Our history 

FALA New York was founded in January 2013 by nine Filipino American attorneys — Annette B. Almazan, Patricia Astorga, Anna Mercado Clark, Rio Guerrero, Melissa C. Lee, Concepcion Montoya, William Panlilio, Vincent Roldan and Noel Vales — with a shared interest in creating a formal professional affiliation group for Filipino American law students, paralegals, lawyers, judges, and other legal professionals in New York. FALA New York celebrated its formal launch on September 10, 2013 with a reception at the offices of Schulte, Roth & Zabel, LLP, attended by approximately 70 supporters. Today, FALA New York boasts approximately 200 supporters, who subscribe to our news and updates, attend events, and share in our professional network. FALA New York continues to find new ways to contribute to and strengthen our community.

FALA New York was incorporated as a not-for-profit corporation in the State of New York in September 2015.

Our Brand 

FALA New York's logo embraces our profession, our Filipino heritage, and our love of the Big Apple.  At first glance, the graphic is a simple apple, New York's longtime civic symbol. But the base of the apple is actually the inverted baybayin character "ba" -- the first syllable in "batas," the Filipino word for "law."  In a happy coincidence, when inverted, the character "ba" also resembles a heart -- representing the solidarity that we hope to encourage among Filipino lawyers.  Our logo uses, as another reference to our ethnic heritage, red, white, blue, and yellow -- the colors of the Philippine flag.