in eLawyering.

Josh King

​From 2007 to 2018, Josh was the Chief Legal Officer for Avvo, the web’s largest and most heavily-trafficked consumer legal destination. At Avvo, he was responsible for Avvo's legal, government relations, and customer service functions, and spoke and advocated frequently on interactive media and professional ethics issues.  Prior to joining Avvo in 2007, Josh spent over a decade in the wireless industry, in a mix of legal and non-legal roles including Vice President, Corporate Development at AT&T Wireless and General Counsel for Cellular One of San Francisco. Josh is a graduate of the University of California Hastings College of the Law and the University of Oregon.​

Fritz Mulhauser

​Fritz Mulhauser recently ended 22 years as staff attorney with the ACLU affiliate in Washington, DC, where he specialized in litigation and po​licy advocacy concerning police misconduct and law enforcement use of technology, as well as speech, assembly and due process rights of students.  With years of experience using public records access tools as part of advocacy and litigation, he serves on the board of the DC Open Government Coalition, where he co-chairs the Legal Committee and blogs for their website on Freedom of Information, open meetings, and open data issues in the government of Washington, DC.  

​As a board member of the DC Council for Court Excellence, Fritz has begun a project to make DC a leader in online access to court records.  He has been active in advocating for access to justice reforms through the DC Bar Section on Courts, Lawyers & the Administration of Justice which he chaired for several terms. Fritz earlier worked on a committee staff in the House of Representatives, led evaluation and policy research at the GAO and served on the founding staff of the U.S. National Institute of Education in the executive branch.  Fritz holds a BA from Harvard and a J.D. from Georgetown.

Chas Rampenthal

Chas Rampenthal has served as General Counsel of online legal document provider LegalZoom since 2003. Before joining LegalZoom, he was a partner at Belanger and Rampenthal, LLC, and an associate at Testa, Hurwitz & Thibeault, LLP of Boston, Massachusetts and the Los Angeles office of Thelen Reid & Priest LLP. Chas also served as an officer and aviator in the United States Navy. He is the former host of "Legally Bound," a weekly legal call-in advice talk show in Los Angeles. He received a B.S. in Economics and Math Studies from Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville and a J.D. from the University of Southern California. 

Daniel B. Rodriguez

Daniel B. Rodriguez is the Harold Washington Professor at Northwestern University and served as dean of the Law School from January 2012 through August 2018. During the 2018-19 academic year, he was a visiting professor at Stanford Law School and the Louis Brandeis visiting professor of law at Harvard Law School. Professor Rodriguez has taught full-time at a number of law schools including, the University of Texas-Austin, the University of San Diego (where he also served as dean), and at the University of California, Berkeley.
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​His scholarship and teaching spans a wide range of topics in public law, including administrative law, local government law, constitutional law, and property. He is also deeply interested in the law-business-technology interface. A graduate of California State University Long Beach and Harvard Law School, Professor Rodriguez has served as the Chair of the ABA Center for Innovation, the President of the Association of American Law Schools, and a council member of the American Law Institute.

​In Memoriam: 

 Paula Littlewood​ 

Paula was a graduate of the University of Washington School of Law and also received a master’s degree in International Studies from the UW.  She most recently served sixteen years with the Washington State Bar Association, first as the Deputy Director, and the last twelve years as Executive Director.  She received a bachelor's degree magna cum laude in political science and history at Claremont McKenna College. She studied law at the University of Washington School of Law, where she also served as editor-in-chief of the Pacific Rim Law & Policy Journal, and received her J.D. with honors in 1997. She also earned a master's degree in international studies, focusing on U.S.-Asian relations and studying Mandarin Chinese.
Littlewood served as a congressional intern at the U.S. House of Representatives, and later as a research assistant for a Member of Parliament in the English Parliament's House of Commons. She has worked as a finance director, field coordinator, and campaign coordinator for various political campaigns. She also taught English in Taiwan for two years and spent another ten months traveling in China and Southeast Asia.  After receiving her law degree, Littlewood served as an assistant dean at the University of Washington School of Law for close to five years. In 2003, Littlewood joined the WSBA as deputy director. From 2007 to 2019, she served as the Executive Director of the WSBA, an agency operating to both regulate licensed legal professionals in the state as well as provide professional support and development.  
In her volunteer service, she served as Vice President of the International Institute of Law Association Chief Executives (IILACE); she is a member of the Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System (IAALS) Board; and is a member of the Executive Committee of the University of Washington School of Law’s Leadership Council. She recently served on the ABA’s Commission on the Future of Legal Services, co-chairing its Regulatory Opportunities Subcommittee, and was a member of the ABA’s Task Force on the Future of Legal Education.