ELAN REORGANIZES IN FLORIDA

By: Stanley F. Rose
   

The Export Legal Assistance Network (ELAN) program has been reorganized in Florida under four (4) regional coordinators. Judd Kessler, the head of the ELAN program and a partner in Porter, Wright, Morris, & Arthur in Washington, D.C., announced this reorganization recently.

ELAN is a program under which lawyers from the Federal Bar Association and other interested professional associations volunteer to provide initial legal consultations free of charge to companies and individuals making their first entry into the export market. The purpose of the program is to have lawyers with knowledge of export-related matters help new exporters over the first hurdles in what may otherwise seem to be a strange and difficult area.

Each ELAN Regional Coordinator works with the U.S. Commerce Department representatives or the Small Business Administration offices in each area, or the local SCORE, Chamber of Commerce, Business Development Corporation, or Economic Development Corporation. The coordinators are available to meet with prospective exporters for an initial free consultation. In such a meeting, the businessman will generally get an indication of the key legal issues which his business needs to address in making its first export sales. The lawyer should be able to help him understand basic contractual, tax and regulatory requirements, provide an indication of priorities among them, and provide some basic information on programs of other institutions which might be helpful in getting export operations started, e.g., international department of a bank, freight forwarders, insurance companies with international experience, and other helpful government programs.

The consultation will be long enough to allow the businessman to identify the export-related legal issues related to his product or service and to demonstrate that, like other business problems, they are divisible into manageable pieces which can be resolved within a reasonable time at a foreseeable level of cost. ELAN is designed to help the exporter feel comfortable with the legal aspects of exporting.

However, the free consultation is not intended to have the lawyer draft contracts or enter into deep analyses of specific pending issues. It is intended to provide an overview and a reasonably detailed discussion of the legal problems involved in entering the export market. Even those with only dreams must have an opportunity to discuss their ideas with interested experts.

The first consultation is free and without obligation. Thereafter, the businessman can handle his affairs himself, hire the ELAN volunteer, or another attorney. That is his choice.

As professionals and as Americans, ELAN attorneys are interested in improving the U.S. balance of payments and securing the future of the United States in international trade.

Kessler announced that the regional coordinators in Florida would be:

1. FWCIAC AREA: Stanley Rose, a Naples foreign investment attorney, will be responsible for the Florida West Coast International Affairs Commission (FWCIAC) area of the counties of Collier, Lee, Charlotte, DeSoto, Sarasota, Manatee, Hillsborough, Pinellas, Pasco, Hernando, and Hardee counties. Rose will also be responsible for Monroe County and overall press relations for ELAN in Florida. Rose will be assisted in Sarasota County by Christopher K. Caswell of the law firm of Christopher K. Caswell, P.A., and in Hillsborough County by Lucius Dyal of the Tampa law firm of Shackleford, Farrior, Stallings & Evans, P.A., and Sidney W. Kilgore of the Clearwater law firm of Coton, Kilgore & Lavigne, P.A.

2. Southeast Florida: Thomas Morante of the Miami law firm of Jorden Burt Berenson will be responsible for Dade, Broward, Glades, Hendry and Palm Beach counties. In the past, Morante has been most successful of the coordinators due to, in part, Miami's international activity. He is a strong, successful member of the ELAN group. He will be assisted by George C. J. Moore, a practitioner in the international area located in West Palm Beach.

3. Central and Northwest Florida: Donna L. Draves and James R. Levigne, Orlando attorneys, will be the coordinators of the Orlando area plus all the Florida Panhandle, and the south central counties of Osceola, Polk and Highlands. They will be supported by Rosellen Kraus of the Small Business Development Center in Orlando.

4. Central East Coast and Northeast Florida: Michael Pyle, a Daytona Beach attorney, will handle all those counties from Martin and St. Lucie in the south to Nassau in the extreme north on the central and north east coast of Florida.

The ELAN coordinators, in general, have extensive international background and language skills. They are available to provide their services to companies interested in international trade, and can be reached at: