Shelley R. Smith is a Partner in the Philadelphia office. In her practice, she counsels clients in commercial litigation and labor and employment matters. Ms. Smith joined Archer following a distinguished career in public service for the City of Philadelphia, most recently serving eight years as City Solicitor during Michael Nutter’s mayoral tenure. Ms. Smith represented the Mayor, City Council, all City elected officials, all City employees, Agencies, Boards, and Commissions. She is the City of Philadelphia’s longest serving solicitor. As City Solicitor, she managed an office of 325 attorneys and was responsible for an $11-$14 million operating budget and an indemnities budget of $40 million.
Ms. Smith began her career with the City Law Department as a trial attorney in the Civil Rights Unit representing the City in constitutional tort cases alleging, primarily, of violations of the 1st and 4th amendments to the United States Constitution. Ms. Smith litigated more than 60 federal civil jury trials to verdict, as well as hundreds of other litigation and policy matters. She is known for her representation of the City in many prominent constitutional tort cases, including the 39th Police District litigation, NAACP v. City of Philadelphia and the jury trials of Joseph Frazier v. City of Philadelphia, Estate of Shannon Schieber v. City of Philadelphia, and Robert Mitchell v. Mayor John F. Street. As a trial attorney, she also served as in-house legal counsel for former Philadelphia Police Commissioner Richard Neal.
Following her position in the Civil Rights Unit, Ms. Smith headed up the Law Department’s Affirmative Litigation Unit, which explored opportunities to pursue recovery on behalf of the City and initiated proceedings where appropriate and viable. She also led the City’s Labor & Employment Unit, which included labor grievances and employment discrimination cases initiated in state and federal courts and administrative agencies. Prior to her role as City Solicitor, Ms. Smith served as Chair of the Law Department’s Corporate and Tax Group where she managed the transactional work of the full-service department, including real estate, tax and intellectual property matters.
Included in Ms. Smith’s more than 25 years of civil trial, risk management, litigation, and counseling experience is, among other things, exploration of the sale of a public utility; management and supervision of labor and employment matters, including collective bargaining and interest arbitration; organizational restructuring; internal investigations; personnel and human resources management and advice; and the hiring, retention and termination of employees. Her litigation experience also includes pretrial litigation of hundreds of federal and state civil matters; counseling and strategic and risk management advice in matters, including employee injury claims and coverage, constitutional tort claims, employee discipline, and related policies.
Ms. Smith is committed to the excellence of the judiciary and has demonstrated this commitment through her work as Chair of the Philadelphia Bar Association’s Commission on Judicial Selection and Retention, of which she has been a member and past Chair since 2004; and her participation as a member of the Southeastern Pennsylvania Advisory Commission for Pennsylvanians for Modern Courts, an organization whose mission is to achieve the merit selection, rather than election, of judges in Pennsylvania.
She is passionately devoted to improving and enhancing the quality and prominence of civic and cultural institutions. For several years, she served on the Law and Public Safety Stakeholders Partnership, one of several professional clusters established by the Philadelphia School District to create opportunities to expose Philadelphia Public School students to the myriad career options in various fields. Ms. Smith has served as a member of the Board of Directors of Lincoln Day Nursery, the oldest nursery program in Philadelphia serving predominantly African-American families.
