Many people familiar with litigation probably think of pretrial discovery in the context of traditional and often heated litigation—perhaps a contentious divorce, a complex contractual or real estate dispute or a contested personal injury or medical malpractice lawsuit. While pretrial discovery in Florida is certainly very common in these types of cases, the Florida Probate
Guardianship
As Your Young Adults Leave for College, Add a Power of Attorney and Health Care Directive to the Packing List
By Lori Wolf & Juliya L. Ismailov on
Posted in Estate Planning, Special Needs Assistance
The fall is upon us: is your new or soon-to-be adult (child) going off to college? Besides taking with him or her the extra long sheets and a new credit card, should your child be leaving you with something too: the right to control his or her finances and medical decisions?
When a child reaches…
Adults with Special Needs May Soon Be Able to Streamline the Process to Establish First Party Special Needs Trusts on Their Own: A Review of the Special Needs Trust Fairness Act
By Jenny Flom on
In 1993, Congress enacted Section 1917(d)(4)(A) of the Social Security Act, authorizing the establishment of special needs trusts (also called first-party trusts and self-settled trusts). First-party special needs trusts enable disabled individuals to set aside their funds to pay for supplemental care while enabling those individuals to remain eligible for government benefits. See 42 U.S.C.…
New Jersey Judiciary Asking for Volunteers to Oversee Guardians
By Mary Browning on
Posted in Guardians/Guardianship
The New Jersey Judiciary is asking New Jersey citizens to volunteer for a guardianship monitoring program. The volunteers will work directly with the surrogates’ offices to review the guardian files and also the annual reports that guardians are required to file. The purpose of this program is to track all guardianships in the State and…
The Magic Age
By Lori Wolf on
Posted in Guardians/Guardianship, Special Needs Trusts
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There are certain ages in a child’s life that are benchmarks for changes. For some children, turning age 17 is an important day, since that is when the child can obtain a driver’s license and for some…