Legal Services NYC Announces Launch of New Equal Rights Initiative

January 20, 2014, New York, NY— Legal Services NYC (LSNYC) is pleased to announce the launch of our new Equal Rights Initiative (ERI), which will develop and support advocacy and litigation to fight discriminatory policies and practices affecting LSNYC clients. The ERI will work in collaboration with advocates from LSNYC neighborhood offices and community-based organizations around New York City to address systemic inequality in New York City’s lowest-income communities.

The Equal Rights Initiative is an expansion of LSNYC’s Language Access Project, which over the past seven years has protected the rights of low-income limited English proficient (LEP) New Yorkers by challenging discriminatory practices and raising awareness of language rights as an important civil rights issue. The Language Access Project, which will become part of the ERI, is a nationally-recognized model that has successfully advocated for expanded rights to translation and interpretation services at City and State agencies for LEP people. The ERI will build on the Language Access Project’s model, but will move beyond language discrimination to challenge a broad array of discriminatory practices based on race, gender, disability, sexual orientation and other protected categories.

The Equal Rights Initiative will work in close partnership with community-based organizations to raise awareness of the broad anti-discrimination protections available in New York City, and to train staff and community members on advocacy strategies to address discriminatory practices. The ERI will accept individual cases on behalf of clients who have faced discrimination in housing, city agencies and other public accommodations, and in the workplace. The ERI will also seek to address discriminatory policies that affect our clients by partnering with community groups to address city-wide problems.

“New York City has some of the strongest civil rights laws in the nation, and many people don’t know about them,” said ERI Coordinator Amy Taylor. “The Equal Rights Initiative will be a hub for coordinating advocacy on all types of discrimination issues affecting our clients. This will increase our capacity as an organization to address discrimination in a variety of contexts and across our practice areas. Most importantly, the ERI, in partnership with community groups, will identify systemic problems facing low-income New Yorkers and address them through coordinated litigation or other advocacy initiatives.”

Raun Rasmussen, LSNYC’s Executive Director, said: “We are especially pleased to announce the launch of the Equal Rights Initiative on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday and during the 50th Anniversary of the War on Poverty. There is no better time to renew our determination to fight for civil rights and against inequality.”

The Equal Rights Initiative is supported by funding from the Bernard F. and Alva V. Gimbel Foundation, Inc., and the Scherman Foundation. For more information about the ERI, please contact Amy Taylor at 646.442.3664 or [email protected].

About Legal Services NYC

Legal Services NYC fights poverty and seeks justice for low-income New Yorkers. For more than 40 years, we have challenged systemic injustice and helped clients meet basic needs for housing, access to high-quality education, health care, family stability, and income and economic security. LSNYC is the largest civil legal services provider in the country, with deep roots in all of the communities we serve. Our neighborhood-based offices and outreach sites across all five boroughs help more than 60,000 New Yorkers annually.

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