Don Doerr has been a prominent attorney in Central New York for over 34 years. He is currently the District Executive of the Fifth Judicial District (Onondaga, Oneida, Oswego, Jefferson & Lewis Counties), where he, along with Administrative Judge James P. Murphy, oversees and supervises all Court Operations of New York State’s trial courts in the 5th Judicial District. The 5th District has approximately 700 non-Judicial court personnel and staff, seventy State Court Judges, not including the ~150 Town & Village Courts and ~200 Town & Village Justices throughout the District. District Executives are the highest-ranking non-judicial employees in each of the State’s 13 District Administrative Judges’ Offices. Soon after Don started as District Executive on February 20, 2000, the pandemic struck, and Doerr had to consolidate Court operations in each County and mount an unprecedented technology effort that has not and likely will not ever be duplicated again. Doerr is in good standing and admitted to practice law in New York State and Massachusetts, as well as in the United States Supreme Court and the Northern, Western & Southern District Federal Courts located in New York State.
Prior to his appointment as District Executive, he was with Cerio Law Offices, where he concentrated in civil litigation and municipal and land-use law but had a broad general practice in many areas of the law. He served as the Zoning Board of Appeals (ZBA) attorney and Town Prosecutor for several Towns in Onondaga County for many years. He was previously of Counsel at POMCO (now United Healthcare), which was one of the nation’s largest third-party administrators of Health and Welfare Benefit Plans. He also served on the Board and was the Compliance Officer at Health Insurance Company of America (HICA), a Syracuse-domiciled insurance company. He received his undergraduate (1985) and Juris Doctorate (1988) with honors from Syracuse University and served as a Confidential Law Clerk to the Justices of the New York State Supreme Court Appellate Division, Fourth Department in Rochester, NY from 1988 to 1990. After serving as an Associate in the Litigation Department of a New York City law firm, he moved back to Syracuse and was a founding Partner at McDermott & Doerr, P.C. from 1991 through 2004. From 2004 to 2006, he served as an Assistant Vice President at Syracuse University, where he oversaw the Office of Alumni Relations and its over 230,000 alumni at the time.
Doerr has been very active in professional and civic organizations. He is the Past-President of the Onondaga County Bar Association and is a past member of the House of Delegates and the Executive Committee of the 70,000-member New York State Bar Association, where he is currently the longstanding Chair of the Committee and an active member of several additional committees and sections. He was elected as a Director of the New York Bar Foundation, where he is a “Life Fellow” and serves as Vice-Chair of the Fellows State-wide. He is a frequent lecturer on numerous legal topics and served as the co-chair and chair of the Continuing Legal Education (CLE) Committee of the Onondaga County Bar Association, and from 2001 to 2004 was appointed to serve on the New York State Continuing Legal Education Board. Doerr has also sat and held officer positions at numerous not-for-profit organizations in the community. He currently sits on several boards in the community, including the Volunteer Lawyers Project of Central New York, the Hendricks Chapel Board of Advisors at Syracuse University, and Pass da’ Rock (a local non-profit that works with inner-city youth). Doerr is the Past President of the Syracuse University National Alumni Association and a former member of the Syracuse University Board of Trustees and the College of Law Board of Visitors. Doerr is an Eagle Scout and is a Lifetime Member of the National Eagle Scout Association.
He resides with his wife, Maria, in the Town of Dewitt.