SPEAKER PROFILE

Melissa Melewsky is Media Law Counsel for the Pennsylvania NewsMedia Association. She provides legal advice and advocacy to newspapers across the Commonwealth on a wide range of legal topics affecting the newspaper industry. Melissa also advocates for newspapers as an amicus curiae in the Pennsylvania judicial system in cases affecting the newspaper industry including access to government records and meetings, First Amendment rights, and defamation. Melissa has been a guest lecturer throughout the Commonwealth for media and civic organizations as well as government agencies and the court system on the Right to Know Law, the Sunshine Act and other laws that affect the media industry. She is a former co-chair of the Pennsylvania Bar Association’s Bar Press Committee and is currently an active member.  Prior to joining the Association, Melissa was the judicial law clerk to the Honorable William Harvey Wiest, Northumberland County Court of Common Pleas. She received a B.A. in Telecommunications from the Pennsylvania State University and a J.D. from Widener University School of Law.