We are pleased to announce that Wayne Barkauskas Q.C., of Law Firm Wise Scheible Barkauskas, is NSRLP’s latest Access to Justice All-Star, and our first COVID-19 A2J All-Star!
Wayne has over 25 years of experience as a family lawyer. He also works as a family mediator, arbitrator and parenting coordinator.
During the COVID-19 crisis, Wayne has been keeping his followers up-to-date on COVID-19 related court cases, especially when it comes to domestic abuse, co-parenting, and unusual divorce issues. He has offered to mediate and arbitrate matters at a reduced hourly rate for those in need on a case-by-case basis, and recently took part in a legal Q & A on co-parenting during the COVID-19 crisis with PwrSwitch, a cloud-based communications tool for lawyers, parent coordinators, and individuals. You can read more about that here.
Wayne is also a board director for Sagesse, an organization dedicated to empowering individuals, organizations, and communities to break the cycle of domestic violence by curating environments to heal and develop competencies to lead safe, healthy lives. They do this through direct service, capacity building, education and advocacy. Sagesse offers REAL (Recognize Empathize AskListen) Talk workshops, guides, webinars, and resources which Wayne is a huge advocate for. REAL Talk is a guide to help people understand and talk openly about domestic violence. Wayne has been encouraging lawyers to sign up for REAL Talk training, which is not only extremely beneficial during the COVID-19 crisis, but should be used as a best practice communication tool for legal professionals at all times.
Andrea Silverstone, the Executive Director of Sagesse, had the following to say about Wayne:
“Wayne is a long-time supporter of the domestic violence sector in Calgary. We have benefited from his support and expertise for over 20 years, through serving on the Board of Directors (at one time as President) of Sagesse, offering support and information to clients who have experienced domestic violence, assisting us in developing policy papers on a variety of family law related issues and their impact on victims of domestic violence, providing collaborative trainings around mediation in cases of domestic violence, and most recently stepping forward to provide online trainings for our sector about how to address family law issues that are arising as a result of COVID-19.
Wayne’s support helps us to support our clients to better navigate the legal system. He has also helped us, as a sector, to address systemic issues that affect those impacted by domestic violence.
Wayne has used his intellect, integrity, wisdom, vision, and legal expertise to lead the agencies toward providing both systemic and individual change for individuals experiencing abuse.
Sagesse is lucky to have Wayne as a board member. Heis well respected by all of our volunteers, staff and clients. The domestic violence sector in Calgary has benefited from him openly sharing his expertise to help us to support victims of violence. Wayne is a credit to the legal profession.”
Thank you Wayne, and congratulations!
Moya McAlister, NSRLP Communications Manager