Joyce A. Mader is Of Counsel to the law firm of O’Donoghue & O’Donoghue LLP in Washington, DC. She joined the firm in 1976 and since then has been primarily engaged in the representation of multiemployer pension and welfare plans on a wide range of issues including plan design and administration, benefit claims and appeals, tax qualification and voluntary correction, fiduciary matters, investments, DOL investigations, IRS examinations, HIPAA compliance, Affordable Care Act compliance, health fund tax issues, Pension Protection Act compliance and pension funding issues, mergers and reciprocity, and Multiemployer Pension Reform Act. A list of her papers and presentations is available.
Ms. Mader was Union Co-Chair of the Employee Benefits Committee of the Labor Section, American Bar Association 2005-2008 and Union Co-Chair of the Employee Benefits Committee Sub-Committee on Qualified Pension Plans, 1990-2005. She has served on the Employee Benefits Committee’s Task Forces on Health Care Reform and on Coverage and Non-Discrimination Testing for Multiemployer Pension Plans as well as on the ABA Joint Committee on Employee Benefits Task Force on Code Section 419. She served on the Council of the Labor Section and as a liaison from the Council to the Employee Benefits Committee of the Labor Section until 2015. She was inducted as a charter member of the American College of Employee Benefits Counsel.
Ms. Mader was appointed in 2011 to serve on the PBGC Advisory Committee and was reappointed to the Committee for a second term in 2014. From 2015 through 2016, Ms. Mader was appointed to Chair the Advisory Committee.
Ms. Mader served on the Department of Labor ERISA Advisory Council, 1994-1997. She chaired the 1997 ERISA Advisory Council and the 1996 Advisory Council’s Working Group on Service Providers. Ms. Mader also served on the Steering Committee of the District of Columbia Bar Labor Law Division and the Attorneys and Government Liaison Committee of the International Foundation of Employee Benefit Plans.
Ms. Mader is a frequent speaker before labor and industry groups and at educational programs on a variety of issues relating to employee benefit plans. She was a lecturer at the Catholic University Law School, teaching a course entitled, “ERISA: The Labor-Management Perspective.”
At one time or other, Ms. Mader has worked with most of the firm’s clients and is often retained for special projects such as DOL or IRS audits or to provide a specific opinion by funds which are not regular clients of the firm. Ms. Mader also regularly works on comments and submissions to government agencies in connection with regulations and opinion requests as well as amicus briefs in benefits litigation. She has testified before the Department of Labor ERISA Advisory Council and as an expert in federal court litigation on employee benefits related issues.
Ms. Mader received her Bachelor’s degree from Dickinson College, Carlisle, Pennsylvania in 1973 and her Juris Doctor degree from The Columbus School of Law of the Catholic University of America, Washington, DC in 1976. She is listed in Best Lawyers in America and in Washington, D.C. Super Lawyers.