Kembra Smith says: "CASA has provided me with many opportunities for significant connections and delightful experiences."

She joined CASA in 1985 but waited until 1994 to attend her first CASA Conference, the infamous Key West "low speed chase" conference. She served CASA on the membership committee from 1995-1998, as membership chair in 1998-99, on the Executive Board from 2000-02, on the education committee in 2003-04, and became Secretary in 2004.

Kembra has had a long and interesting career. After obtaining a B.S. in Journalism from the U. of Florida, she worked as one of the first female probation and parole officers in the State of Florida from 1974-76, followed by work as a mental health counselor and school teacher. She attended South Texas College of Law, and worked for the U.S. D.C., S. District of Texas in Houston until she joined the United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit?Unit B, Atlanta, Georgia (what would become the 11th Circuit) as a docket clerk. She finished her legal education at Woodrow Wilson College of Law in Atlanta in 1983. At the 11th Circuit, she has served her court as a motions attorney, a staff attorney and most recently as a personal law clerk for two judges of the court.

In addition to her legal life, Kembra has a daughter, now 18 and attending Erskine College in Due West, S.C. Her husband, Lawrence Landry, is a bankruptcy attorney in Atlanta. Her father, a retired Florida judge, is now the magistrate in Due West, and the oldest serving magistrate in South Carolina. Her uncle, Chesterfield Smith, was a distinguished member of the Florida Bar, and former president of the ABA.

Kembra was a Girl Scout Troop Advisor from1992?2004 and served as director of the Daisy Ridge Service Unit from 1994?2000, managing forty-five Girl Scout troops. From her troop, fourteen girls received their Silver Awards in 2001 and four girls received their Gold Awards in 2004. In addition, Kembra has been a long-term local and regional president of the Lions Club in North Georgia.

She has been a member of the Atlanta Bar, Georgia and Federal Bar Associations since 1985 and is a 1989 Fellow of the Institute for Court Management, Williamsburg, Virginia.

Kembra owns a home in Mountain Rest, South Carolina, where she enjoys her many hobbies - hiking, camping, kayaking, travel, reading, and community and river clean-ups. If Kembra Smith is representative of the people in CASA, we're a mighty fine bunch of folks.