New York Legal Update asks Who’s Acronym Is It Anyway?  In Matter of Fireman’s Assn. of State of New York v French Am. School of N. Y., 2007 NY Slip Op 04745, the FASNY firefighters duke it out with the FASNY French School.   FASNY. Man, what a catchy acronym.  No wonder they are all over each other.

What took me by surprise was this bit of info about the volunteer fireman’s FASNY:

It has a membership of 43,000 volunteer firefighters and an annual operating budget of $11,000,000.

Excuse me?  These are the vollys that are so desperate that they need pensions for retention, race cars for fun, and have a piece of fire apparatus for every member (okay, I’m exaggerating on the last one, but if you’ve ever been to a parade, it certainly looks that way.)  And they have an association with an annual operating budge of $11 Mil!  Who’s paying for this, and what do they do that they need $11 Mil that isn’t already being done with my tax dollars the first time around?  Holy Smoke!  Volunteers cost a bundle!

Apparently, part of that $11 Mil is needed for legal fees to keep those French students from glomming their good name.  When I first saw the decision, I thought to myself, this is a tempest in a teapot.  But now I realize, if only 10% of that $11 Mil gets mistakenly shuffled over to the French FASNY instead of the fireman’s FASNY, that could cost them 3 Las Vegas conventions.  This is serious business.

Turning now to my other reason for taking note of this nonsense, the New York State Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, or NYSACDL as its called by almost every New Yorker, was looking for a new name.  The problem was that the name was too long for the media, such that its was either left out entirely or routinely butchered into some shortened version.  So, we tried to come up with a new, more media friendly name. 

One of the choices was Defense Attorneys of New York, or DANY.  Catchy, right?  Except for one tiny hitch.  DANY is used by the District Attorney of New York County, Bob Morgenthau’s gang.  Potential for confusion?  Perhaps, but think of the fun we would have litigating the issue.  I wanted to go for it.  Others, less inclined to tussle with the DA when not being paid to do so, thought it ill-advised.  Still others thought that the original name was so deeply etched in the public’s consciousness that a change would be unwise. 

What about the Feisty Attorneys of the State of New York.  Catchy, right?