Steven M. Fast
smfast@daypitney.com

West Hartford
Blue Back Square
75 Isham Road, Suite 300
West Hartford, CT 06107
T: (860) 313 5724
F: (860) 331 8901

Steven M. "Steve" Fast – Partner

Professional Experience

Steve Fast, resident in the firm's West Hartford office, works on estate planning and estate and trust administration and litigation, particularly when there is a family issue or business involved or corporate benefits to be considered. He is a partner in Day Pitney's Individual Clients Department, and his work has ranged from representing CEOs of Fortune 100 companies and business owners to pro bono work for the homeless. He has worked with tax and personal planning devices ranging from gifts of stock options to "ethical wills" setting forth personal values.

Steve has taught estate and gift tax at the University of Connecticut School of Law and presented papers at professional meetings in Atlanta, Boston, San Francisco, Chicago, Washington, and other cities for the American Law Institute-American Bar Association Committee on Continuing Professional Education, the University of Connecticut Law School, the American Bar Association, the Connecticut Bar Association, the Federal Tax Institute of New England, and the Connecticut Society of Certified Public Accountants. Quoted in Forbes and Business Week, he has written for CCH, Practical Lawyer, ALI-ABA Estate Planning Course Materials Journal, Probate & Property, and Trusts and Estates.

Steve has chaired the Connecticut Bar Association's Trusts and Estates Section Executive Committee and co-chaired the Business and Investment Entities Committee of the Probate and Trust Law Section of the American Bar Association. He has also contributed to the drafting of Connecticut's Prudent Investor Act and its Principal and Income Act. Steve is a fellow of the American College of Trust and Estate Counsel. He graduated from Dartmouth College as a Choate Scholar and from Columbia Law School as a Stone Scholar.

Practice Areas

News, Publications & Presentations

  • Featured, "Seventy-six Day Pitney Lawyers Named to Best Lawyers for 2011," Day Pitney Press Release, August 9, 2010
  • Speaker, "Representing Estate and Trust Beneficiaries and Fiduciaries," 13th Annual Advanced ALI-ABA Course of Study for the Estate Planner, Litigator, and Corporate Fiduciary Counsel, July 15-16, 2010
  • Featured, "Fifty-Six Day Pitney Partners Recognized as New England Super Lawyers," Day Pitney Press Release, October 30, 2009
  • Featured, "Seventy Seven Day Pitney Partners Named to Best Lawyers 2010," Day Pitney Press Release, July 30, 2009
  • "Estate Planning Update," Day Pitney Newsletter, December 2008
  • Featured, "75 Day Pitney Partners Named Among The Best Lawyers in America® 2009 Ranked #1 in New Jersey and #2 in Connecticut," Day Pitney Press Release, December 11, 2008
  • Speaker, "Seeking Uniformed Consent to the Routine: Is It Self-Dealing?" ALI-ABA Course of Study, Representing Estate and Trust Beneficiaries and Fiduciaries, San Francisco, July 17-18, 2008
  • Speaker, "Prudence: From Fuzzy to Precise," ALI-ABA Course of Study, Representing Estate and Trust Beneficiaries and Fiduciaries, Boston, July 19-20, 2007
  • Speaker, "Hunting for the Best Courtroom - Situs Concerns in Litigation," American College of Trust and Estate Counsel, Providence, October 14, 2006
  • Speaker, "Whose Trust Is It Anyway? (With Sample Trust Provisions)," ALI-ABA Course of Study, Representing Estate and Trust Beneficiaries and Fiduciaries, Chicago, July 13-14, 2006
  • Speaker, "Drafting and Administering the Special Needs Trust," ALI-ABA Course of Study, Representing Estate and Trust Beneficiaries and Fiduciaries, San Francisco, July 21-22, 2005
  • Speaker, "Ethical Quicksand for Fiduciaries and Counsel," ALI-ABA Course of Study, Representing Estate and Trust Beneficiaries and Fiduciaries, New Orleans, February 10-11, 2005
  • Speaker, "Risk and the Private Foundation Trustee: From Sleepy to Sleepless," ALI-ABA Course of Study, Representing Estate and Trust Beneficiaries and Fiduciaries, Boston, July 1-2, 2004
  • Speaker, "Aggressive Drafting to Tilt the Playing Field Your Way," ALI-ABA Course of Study, Representing Estate and Trust Beneficiaries and Fiduciaries, Chicago, July 17-18, 2003
  • Co-author, "Can Everybody Be Happy? Distributing Trusts Wisely," ABA Trusts & Investments, May/June 2003
  • Co-author, "Get Real or Get Out," Trusts & Estates, 2003
  • Co-author, "Drafting to Excess (With Sample Clauses)," ALI-ABA Course Materials Journal, 2003
  • Speaker, "Living with the Total Return Litigation Threat," ALI-ABA Course of Study, Representing Estate and Trust Beneficiaries and Fiduciaries, San Francisco, July 18-19, 2002
  • Speaker, "Structuring Trusts to Avoid Beneficiary Dissatisfaction," ALI-ABA Course of Study, Representing Estate and Trust Beneficiaries and Fiduciaries, Boston, July 26-27, 2001
  • Speaker, "Walking the Line Between Protecting the Trustee and Protecting the Beneficiary," ALI-ABA Course of Study, Representing Estate and Trust Beneficiaries and Fiduciaries, Boston, July 26-27, 2001
  • Speaker, "Estate Planning for Business Owners," American Bar Association, Annual Meeting, Chicago, 2001
  • Speaker, "New Frontier of Fiduciary Liability Where Principal and Income Blur in the New Principal and Income Act," ALI-ABA Course of Study, Representing Estate and Trust Beneficiaries and Fiduciaries, Chicago, June 29-30, 2000
  • Speaker, "The Practical Response: Representing the Fiduciary," ALI-ABA Course of Study, Representing Estate and Trust Beneficiaries and Fiduciaries, Chicago, June 29-20, 2000
  • Speaker, "Underlying Principles in Representation Issues: Conflicting Signals with Conflict of Interest," ALI-ABA Course of Study, Representing Estate and Trust Beneficiaries and Fiduciaries, Chicago, June 29-20, 2000
  • Co-author, "Converting a Corporation to an LLC-and Conversion Bypass with Parallel Structure," Probate & Property, 2000
  • Co-author, "A Primer for the Lawyer (with Sample Clauses)," The Practical Lawyer, September 1999
  • Co-author, "Adjusting to the Power to Adjust: Distortion as the key to exercising a major new trustee power," Connecticut Banking Magazine, Summer 1999
  • Speaker, "Gift and Estate Planning with 'Intentionally Defective' Grantor Trusts," Federal Tax Institute of New England, Inc., Boston, May 1, 1999
  • Co-author, "Trustee Powers of Amendment," ALI-ABA Course Materials Journal, 1999
  • Speaker, "Trustee Powers of Amendment," ALI-ABA Course of Study, Sophisticated Estate Planning Techniques, Boston, September 10-11, 1998
  • Speaker, "Counseling Fiduciaries on Dealing with Receipts and Releases; Requests for Resignation; Conflicts of Interest with Co-Fiduciaries; and Discharge from Tax Liabilities," Massachusetts Continuing Legal Education, Inc., Boston, June 25-26, 1998
  • Co-author, "Simplifying Estate Planning Documents: A New Idea for Reform," Probate & Property, 1998
  • Co-author, "The Family Buy-Sell Agreement: A Trap for the Unwary Estate Planner Who Fails to Consider Use of the Life Estate," Estates and Probate Newsletter, 1995
  • Co-author, "Administration of Insolvent Estates in Connecticut," Connecticut Bar Journal, 1995
  • Co-author, "Keeping it in the Family," Hartford Business Journal, June 20, 1994
  • Speaker, "Marital Deduction: Interaction with Unified Credit, GST Tax, and Fiduciary Responsibility," ALI-ABA Course of Study, Marital Deduction Skills Workshop, May 31, 1991
  • Speaker, "Sheltering the Credit Shelter Trust," Connecticut Bar Association, Will Drafting: Planning in Less Certain Times, February 15, 1991

Education

  • Columbia Law School, J.D.
  • Dartmouth College, A.B.

Admissions

  • State of Connecticut

Awards and Achievements