Meet Our Trustees
Janna Annest
Trustee
Janna is an attorney and partner at Lirhus Keckemet Annest PLLC in Seattle, 
Washington. Janna began building her family formation practice after adopting her daughter in 2008, became a Fellow of the Academy of Adoption and Assisted Reproduction Attorneys in 2015, and joined the experienced adoption and estate planning team of Albert Lirhus and John Keckemet in 2019. Her practice includes all types of adoption, including complex situations involving ICWA and ICPC, step-, second-, and third-parent adoptions, contested adoptions, and birth parent representation. Janna chairs the AAAA Independent Adoption Committee. Surrogacy and gamete donation contracts represent a growing portion of Janna’s work, as revisions to Washington’s Uniform Parentage Act in 2019 opened new possibilities for families pursuing assisted reproductive technologies.
A Seattle native, Janna graduated cum laude and with high honors from Dartmouth College in 2000, where she captained the women’s volleyball team and was a visiting student at Oxford University. She received her J.D. with honors from the University of Washington School of Law in 2003 and served as a Notes and Comments Editor of the Washington Law Review. In her pre-parenting years, Janna served as President of the Western Washington chapter of the Dartmouth Alumni Association, competed in volleyball tournaments with her USAV team, and enjoyed gardening, home improvement projects, and theater. She hopes to resume some of these activities once her children no longer require her services as their personal Uber driver.
Kelly Dempsey
Trustee
Kelly is a Partner at Fox Rothschild LLP, a 1,000-lawyer national law firm with 29 offices. She is a fierce, compassionate and experienced advocate who provides legal representation to a broad range of diverse clients in all aspects of family formation, including assisted reproductive technology (ART), surrogacy, and domestic and international adoptions.
Kelly provides comprehensive guidance to clients and handles the full spectrum of adoption options, including domestic, international, step-parent and relative adoptions and adoptions from foster care, as well as disruptions, dissolutions, and contested adoptions. She also helps clients demystify and navigate the legal challenges related to surrogacy and ART, including counseling clients through the immigration and naturalization process for foreign-born adopted children.
Proud mother to four children, one of whom was adopted from Vietnam and another domestically, Kelly has a genuine understanding of the personal aspects of adoption that shines through in the attentive and thoughtful way in which she represents her clients on their family formation journey.
Katie Jay
Trustee
Katie is a founding partner at Jay & Campbell, a Florida adoption law firm with a busy trial and appellate practice. Many of the firm’s cases involve the Florida Department of Children and Families (DCF), as well as interstate adoptions that involve the Interstate Compact on the Placement of Children (ICPC). Experienced in both state and federal courts, Jay & Campbell prevailed in obtaining Jamaica’s first return of a child under the Hague Abduction Convention.
Driven by her personal experiences as an adoptive mother and former foster parent, Katie is highly involved in advocating for good adoption laws in Florida and around the country. She has co-chaired AAAA’s Foster Committee and in 2023 was appointed to the Florida Legal Needs of Children Committee.
Katie earned her law degree from Indiana University Maurer School of Law and BA in Government from the University of Texas. She lives in Florida with her husband Ben, their three girls, and assorted family pets. Her family enjoys Scouts BSA, music, running, and unrelenting debate.
Rob Kirsh
Trustee
Rob Kirsh has been practicing law for 20 years, 14 of which in adoption law, beginning while he lived in Memphis, Tennessee. He practices with his brother Steve (AAAA Past President), brother Joel (AAAA Past Networking Chair), and nephew Grant. Combined, the "Kirsh Boys" have over 100 years of experience practicing adoption law, and, over the last 40 years, have handled nearly 4,000 infant adoptions.
Rob is admitted in Indiana, Illinois, Kentucky, Michigan, Mississippi, and Tennessee, working with expectant moms, adoptive parents, attorneys, and adoption agencies on interstate/ICPC and intrastate adoptions. An instrument-rated Private Pilot, Rob flies the firm’s Columbia 350 airplane for adoptions across the Hoosier State, Land of Lincoln, Bluegrass State, Great Lakes State, Magnolia State, and Volunteer State regularly. Although a big territory, he can be anywhere from the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, to the Mississippi Gulf Coast, within a few hours, when a phone call or video chat isn't personal enough.
Rob earned his Bachelor of Arts in Psychology degree from Indiana University, his Juris Doctor degree from The University of Tulsa College of Law, and his Master of Science in Management (MBA) degree from the Purdue University Krannert Graduate School of Management. He is a Fellow of the Academy of Adoption & Assisted Reproduction Attorneys (AAAA), and serves on the Academy's Board of Trustees.
Rob and his wife Amy live in Carmel, a suburb of Indianapolis. Their daughter Campbell is a college student at Indiana, and their son Hudson is a student at Carmel High School. Their goldendoodle Wilson loves belly rubs, car rides, and going to the office with Rob. Rob is an avid cyclist (indoor and outdoor).
To Rob, there is no more fulfilling type of work. He loves helping expectant moms turn challenging situations into positive ones, creating loving adoptive families, and working with his family and other adoption professionals to do the same!
Lance Rich
Trustee
Lance D. Rich, JD, is a shareholder at the law firm of Kirton McConkie in Salt Lake City, Utah and is licensed to practice law in Utah and Wyoming. He is a graduate of the University of Michigan Law School where he was a Bergstrom Scholar who received specialized training in child welfare cases. Lance handles mainly adoption cases for adoptive parents, birth parents, and adoption agencies. He also represents intended parents and gestational carriers in surrogacy cases. Having adopted three children, Lance has a personal as well as a professional perspective on the adoption process. He is an active proponent of adoption and serves on the board of directors and as the vice chair for United for Adoption. He has previously served on the board of directors for Utah Foster Care and served as president and on the board of directors of the Utah Adoption Council. He has been an active member of the Academy of Adoption and Assisted Reproduction Attorneys since 2010 and serves as the co-chair of the Academy’s Adoption Agency Committee. Lance has been a frequent presenter on a variety of adoption topics for conferences and seminars sponsored by organizations such as the Utah State Bar, the Utah Adoption Council, the National Business Institute, the Academy of Adoption and Assisted Reproduction Attorneys, United for Adoption, and the International Society of Family Law.
Meryl B. Rosenberg
Trustee
Meryl B. Rosenberg Esq. is an attorney specializing in the field of assisted reproductive technology (ART). For almost 30 years she has helped intended parents build their families through surrogacy, gamete donation, embryo donation, and second-parent and stepparent adoption. Among the many local and international non-profit organizations she actively participates in, Ms. Rosenberg is a Fellow of the Academy of Adoption and Assisted Reproduction Attorneys (AAAA) and past member of the ART executive committee and chair of its ART membership committee for the same, is a board member of the Jewish Fertility Foundation, is past chair and member of the executive board of the Legal Professional Group of ASRM, is past co-chair of the Legal Advisory Committee of Path2Parenthood (now part of Family Equality), is a professional member of RESOLVE, is a member of the ABA Reproductive Technology Committee, CLE chair of the same and liaison to the Family Law Section, and is a member of Family Law Institute of the LGBTQ Bar. Ms. Rosenberg has worked collaboratively with fellow attorneys in DC and Maryland to spearhead positive change in legislation affecting those who build their families through ART, with the relatively new DC law passed in April 2017. Ms. Rosenberg has been a guest lecturer for the University of Maryland School of Law and the American University Washington College of Law. She is also a frequent lecturer for the ABA Family Law Section, AAAA, ASRM, Rainbow Families DC, P2P/Family Equality, Men Having Babies, and other local organizations on relevant topics surrounding ART and family building.
Kim Surratt
Trustee
Kim Surratt began her legal career in 2002 and opened her firm in 2007 with both a Nevada and a California license to practice law. She continues her role as principal of Surratt Law Practice, a full-service reproduction, family, and estate law firm. Kim began her ART law career in 2004 with her first surrogacy case. She is an ART Fellow with the Academy of Adoption and Assisted Reproduction Attorneys (AAAA), sits on her second term for the Board of Trustees for AAAA, is a past president of the Family Law Section of the State Bar of Nevada, is a member of the National Family Law Advisory Council for the National Center of Lesbian Rights, and a past president of the Nevada Justice Association. Kim drafted and lobbied the passage of all the current reproduction family law statutes in Nevada. She has spoken in various countries and several media around the world on reproduction law. Her surrogacy case load over the years has netted many babies and continues strong today with her recent prestigious President Award from AAAA.
