Hurricane Agnes of 1972 still ranks among the most destructive storms to hit the United States. It also marked a turning point in Joan Stern's life and career, helping put her on a path that led to The Bond Buyer Muni Hall of Fame.
At the time, she was a paralegal in the securities law practice at Blank Rome in Philadelphia — the firm's first paralegal.
She was assigned to assist with the disaster relief bonds the firm was working on for then-Gov. Milton Shapp, in an effort to fund the local matching share of disaster relief for the destruction the storm had wrought on the Susquehanna River Valley.
The bond proceeds were also used for restoring farms, homes and businesses.
"You knew that if you were successful, you would be able to get those people out of tents and into homes," Stern said.
"I was so taken by the importance of issuing bonds to make the capital expenditures necessary to recover," she said. "I got very interested in going to law school and studying public finance."
It was not an easy path.
"Women, especially Jewish women, didn't practice public finance law," Stern said.
But with support from Blank Rome, which allowed her to clerk part-time while attending classes at Temple University's law school, she earned her J.D. in 1977 and the firm hired her as a public finance associate.
Thus began a career that has profoundly shaped public finance law in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and New Jersey.
She has been bond counsel for the commonwealth's government, the Philadelphia city government and the School District of Philadelphia.
Stern also worked on transactions that helped the National Football League's Philadelphia Eagles develop their stadium, Lincoln Financial Field.
"I had the best clients for anyone from Philadelphia," Stern said.
Along the way, she did a lot of work with one of her college classmates at the University of Pennsylvania: Ed Rendell, who went on to be Philadelphia's mayor and Pennsylvania governor, and is also being inducted with The Bond Buyer's 2024 Muni Hall of Fame class.
In addition to bond documents, Stern also drafted significant debt and finance legislation.
She guided the statutes creating structures to help both Philadelphia's city and school district weather financial challenges and drafted the legislation and the bond indenture establishing the South Jersey Transportation Authority, which oversees the Atlantic City International Airport and Atlantic City Expressway.
Stern was among a group of five public finance attorneys
Among other duties, she is a trustee of the Moore College of Art & Design, a member of the Police Athletic League of Philadelphia Board of Directors, and a Board of Trustees member of the Jewish Federation of Philadelphia.
And earlier this year, Mayor Cherelle L. Parker appointed Stern to the Board of Education of the School District of Philadelphia, continuing service to the system she served for decades as a bond attorney and that she attended as a young person.
Much has changed during the course of Stern's career, and much of it for the better compared to the years when she was the only woman in the room.
"I have lived long enough to see those barriers being broken," Stern said. "And seeing our politics full of people who want to live in the past, having lived in the past I can tell you it isn't anything worth going back to."
