Judge Lora Livingston
Judge Livingston is a 1982 graduate of the UCLA School of Law. She began her legal career as a Reginald Heber Smith Community Lawyer Fellow assigned to the Legal Aid Society of Central Texas in Austin, Texas. After completion of the two-year fellowship program, she continued to work in the area of poverty law until 1988 when she entered private practice with the law firm of Joel B. Bennett, P.C. In 1993, she and S. Gail Parr formed a partnership and opened the law firm of Livingston & Parr. She was engaged in a general civil litigation practice with an emphasis on family law. In January 1995, she was sworn in as an Associate Judge for the District Courts of Travis County, Texas. After her successful election, Judge Livingston was sworn in as Judge of the 261st District Court in January 1999. She is the first African-American woman to serve on a district court in Travis County, Texas. Since 2011, she has served as the Local Administrative Judge for the Travis County Courts.
Judge Livingston has been active in local, state and national bar association activities and has served on the boards of the Texas Equal Access to Justice Foundation, Texas Access to Justice Commission, the National Center on Women and Family Law, the National Association of IOLTA Programs, the Judicial Section of the State Bar of Texas, and the Board of the Texas Center for the Judiciary. She is a member of the National Bar Association, the American Bar Association and the National Association of Women Judges. She has served as a delegate to the House of Delegates of the American Bar Association (ABA) representing the State Bar of Texas and the Travis County Bar Association. Her ABA service includes Chair of the Commission on Interest on Lawyers Trust Accounts (IOLTA), Chair of the Standing Committee on the Delivery of Legal Services, Chair of the Standing Committee on Legal Aid and Indigent Defendants (SCLAID), member of the Standing Committee on Pro Bono and Public Service, member of the Commission on the Future of Legal Services, the ABA Center for Innovation and member of the ABA Judicial Division. She is a Texas Delegate to the ABA Judicial Division National Conference of State Trial Judges. She has also served on a number of committees in various state and local bar associations, including the Austin Bar Association, the Austin Black Lawyers Association and the Travis County Women Lawyers Association.
Judge Livingston is a proponent of pro bono activities and has served on the Board of Volunteer Legal Services (formerly Austin Lawyers Care). Judge Livingston is the 2015 Chair of “And Justice for All: An ABA Day of Service,” a National Pro Bono Celebration. Judge Livingston was instrumental in the establishment of the Travis County Self Help Center for self-represented litigants, and she led the effort to adopt a language access plan in the Civil Courts. She is a passionate supporter of access to justice initiatives on the local, state and national level.