About DALA’s New Chief Magistrate, Shelly Taylor

Taylor comes to the Patrick Administration from Massport (the Massachusetts Port Authority), where she served as Senior Legal Counsel for Litigation. She was responsible for complex business litigation, investigations and compliance matters, as well as general legal advice to senior management. In an innovative approach to public sector litigation, Taylor staffed a series of major cases by joining the litigation team as an active member, working along side retained counsel. The goal - controlled legal fees, better overall quality of representation, and superior results.

 Taylor argued Massport’s prevailing case before the First Circuit Court of Appeals in Jalbert Leasing, Inc. d/b/a C & J Trailways, et al., v. Massachusetts Port Authority, in which a consortium of bus companies asserted that the federal Anti-Head-Tax Act barred Massport from collecting use and access fees from carriers with interstate routes out of Logan Airport.

 She was on Massport’s amicus brief in Suffolk Construction v. DCAM, the Attorney General’s successful defense of the right of public officials to assert the attorney-client privilege in the face of a public records request for confidential communications.

 Taylor was also on brief in Massport’s prevailing motion to dismiss in Kelen et al. v. Massachusetts Turnpike Authority et al. This class action sought significant monetary damages for alleged constitutional defects in the resident toll discount programs in use at the Tobin Bridge, the Sumner Tunnel and the Ted Williams Tunnel.

 In Massport v. Terri’s Little Pumpkins, Taylor was active in pretrial investigation, deposed key witnesses, and sat as second-chair in a week-long jury trial. This commercial lease dispute centered on an Office of Child Care Services investigation of the licensed child care center at Logan Airport.
With the Port Authority’s Economic Planning and Development Department as a major client, Taylor also handled a range of matters associated with commercial and maritime development of Massport’s extensive holdings in and around the Port of Boston, including tax and environmental litigation as well as administrative proceedings before the Department of Environmental Protection and other agencies.
 Taylor managed the successful defense in Conservation Law Foundation et al. v. Massachusetts Port Authority in which Superior Court Judge Brady ruled that commercial business on the Fish Pier in South Boston could not sue under the cloth of the 10-citizen provisions of G.L. c. 214, § 7(a) alleging environmental damage when the true injuris at issue were economic.
 When CLF and others gave notice of intent to challenge the Commonwealth’s performance on the so-called Boston Transit Commitments, Taylor persuaded the plaintiffs to withdraw a threatened claim against Massport, after demonstrating in negotiations that the claim had no merit. Massport was the only state transportation agency not named as a defendant.

Taylor began her legal career as a law clerk in Superior Court, followed by four years in the Office of the Attorney General Scott Harshbarger. As a member of the Government Bureau’s Trial Division, Taylor defended state officials and agencies in civil litigation in state and federal court. She also spent several months on special assignment with the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office. Working under the supervision of the late Paul McLaughlin and other senior trial attorneys, Taylor prosecuted criminal cases in Roxbury District Court as part of the Attorney General’s Safe Neighborhood Initiative. Taylor was an original member of the Attorney General’s Diversity Committee, and spearheaded the program “Race On Trial.” A panel discussion led by Harshbarger including then Suffolk County District Attorney Ralph C. Martin II, Hampden County District Attorney William M. Bennett, Henry Owens, then Chelsea Police Chief Edward A. Flynn, Taylor and others in a discussion of how race issues play out in the courtroom.

In 1997, Taylor joined the firm of Peckham, Lobel, Casey, Prince & Tye, LLP (now Prince Lobel Glovsky & Tye LLP) where she practiced employment law and litigation. As an associate in the firm’s Employment Law Group, she represented employers and plaintiffs in discrimination, sexual harassment and other cases, and also handled business litigation and some criminal matters as a member of the firm’s Litigation Group. Taylor was on the team which handled a major constitutional challenge to a state DBE program formerly in use in public construction contracting, an area in which she later expanded her expertise at Massport. She also handled significant cases for such clients as the Boston Police Department as well as individual Boston Police Officers, and tried an in rem forfeiture case involving a Dorchester apartment in which her client, Idene Wilkerson, prevailed as a so-called ‘innocent owner’ under the federal statute. Wilkerson, known as Ma Siss, was recently featured in a Boston Globe series about a church and street mission she founded.

In 1999, Taylor was appointed Deputy General Counsel in the Office of the State Treasurer where her duties included representing the State Board of Retirement at DALA and in the Superior and Appeals Courts. In addition to litigation, Taylor managed several significant administrative and policy initiatives, including key legislative changes designed to preserve the tax advantages available to members of the Commonwealth’s public pension systems.

Taylor holds her J.D. from Northeastern University School of Law where she was a Patricia Roberts Harris Fellow and was one several in her class who received the Massachusetts Black Lawyers Public Service Award for volunteer work with violent offenders in the Boston public school system.

Taylor holds her bachelor’s degree in Government from Harvard-Radcliffe. In college, she one of a small group of students who started the Cambridge Youth Enrichment Program (CYEP), a summer ‘school-without-walls’ for children living in the city’s public housing developments. The program is based at Harvard’s social service organization the Phillips Brooks House Association (PBHA) and has run continuously every summer since that first year. Taylor later returned to Harvard as Director of Public Service Programs and, more recently served on the PBHA Board of Trustees. She lives with her husband and children in East Cambridge, where she often meets up with current and former CYEP campers.