Ashley Dunning Recognized as a “Top 100” Lawyer for 2023

Ashley Dunning was once again recognized as one of the “Top 100” (subscription required) lawyers in California by the Daily Journal, California’s leading legal newspaper. The “Top 100” list annually recognizes California lawyers whose work has a profound impact at both the state and national level.

The Daily Journal noted that for the past year, Ashley “has dealt with the rippling aftershocks of the California Supreme Court’s landmark pension decision of 2020. In Alameda County Deputy Sheriffs’ Association v. Alameda County Employees’ Retirement Association (Alameda), [Ashley] prevailed on behalf of her client, the Merced County Employees’ Retirement Association...[when] the court upheld the statutory limitations enforced by the retirement systems.”

The article goes on to highlight that during the past year Ashley has “led teams that secured victories on behalf of CERL systems, the Sacramento County Employees’ Retirement System and its Board of Retirement and on behalf of the Ventura County Employees’ Retirement Association (VCERA), regarding the implementation of Alameda” and that she “also represented the San Bernardino County Employees' Retirement Association in over a dozen successful administrative adjudications regarding similar issues of Alameda implementation.”

Commenting on her work, Ashley said, “I’ve had the honor of representing a number of the retirement systems in more than a dozen administrative adjudications and in three writ actions defending the proper implementation of the Alameda decision and pension reform legislation and regulations. In these proceedings, both superior courts and hearing officers have uniformly upheld the retirement boards’ implementation of the rules that apply to them.”

“People sometimes criticize defined benefit governmental pensions,” she continued. “But the idea is they’re supposed to give people a guaranteed life income that provides them with an ability to live within means that are roughly similar to, and not higher than, what they received in pay for their normal governmental services…not more or less than they should be paid under the statutory formulas. The retirement systems and their boards perform important work by both providing the retirement benefits, and enforcing these rules.”

Ashley was previously recognized as a “Top 100” lawyer in 2022 and 2020.