April 27, 2026

BusinessWest 40 Under 40: Corrine Ryan

BY George O'BrienBusinessWest.com

Managing Attorney – Hampden County, Community Legal Aid

Corrine Ryan wasn’t sure what she would do with the law degree she was earning at Georgetown University Law Center. But she knew it would be in the broad realm of public interest law, which is dedicated to representing and advocating for the rights and interests of individuals or groups that are typically underrepresented or marginalized in society.

And that is exactly the path she has followed, rising to the role of managing attorney at Community Legal Aid (CLA), which provides free civil legal help to low-income and elderly residents in Central and Western Mass. across several practice areas, ranging from eviction defense to education law; immigration to Social Security.

Ryan doesn’t handle many cases in this role; instead, her multi-faceted work is focused on staff development, professional development, grant writing, meeting with legislators to secure adequate funding, community engagement to build awareness of what CLA does, and direct oversight of its many operations, from the more than 100 calls the office receives each day to implementation of new programs.

Since becoming managing attorney, she has led several new initiatives, including the Commonwealth Care Alliance (CCA) Medical Legal Partnership, a collaboration between CLA attorneys and CCA medical staff that gave critical legal help in 350 cases to poor and elderly patients presenting with health-harming legal needs between 2022 and 2025, as well as the Family Preservation Project, a first-of-its-kind interdisciplinary team that helps families with open child welfare investigations, with the goal of keeping families intact.

“It’s an access-to-justice gap, really, and we try to fill that gap by providing representation to people who can’t afford attorneys,” Ryan said, adding that one of her biggest challenges is coping with the reality that CLA must turn away half the people who apply for help because it simply doesn’t have the capacity.

Active in the community, she serves on the board at Square One, an agency she’s passionate about, most recently as board chair. In addition, she is a board member with the Hampden County Bar Assoc.

Meanwhile, in her day job, she finds all aspects of the work — and fighting those legal battles — immensely rewarding.

“You can really move the needle in a huge way and change people’s lives,” she explained. “Whether it’s defending against an eviction or helping people get services in schools … we win a lot of the time, but even when we don’t, it’s that dignity and representation; they had their fair shake at due process.”

—George O’Brien