wants to bring on someone else and the short answer is other than the person who created the power of attorney, no one else can make changes so for example, my brother can't come back and say I should have been made a power of attorney; we can't go ahead and change it. There are other options to have other people in the decision making process or hold the attorney accountable. So to appoint others the attorney may actually permit a delegation or assignment. More often than not, I find they are silent on this but sometimes they do mention it and I think it can be useful to mention it. I actually had a client who was very upset because one daughter was relying on one daughter so heavily that the other daughters perception was that she wasn't just relying on her, she was delegating her job to her so that was not okay. So instead it can be useful to address delegation right in the document. For example, I had a client where she directly said my daughter in law should be involved. She is not an attorney but she needed to be involved to help explain the medical terminology and to play a useful role to support the attorney and that can be useful if there's anticipated that there may be some kind of family disagreement so that if this happens there can be a resolution using this third party. To involve others the attorney can still seek input whether it be with attorneys, accountants etc and in fact under the substitute decision makers act there can be legal requirements to consult with supporting family members who are in consistent contact with the incapable person. There are options to involve other people if the attorney wants to seek that input. The attorney however can be held accountable through a process called passing of accounts that involves going to court and having the attorney show the records of what decisions have been made and what's been done if there's a concern that the attorney is exploiting the loved one and of course police can always be called if there's a concern about theft or elder abuse and someone can apply to become a guardian and outrank the attorney and that can be through the courts but it's an option in the event that someone is taking advantage of their position as an attorney and somebody else thinks they need to be held accountable so the bottom line is there are options that the law provides even if we can't add on others or get ourselves placed on. Mary- Excellent and my final question is, how can some of the risks of appointing multiple attorneys be mitigated? Lisa- That is such an important question because it's proactive rather than reactive. This is where a lot of problems can be resolved. In my practice often people come to me for advice and the family is already in conflict and I do often think to myself if only the power of attorney had addressed XX?! Often we view the POA as the cherry on top of doing a will and I wish that weren't so. There's so much that can go into the document and it should be considered stand alone as its own important legal document. I will give you a number of examples that would help to avoid issues if appointing multiple power of attorneys. One is the tie breaking clause…examples like mediation, veto power, third part decision maker and there are a number of options. Don't' leave them stuck to resolve the situation as it can become time consuming, expensive and nasty so definitely give instructions about how to deal with those situations. Another way to mitigate risk is like thinking through there is joint and several which is legal terminology that lawyers can explain to them but the short of it is thinking through whether the decisions can be made independently or if they must be unanimous, whether checks and balances are desirable or whether that independence is desirable for convenience. There isn't always one right answer but it's important to think through for your family to see what is right for the people having to