Published: April 23, 2008 01:43 pm            

Kimberlee McGrath: Employing law to defend her roots

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Kimberlee McGrath Dunlop habitually sprints toward new personal bests.

The Wilson, N.Y., native was named on her alma mater’s athletic Wall of Fame last year, in acknowledgment of the 12 Varsity letters she earned in three sports, the five school records she set in track and field and the example she continues setting for ambitious scholar-athletes today.

Dunlop, a 1996 Wilson High School graduate, is an attorney specializing in federal Indian law. A member of the Seneca Nation, she’s an associate of Holland & Knight LLP, a 1,200-attorney firm that represents tribal clients in matters from limiting off-reservation gaming to securing better funding for Indian human service agencies.

The work lets her pursue two avocations at the same time, advocacy and defending her roots.

"The best thing about my job is it really provides me an opportunity to work with tribal leaders throughout the country,” Dunlop said. “I know who I’m working for and I can see the results.”

The challenge, she says, is educating members of Congress about Indian issues. Indian history is somewhat familiar in western New York, “but that’s not true in many other areas of the country.”

Dunlop found her life’s work nearly by accident. Her impressive academic-athletic record, which includes a 1996 state championship title in the triple jump, helped her get a scholarship at Bucknell University, where she figured she’d study pre-medicine and prepare herself to be a physician’s assistant.

In college, Dunlop landed a summer internship in the Repatriation Department of the Smithsonian Institution, where she helped judge whether the museum should return particular artifacts to their original tribal owners. The work stemmed from a 1990 federal law, the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, that directed federal institutions to make the returns.

“It was interesting. I felt like I was making a case,” Dunlop said. “I realized my interests were much more diverse than (medicine).”

After that internship, Dunlop’s academic interest turned to anthropology and, from there, federal Indian law. She enrolled in the University at Buffalo School of Law in 2000, founded its Native American Law Student Association and earned a minority fellowship in environmental law.

All the while, Dunlop also was a member of UB’s indoor track and field team, and her continued interest in the sport helped her reconnect with an old friend, Joseph Dunlop, a long-distance runner from Grand Island. They met up unexpectedly at a UB one-mile Dental Dash, Kimberlee recalls, and were married a few months after she graduated from law school in 2003.

Today Dunlop is licensed to practice law in both Washington and New York state. She and Joseph, an engineer for Delphi, are expecting their first child in May. They live in Odenton, Md.



• Who: Kimberlee McGrath Dunlop

• Where She is now: Washington D.C./Odenton, Md.

• Reconnect with hER: by e-mail at kimberlee.dunlop@hklaw.com

        

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