Candidate for
Member, City Council; City of Laguna Beach

Jane is a professor of law, experienced litigator and dedicated community leader. Over a 30 year career, she was a forceful advocate for many years for families and children.

She is skilled at working with people, analyzing complex problems and data sets, generating workable solutions and building consensus.

Over her entire adult life she has participated in community service. Since she moved to Laguna Beach, she has devoted many hours of work to community service in our town. An intelligent, warm and caring person, Jane is dedicated to improving Laguna's City government. She knows how to promote a much-needed collaboration and civility among Council members. She knows how to listen carefully to the public, treat them fairly and respectfully and address their needs.

She has been on and currently serves on boards with responsibility for managing multimillion dollar budgets. Jane is married to retired Judge Paul Egly, a 35-year resident of Laguna. Judge Egly, along with Jim Dilley and others, was one of the original creators of the Greenbelt.

She is the mother of Patti, Paul and Annie and grandmother to Nicolau, Christopher, Syndey and Natalie. As a City Council member, Jane will look to our Vision Laguna 2030 Strategic Plan to guide our growth as a community. She will bring sanity and civility to a process that often lacks both. A conversation with Jane about her professional career and decades of community service

TODAY

I am a Professor and Director of the Clinical Externship Program at the College of Law, University of LaVerne, Ontario, California I am a member of the board and executive committee of Planned Parenthood of Orange and San Bernardino Counties. As former two-term chair I oversaw a budget of $15 million. I serve on board of Neighborhood Legal Services (NLS) of Los Angeles with a budget of $11 million. NLS delivered legal aid to over 40,000 people last year. I also serve on the board of Laguna Greenbelt. Over the years I have served on many boards, most recently for the Laguna Beach Woman's Club and Laguna North Community Association (LANO).

YESTERDAY

Most of my youth was spent in Silver Spring, Maryland (next door to Washington, DC) and Chapel Hill, North Carolina. I loved Washington, D.C. My brother and I would take every possible opportunity and go into the Capitol and watch the Senate and committee hearings. The proceedings were very interesting and we met some interesting people including Senator John F. Kennedy, Senator William Fulbright, Robert Kennedy, Vice President Richard Nixon, Rocket Expert Werner Von Braun and Jimmy Hoffa, President of the Teamsters Union. I started college at the University of Maryland and transferred to the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill in 1962. At that time Carolina only accepted women in their junior year. After graduating from UNC, I spent the summer of 1964 working on the Governor's Commission on the Status of Women. The next summer I married. A few years later I began law school at the University of North Carolina. When my husband took a job in Detroit, I transferred to Wayne State School of Law. Our son Paul was born in 1969 and our Annie 17 months later.

Claremont, CA

In 1973 we moved to Claremont, California. Life was very busy. Paul and Annie were very active and I volunteered in their classrooms and as a crossing guard. After passing the California Bar I began to practice law and was very fortunate to work with the firm Wiener, Newman, Chrisman and Baldonado - a great and supportive group of attorneys. My area of practice was family and real estate law. As a family law attorney I noted the person who most needed protection was the child. I persuaded a family law judge to appoint me as the attorney for the child in a custody case. He continued appointing me and we began to get lots of attention. With the help of a State Assembly member, this practice of appointing an attorney for the child became state law and is the practice followed in the court today. During this time I served on a State Bar Committee, on the Board of the Family Service Agency, Hope House, and started a legal clinic at the Claremont Senior Citizen's Center. The most challenging job, besides being a Mom, was as Chair of the Claremont Water Task Force, which included local leaders, water district employees and representatives from the League of Women Voters and other organizations. In the early 1970's Claremont's City Council was struggling with issues of water service, quality and planning for future needs.

Capistrano Beach

In 1978 we moved to Capistrano Beach where I lived until 1984. Lots of time was spent at soccer and baseball games and on the beach watching son Paul learn to surf. I started a practice and continued doing family and real estate law plus some appellate work. My community service included serving on the board of the Boys and Girls Club and as the first president of Capistrano Unified School District Foundation - set up on the model of Schoolpower. Sadly, my first marriage ended in divorce.

Laguna Beach

In 1984 I married Paul Egly, a terrific move. I had married a great guy, became stepmother to the lovely Patti and moved to Laguna Beach, a place I had loved from the first time I saw it in 1962. My daughter Annie attended Laguna Beach schools from Thurston to High School, graduating in 1989. In 1986 I stopped my law practice to spend time with my family. We spent 1988 living in Barcelona, Spain, and traveled throughout Europe. When we returned, I changed direction in my law career and joined the Orange County Public Defender Office. In the early 90's I joined a civil litigation firm as a trial attorney. Another change occurred a few years ago when I started teaching law.

During my years in Laguna I have served on the City's Parks and Recreation committee, was a worker bee on "Save the Canyon" and on the Open Space Initiative. My involvement with LANO (Laguna North, a community organization) included several terms as president. Most recently, I served as a facilitator on Vision Laguna 2030. Vision Laguna 2030 was an effort launched by City Council in 2000 to gather ideas from residents and make recommendations to improve quality of life in Laguna Beach by year 2030. I also volunteer at the Laguna Beach Senior Center, serving as counselor to seniors with legal problems. Now I am running for City Council because current City Council decisions are endangering the Laguna we all cherish. I hope you will vote for me so we can set a new direction. Together, we can make a difference. Please let me know your opinion and concerns about our wonderful Laguna Beach. Just go to "Ask Jane a question" and send me an email.