Ray Harrison Introduces NMHS Distinguished Alumni Award
He’s a 1992 graduate of Rutgers University. He’s also a 1995 graduate of Syracuse Law School, where he was chosen to serve on their moot court and all-star team of litigators who competed in the courtroom against the best student winners from other law schools.
Adam specialized in real estate law and began working for firms in New York City upon his graduation from Syracuse. After arguing and winning most of his cases for several years, Adam made the bold decision to strike out on his own, and he established his own real estate Adam Leitman Bailey, P.C. in the extremely competitive and traditional atmosphere of New York City. Within seven years his thirteen-attorney real estate firm received an AV rating by Martindale-Hubbell, the country’s preeminent lawyer rating service. An AV rating signifies the firm that has achieved the highest levels of professional skill and integrity. In 2007, Mr. Bailey himself became one of 223 New York metro lawyers to receive Super Lawyer honors. Law and Politics magazine identified him as one of the top 5% of the attorneys practicing the entire New York metro area based upon an independent survey of 90,000 attorneys. Mr. Bailey was recognized as a lawyer who had achieved a high degree of recognition and professional achievement based upon verdicts and settlements, transactions, and representative clients.
Mr. Bailey has prevailed in the courtroom in a number of significant real estate cases including a landmark case that lead to changes in the way in which deeds were recorded. He has written and drafted agreements that have been adopted as standard practice by the real estate industry, and he has recently had four new comprehensive lease forms published by Blumberg legal forms. Mr. Bailey is a prolific writer, has published numerous real estate law articles in such prestigious publications as the New York Law Journal, The Wall Street Journal, and The New York Times.
Mr. Bailey has a reputation of being a litigator with a conscience, who provides a passionate voice of the needy against the wealthy and powerful. He has established the highest reputation for himself and his firm in compassionate legal work that benefits others. He currently represents a group of Harlem business owners who are in the process of being evicted to make way for a shopping mall. In a novel proposal to halt gentrification in Harlem, Mr. Bailey has proposed that 125th Street, from river to river, be declared the Harlem Historic District, which he believes would make it more difficult to tear down the neighborhood’s historic buildings.
Mr. Bailey has also been dedicated to community service and charitable activities. He established the Building Foundations internship program to help improve high school students through educational opportunities, technology, instruction, and leadership training. He’s a member of the Board of Advisors for the Katharine Gibbs School, where he advises faculty, lectures students, and assists students in finding meaningful jobs. He has been an enthusiastic fundraiser for The Leukemia Society of America, and he has received international recognition for it.
My most intimate connection with Adam originated on the New Milford track. Adam was a four-year participant on the cross-country indoor track and field and outdoor track and field teams. He was a fierce competitor with the desire to excel and the determination to maximize his potential. During both his junior and his senior years, he earned first team all league and honorable mentions all-county honors in cross-country, and as a senior, he served as an extremely diligent captain for the cross-country team. If you look at the wall in the athletic building, you will see his name on the cross-country plaque as the recipient of the coaches award for both 1987 and 1988.
The accomplishments of a senior here are even more impressive in light of the fact that Adam was involved in a serious car accident during June of his junior year. He sustained head injuries from this accident that left both his academic and his athletic career in doubt. When I first spoke with him at the beginning of his senior year, however, I was impressed with his positive attitude. The accident did not hurt me, but it made me tougher.
His perseverance and his tenacious desire to compete and to excel have been transferred from these successes on the track to his victories in the courtroom. Adam Bailey has been recognized by his peers as one of the most professionally successful in his field in real estate law.
Tonight, it is my sincere pleasure to welcome him home to recognize as one of our most distinguished graduates and to thank him for his generosity to the New Milford High School. Mr. Bailey has not only established a scholarship to benefit a worthy New Milford graduate who attends his alma mater, Rutgers University, but he has also most generously providing each of our with a……..as a graduation gift.
I sincerely hope that his words this evening inspire the current graduates with the desire to achieve greatness with character which is what Adam Bailey has so admirably demonstrated through his professional career and through the generosity of his community service. At this time I am most pleased to present Adam Leitman Bailey with the 2008 Distinguished Alumni Award.