Each year, the Association of Corporate Counsel’s Houston Chapter and The Texas Lawbook honor corporate in-house counsel who are true role models for improving the legal profession from the inside and out.
Today, ACC Houston and The Lawbook announce that there are three finalists for the 2021 Houston Corporate Counsel Award for Achievement in Diversity and Inclusion and one finalist for Achievement in Pro Bono and Public Service.
The sole recipient – and thus the winner – of the Pro Bono and Public Service Award goes to CenterPoint General Counsel Monica Karuturi and Jason Ryan, who is senior vice president of regulatory services and governmental affairs at Houston-based CenterPoint.
Together, Karuturi and Ryan have been aggressive supporters of legal services for the poor, military veterans and those who normally do not have access to legal services because it is too expensive. As corporate leaders at one of Houston’s most important and influential companies, they have demonstrated over and over their commitment to access to justice for all in Texas.
The three finalists for Achievement in Diversity and Inclusion have also let their actions speak louder than words in diligently pushing the legal profession to be more inclusive. The three finalists are:
Carolyn Benton Aiman, general counsel at Sempra Energy;
Cydonii Fairfax, general counsel at Houston METRO Transit; and
Christallyn Williams, senior counsel at MilliporeSigma.
“The three finalists for the diversity honor, Carolyn, Cydonii and Christallyn, and Monica and Jason at CenterPoint are prime examples of the good that corporate in-house counsel can achieve,” said Exxon Mobil senior counsel Joseph Yao, who is president-elect of the ACC Houston Chapter. “All of these finalists for the 2021 Houston Corporate Counsel Awards deserve to be honored and to have their stories told.”
Later this week, The Texas Lawbook will announce the finalists for Business Litigation of the Year, Rookie of the Year and the 2021 recipient of the Houston Corporate Counsel’s Lifetime Achievement Award.
ACC Houston and The Lawbook previously announced the finalists for the following awards:
The three finalists for General Counsel of the Year for a Small Legal Department (1-5 lawyers) are:
Andy Wright of Talen Energy;
David Rassin of SAExploration; and
Sarah Hurt of Jefferson Energy.
There are two finalists for General Counsel of the Year for a Midsized Legal Department (6-20 lawyers) and they are:
Charlotte Rasche of Prosperity Bank
Matt Zmigrosky of Diamondback Energy
The two finalists for Senior Counsel of the Year of a Large Legal Department (21 lawyers or more) are:
Chevron Corporation Managing Counsel Siva Barnwell Adams; and
Exxon Mobil Senior Counsel Tom Sikora.
The sole finalist – and thus the recipient – of the Houston Senior Counsel of the Year for Midsized Legal Department (6-20 lawyers) is Enterprise Products Assistant General Counsel Charlie San Miguel.
In the category of Houston Senior Counsel of the Year Award for a Small Legal Department (five lawyers or fewer), the winner is former Southern Company Assistant General Counsel Kathryn McCoy, who is now an assistant GC at Williams Company.
The finalists for the 2021 Houston Corporate Counsel Award for Transaction of the Year are:
LyondellBasell Associate General Counsel Andy Gratz; and
EP Energy General Counsel Jace Locke.
The Texas Lawbook’s partnership with the Houston Chapter of ACC, which is now four years old, is an important part of The Lawbook’s mission to cover business lawyers and business legal trends in Texas, according to Lawbook publisher Brooks Igo.
“Our partnership with ACC Houston is a critical element in The Lawbook’s goal of providing insight into the practice of corporate law in Texas,” Igo said. “ACC Houston has more than 1,000 corporate in-house counsel as members, and it is the influential voice for business lawyers who work in-house in South Texas.
“The Lawbook team relies heavily on advice and support from the members and leaders of ACC Houston and its sister organization, the DFW Chapter of the Association of Corporate Counsel, for helping us to identify the lawyers and issues we should be covering,” Igo said.
The Texas Lawbook will publish in-depth profiles of each of the finalists over the next two months.
The Houston Chapter of the Association of Corporate Counsel and The Texas Lawbook usually announce the Houston Corporate Counsel Award finalists and honor the winners in the spring of each year, but this year’s awards event was delayed and rescheduled to Jan. 13 because of the Covid-19 pandemic. The awards event will take place at the Four Seasons Hotel in downtown Houston.
ACC Houston and The Lawbook received more than 80 nominations for the 14 categories. We employed a team of in-house counsel and outside lawyers to review the nominations and select those that were worthy of being honored.
“It has been the distinct pleasure of ACC Houston to partner with Texas Lawbook on this very important recognition of the Houston area’s finest in-house counsel,” Yao said. “I was surprised by the number of nominees, impressed by the quality of the Finalists and amazed by their accomplishments in a year that was so challenging for all of us.”
The net income generated by the Houston Corporate Counsel Awards goes to two incredibly important causes: ACC Houston’s public school outreach program called Street Law and The Texas Lawbook’s funding of a full-time lawyer/journalist to write about pro bono, public service, diversity and inclusion in the legal profession in Texas.
Publisher’s Note: For more information about the Houston Corporate Counsel Awards, including sponsorship/ticket purchases, please contact Brooks Igo at brooks.igo@texaslawbook.net.