LGBT

© 2008 Law Office of Joyce Kauffman

Website Design by Annie Weatherwax

231 Third Street, Cambridge, MA 02142 Telephone: 617-577-1505 Facsimile: 617-577-1012 admin@kauffmanlaw.net

Attorney Kauffman has been in the forefront of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender family law in Massachusetts. On brief in the historic co-parent adoption case that established the right of same-sex couples to jointly adopt in Massachusetts, she has represented hundreds of LGBT individuals and couples in their quest to legalize their relationships with their children. Attorney Kauffman has handled several same-sex divorces since the Goodridge decision. Her efforts to provide protections to LGBT families also include obtaining three-parent adoptions for several families and a court order mandating that two women be placed on their son’s birth certificate where one of the women gave birth to the other woman’s biological child through in vitro fertilization.  
An activist since the early 1970s and an advocate early on for LGBT families, Attorney Kauffman helped to organize a public celebration of lesbian mothers on Mother’s Day in 1978. She was a founding member of the Somerville Women’s Center in 1976 and of the Cambridge Lavender Alliance/Parents, Teachers, and Allies in the early 1990s. Attorney Kauffman is a past board member of The Family Pride Coalition (now Family Equality Council) and has been in the forefront of LGBT family law in Massachusetts.  
In recognition of her outstanding work as a lawyer and activist, Attorney Kauffman has received a number of awards, including the Gwen Bloomingdale Pioneer Spirit Award, MLGBA, 2007; the Fisher Davenport Award, Family Pride Coalition and COLAGE, 2004; and the Barney Frank Award, Massachusetts School of Law, 2003. 
Attorney Kauffman has written and lectured widely on family law, particularly addressing how family law impacts the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community and how same-sex marriage impacts family law. In an op-ed piece published in the Boston Globe in March of 2006, Attorney Kauffman reacted to the decision by Catholic Charities to stop facilitating adoptions altogether rather than place children with lesbian and gay parents. She wrote, “There are more than 10,000 children in the foster care system in Massachusetts. These children are in desperate need of security, love, and stability. There are lesbian and gay individuals and couples who have the love to give. Fortunately, DSS and many DSS-contracted agencies will continue to place children in these loving homes. But Catholic Charities, the private agency that previously served to place some of the most difficult-to-place children into loving homes, will not, and other agencies will have to scramble to fill the void. This will no doubt cause excruciating delays in placement for these most vulnerable children.” Attorney Kauffman is a proven and effective advocate for her individual clients and the community.