Privacy Policy

The Houston Lawyers Association ("HLA," "we," "us") is a bar association for lawyers, law students and legal professionals in the Houston area. This policy explains what information we collect through houstonlawyersassociation.org (the "site"), what we do with it, and the choices you have.

Questions about this policy can be sent to HLA through the contact form on this site.

What we collect depends on how you use the site.

• Browsing. Like most websites, our hosting provider sees your IP address and basic request details (pages requested, browser type) in order to deliver the site and protect it from abuse.
• Contact form. If you write to us through the contact form, we collect your name, email address, the topic you pick and your message. It is emailed to HLA's office inbox.
• Event RSVPs. If you RSVP to a free event while signed in, we record your name and email against that event so the office can see who is attending. You can cancel your RSVP.
• Sign-in. Member sign-in is handled by Clerk (see "Who handles your information"). Clerk holds your email address and sign-in details. If you choose to sign in with Google, Google shares your basic profile with Clerk.
• Membership application and profile. When you apply or update your profile we collect your name, phone number, membership tier, and the details you choose to give us: bar number, year of licensure, employer or firm, law school, undergraduate or graduate institution, states where you are licensed, other bar associations you belong to, a former role (such as judge or clerk), whether you are a member of a Divine Nine (NPHC) organization, committee, section and affinity-group interests, how you heard about HLA, and the name of any board member who referred you. We also record the date and time you accepted the membership attestation.
• Dues and payments. See "Payments" below.
• Attorney directory. See "The attorney directory" below.
• Existing member records. Records of members who joined before this site existed were moved over from HLA's previous membership system. They hold the same kinds of information listed above.

• To run your membership: confirm your standing, process dues, show you your portal and let you update your details.
• To run HLA: manage events, committees and sections, answer your messages, and keep a record of who attended and who paid.
• To email you. We send membership messages (welcome, dues renewal reminders, receipts and notices from the office).
• To keep the site secure and working.

We do not sell your personal information.

The public attorney directory is opt-in. Nothing about you is published there unless you ask to be listed from your member portal. When you ask, the site creates a pending listing from your member record and the details you give (name, firm, practice areas, phone, email, website, whether you are accepting clients). A listing is reviewed by HLA officers before it appears publicly, and nothing is public until they approve it.

Once approved, anyone on the internet can see what is in your listing, including your phone number and email address. HLA shares the directory with the community and with the NAACP for attorney referrals.

You can remove yourself at any time from your portal. Removing yourself deletes the listing from the public site and clears your consent. Copies already collected by search engines or others may remain outside our control.

Membership dues are paid by card through Stripe. Your card number is entered on Stripe's payment page and is handled by Stripe. It is not stored on HLA's site or in our member records. We keep the identifiers Stripe gives us (such as a customer and subscription reference) and your payment status so we can show your standing and send renewal reminders. Some payments, such as checks or cash, are recorded by the office by hand, with the amount, method, date and a reference.

Sponsorship donations, scholarship breakfast tickets and similar items are sometimes paid through other providers (for example Intuit QuickBooks Payments and Give Lively). Those pages are run by those providers under their own privacy policies.

We use these service providers to run the site. Each receives only what it needs to do its job.

• Cloudflare hosts and delivers the site.
• Sanity stores the site's content and our member records. Member records are kept in a private database that is not available to the public.
• Clerk handles sign-in and sessions.
• Stripe processes card payments.
• Resend sends our email from the site.
• Mailchimp holds your name, email address and membership tier tag for HLA's mailing list. If you unsubscribe, we do not add you back.

Member information can be seen by HLA officers and the office team according to their role. For example, only certain officers can approve directory listings or handle dues. We may also disclose information if the law requires it, or to protect HLA's rights and members' safety.

We keep information for as long as we need it to run HLA's membership and activities. You can ask us to delete your information at any time (see "Your choices").

• You can update your profile details in your member portal.
• You can remove your attorney directory listing at any time from your portal.
• You can unsubscribe from marketing email using the link in any message. Membership notices about your account may still be sent.
• You can ask HLA to correct or delete your information through the contact form on this site.

Member records are stored in a private database, access to the site's admin area is limited to signed-in officers with a role, and payments are handled by Stripe. No system is perfectly secure, and we cannot guarantee absolute security.

The site is for adults and professionals. It is not directed to children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect their information.

We may update this policy. Last updated October 14, 2026.