Lawyers Fight War on Poverty

The following op-ed by LSNYC Executive Director Raun Rasmussen appeared in the Feb. 14, 2014 New York Law Journal.

In 1964, U.S. Attorney General Robert Kennedy challenged the legal
community "to enlist our skills and ourselves in the unconditional war
on poverty to which President Johnson has summoned us all." He spoke
shortly after the U.S. Supreme Court established a right to counsel for
criminal defendants in Gideon v. Wainright. Kennedy said: "We
have secured the acquittal of an indigent person—only to abandon him to
eviction notices, wage attachments, repossession of goods and
termination of welfare benefits."

Fifty years later, while the effectiveness of the War on Poverty is
being debated, one thing is unassailable: civil legal services have
become an essential part of the fight for equal justice and against
poverty. Legal services help our clients get and keep the bare
essentials of food, shelter, economic security and safety; eliminate
barriers to education, employment and citizenship; and achieve racial,
social and economic justice.

 

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Read the op-ed on the NYLJ website.

 

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While the efforts of the legal community have certainly not eliminated
poverty, they mitigate its impact every day. Without our work, more
low-income New Yorkers would be homeless, victimized by domestic
violence, left without funds to eat or pay bills, and held at the mercy
of predatory lenders and consumer scams. But we only have the resources
to help a small fraction of the people who need legal services to
protect their rights. If New York City's new mayor wants to find ways to
combat social and economic inequality in 2014 and beyond, there are
vibrant legal services programs and partnerships that, if expanded, can
make a big difference in that fight. Our own program, Legal Services
NYC, has long understood the power of those partnerships to fight
poverty.

Starting in the late 1980s, we partnered with The Legal Aid Society,
the New York City Human Resources Administration, and the Department of
Housing Preservation and Development to create eviction prevention
programs for families, seniors and those who live in Single Room
Occupancy hotels. For more than 25 years, these programs have funded
housing advocates in legal services programs throughout the city who
have prevented evictions and homelessness. Without our work, hundreds of
thousands of additional families would have been knocking on the doors
of the city's beleaguered shelter system.

Also in the late 1980s, we worked with The Empire Justice Center, other
legal services providers, and the New York State Office of Temporary
Disability Assistance to create the statewide Disability Advocacy
Project. Advocates funded through this project help thousands of
disabled children and adults every year to get the federal disability
assistance they need, increasing and stabilizing their incomes, and
returning millions of dollars to low-income communities.

For many years, we have joined Safe Horizons, Legal Aid and numerous
community-based social service providers to deliver legal and social
services that protect and empower those experiencing domestic violence
to achieve safety, economic stability, and change their lives. The
Domestic Violence Empowerment Initiative (DOVE) has been instrumental in
helping survivors and their children break the cycle of violence that
so often keeps women and children in poverty.

Since 2005, we have joined with the National Employment Law Project,
the Minkwon Center for Community Action, Legal Aid, MFY Legal Services,
and the private law firm Raff & Becker to provide representation on
Unemployment Insurance (UI) appeals. Our advocates have obtained
millions of dollars in UI benefits for those whose applications were
illegally denied. It is well documented that when those who become
unemployed lose all income, they often drop out of the economy and into a
cycle of chronic unemployment and poverty. Our work is critical in
preventing that downward spiral.

With the largest foreclosure prevention advocacy team in the country,
Legal Services NYC has helped to create and lead a network of lawyers,
paralegals and mortgage counselors who have fought the tidal wave of
foreclosures threatening homeowners and their communities. Through our
partnership with the Center for New York City Neighborhoods, mortgage
counselors, and other legal services providers throughout the state, we
aggressively litigate scores of cases to prevent foreclosures and
develop foreclosure law; provide litigation, training, and management
support to foreclosure prevention legal services and mortgage counseling
programs; and work with the Office of Court Administration to improve
the foreclosure settlement process.

For more than three decades, civil legal services programs have
partnered with pro bono lawyers and non-profit organizations in
low-income neighborhoods to produce new and rehabilitated affordable
housing, expand health care services, provide more childcare, and create
minority and community-owned businesses. This work has created hundreds
of jobs that pay living wages, one of the most important ways to lift
people out of poverty. The Lawyers' Alliance, Brooklyn Legal Services
Corp. A (a former program of Legal Services NYC), Urban Justice Center,
Legal Aid and clinics at various law schools all have vibrant programs
that engage in this important transactional work.

On Veterans Day 2011, we launched the Veterans Justice Project to
provide civil legal services to low-income veterans in all five boroughs
of New York City. With funding from the Robin Hood Foundation and the
State Assembly, we partner with the Urban Justice Center, the City Bar
Justice Center, and numerous veterans' health and social services
facilities to help prevent homelessness and increase incomes for
thousands of veterans, service members, and their families.

Low-income immigrant New Yorkers face particularly daunting problems,
often exacerbated by language challenges. With funding from the New York
City Council and State Assembly, we have worked with Legal Aid, Make
the Road, the New York Immigration Coalition, and numerous other
community-based advocacy and service organizations to provide thousands
of immigrant New Yorkers with legal services that allow them to remain
in the country without fear of deportation, finish school and achieve
economic stability and a pathway to citizenship.

As we did after 9/11, the civil legal services community—with our
partners in the private bar and private foundations—mobilized vast
resources when Superstorm Sandy struck, delivering life-saving legal
services to help storm victims access food stamps, shelter, disaster
unemployment benefits and emergency FEMA benefits. More than a year
after the storm, lawyers continue to represent tenants and homeowners to
restore essential services and recover insurance claims so they can
return to and rebuild their homes.

Finally, since 2002 Law Help New York, managed by Pro Bono Net and a
consortium of civil legal services programs throughout the state, has
provided online legal resources and referral information in more than 30
languages. LawHelp/NY (http://www.lawhelpny.org/) is the largest
website of its kind in the country, and annually helps hundreds of
thousands of low-income New Yorkers navigate the court system, solve
legal problems and find legal services when they need them.

Unfortunately, fewer than one in five low-income New Yorkers who need
legal help can get it due to insufficient funding. The Chief Judge's
Task Force to Expand Access to Civil Legal Services recently stated
that, at current funding levels, "at best, 20 percent of low-income New
Yorkers have a lawyer to assist them in responding to matters involving
life's most basic necessities."

Fortunately, in the face of severe federal and other funding cuts and
the skyrocketing need for help caused by the economic crisis, Chief
Judge Jonathan Lippman has dedicated himself to the fight for equal
justice. In Fiscal Year (FY) 2012, Lippman set aside $27.5 million in
the OCA budget for civil legal services; that allocation increased to
$55 million by FY 2014, and in FY 2015 he has proposed a further
increase.

We are fortunate to have a chief judge who leads the nation in
dedicating critically-needed funds to secure justice for all New
Yorkers, and we now have a mayor who is determined to address inequality
in our city. On the 50th anniversary of War on Poverty, there is no
better time to renew our determination and our efforts.

Raun J. Rasmussen is executive director of Legal Services NYC.