last post

Just finished the last workshop - on Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF). The big problem is the continued push for caseload reduction. The speakers proposed shifting the debate and reframing the discussion towards how do we improve the economy of each state by better training and educating workers to meet the demands of the economy. This can help maintain folks in 4 year colleges, etc., to pull out of the TANF cycle.

Overall, a good conference, lots of new ideas, some decent networking, and I am looking forward to bringing back what I've learned to LAN.

Dave

last day

Today is the last day of the conference.

There are going to be two sets of workshops this morning, and the conference ends around Noon. Spoke with Jon Baird from the statewide non-LSC program in New Hampshire at breakfast about advocacy issues.

I am right now in a workshop called "Representing low-wage workers in employment law cases."

Sharon Dietrich from Community Legal Services in Philadelphia spoke first. They have an excellent employment law program. Interestingly, the majority of their referrals come from the criminal records division in Phila. These involve former prisoners who have been denied employment opportunities because of their criminal records. They are also handling a lot of occupational license cases, Family Medical Leave Act cases, and so on.

She does very few employment discrimination cases, as they tend to demand a lot of resources and the results are usually very limited. They did handle one case in which a person involved in a welfare-to-work program had a worker say to her, "if you don't sleep with me, I will get you sanctioned from welfare." They got a good settlement on this case.

Wireless is pretty sketchy in this room, so I'll quickly post this and get out.

Dave

yesterday's last session

Attended an informal workshop on policy advocacy yesterday afternoon. Nice mix of LSC and non-LSC programs. We agreed to set up a listserv to share strategies. I think Don Saunders of NLADA has volunteered me to help do it.

One thought I had about something that should be done in NE: Texas recently got their workers compensation laws changed to include farmworkers. New Mexico is now doing the same thing. In many states, farmworkers are excluded from comp , and this list includes Nebraska. May be an area for advocacy in the future.

Dave

guaranteed right to counsel in civil cases, 2

One thought I had was to make an economic argument to the legislature in the context of federal benefits: guarantee a right to counsel where the loss of the federal benefit (e.g. SSI cessation) would impact the state treasury (e.g. beneficiary will now be more dependent on state funds, etc.) and there's no private bar that would have an economic incentive to take the case (e.g. in SSI cessation cases, when the beneficiary maintains continuing benefits pending appeal, there's no retroactive underpayment from which to withhold attorneys fees...)

Dave

guaranteed right to counsel in civil cases

I am now at a panel about the guaranteed right to counsel in civil cases. Also known as "Civil Gideon", this movement:

"urges federal, state, and territorial governments to provide legal counsel as a matter of right at public expense to low income persons in those catergories of adversarial proceedings where basic human needs are at stake, such as those involving shelter, sustenance, safety, health or child custody, as determined by each jurisdiction." (From the American Bar Association Resolution on the matter passed August 7, 2006.)

Interesting to think how this may be applied in Nebraska.

Dave

lunch panel on the political situation

During lunch (at which I drank too much caffeine) there was a panel of policy folks on what's likely to happen in 2009. Things are looking good on the non-federal, non-LSC funding restrictions front for that year. Other hopeful signs are in agency regulations and implementation. Things are not looking good for comprehensive immigration reform.

TANF reauthorization will be up in 2010, and a lot good can occur there.

An attorney from North Carolina said we should all get behind a manifesto stating our opposition to poverty which would involve simultaneous press conferences in all 50 states. Folks were into that.

Dave

education

Now they are discussing how South Carolina passed a law preventing illegal immigrants from accessing any post-secondary education.

There's a push to have this occur in other states as well...

Dave

ICE raids

Tanya Broder from NILC is talking about possible responses to recent and expected ICE raids. These are "enforcement actions" in which major employers of immigrants are raided for "violations" of federal law. The strategy is to tell the stories about families being broken up when parents are taken away from their kids, etc.

Some states are "filling the gaps" in providing help to these families.

This really applies in the heartland. I am recalling recent raids at the Swift plant in Grand Island, as well as the recent raid in Postville, Iowa.

Dave

local enforcement of immigration enforcement

Arguments against involving local law enforcement in immigration laws: When you involve local and state police, you hinder public safety. Victims won't come forward. There will be widespread racial profiling. Often local police are against mandated enforcement as it stretches their resources thin. They can't enforce criminal laws if they have to spend time enforcing federal civil immigration laws. Oregon actually has a state law BANNING local law enforcement of immigration law. NILC's website has information about state and local laws that are out there.

Dave

more on e-verify

Found this on the e-verify website:

What's New
Information for Federal Contractors
The Executive Order (Amending Executive Order 12989) dated June 9th, 2008, instructs federal agencies to require contractor participation in E-Verify, and the proposed rule provides detailed guidance on how that requirement is to be implemented. However, the proposed rule is not a final rule; it is a proposal that is open for public comment at this time.
Please see the press release dated June 9, 2008 " DHS Designates E-Verify as Employment Eligibility Verification System for All Federal Contractors" linked below. For more information on how this Executive Order impacts your company, as an organization who engages in contracts with the federal government see "Federal Contractors Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)" linked below.

e-verify/immigration

The next topic is state laws requiring e-verify for employment. This would require employers to "verify" against a federal database whether an individual applying for employment has a valid Social Security number. The problem is that e-verify is only 90% accurate.

California passed a law that has the effect of rejecting e-verify in the state. Other states are looking at requiring e-verify.

Dave

Immigration panel

They are talking about legislation being introduced in various states to deny public benefits and access to education to immigrants. The model was an Oklahoma bill. This effort succeeded in some states, but failed in Nebraska in the last session. Go Huskers!

Dave

Immigration panel

This panel is about fighting state and local restrictions on Services for Immigrants. The panelists are with national organizations who advocate on immigration issues. I asked them to address what LSC funding programs can do. Just doing introductions now. Audience members are all reflecting on rising anti-immigrant sentiments in their states and community.

I raised the recent Fremont, NE issue that their city council is addressing, which would authorize local law enforcement to enforce federal immigration laws. A lot of that is happening nationwide.

Vivek Malhotra of the ACLU immigration project is beginning the presentation.

More to come...

Dave

multi-party litigation without class action - 2

Need to also look up state "Private Attorney General Act" if there is one.

Dave

multi-party litigation without class action

Good morning!

I was able to find wireless in a session, so I am actually blogging directly from a workshop. This is primarily geared to LSC-funded programs who are restricted from filing class actions by LSC regs. It answers the question, how do you achieve class-wide relief without filing a class action?

Sarah Somers of the National Health Law Program spoke first.

One major tool is challenging state regulatory agency decisions using the state Administrative Procedures Act. State APAs vary somewhat, but they basically require that any regulation or rule promulgated by a state agency must be published for comment before it is enacted, otherwise the state agency has abused its discretion. If you can proceed with one or a few plaintiffs in challenging a rule, and get the rule invalidated for violating the State APA, there is class-wide relief, even though you have not filed a class action.

The other two speakers are both attorneys from California. They do some good work but most of their references are to state laws which provide protections that I don't think exist in Nebraska. One is a "writ" or "mandamus" law, where any "interested person" can challenge an illegal state agency action. Another is a "aggreived taxpayer law" which allows any taxpayer to sue to challenge wasteful tax money spending. In both cases, you don't need a specific harmed plaintiff.

Sarah Somers mentions that state Protection and Advocacy organizations (federally funded) have automatic organizational standing in disability rights cases.

Dave

more SF posts

I've attached a few more pictures of SF at night.

I am also mourning George Carlin's death. Outside of the countless film, tv, and audio forums in which I've appreciated his skewed comedy, I remember having the chance in college (in the '80s) to see him live at the State Theatre in New Brunswick, NJ. RIP to George Carlin.

predatory, non-mortgage loans

I continued my focus on consumer issues by attending this session. The two presenters were Stuart Rossman, litigation director of NCLC and Michael Eakin, litigation director of Montana Legal Services Association.

Non-mortgage predatory loans include payday lenders, rent-to-own, internet payday lenders, bank "check bounce loans", etc. According to Stu Rossman, there are over 22,000 payday lenders in the United States, twice the number of McDonalds restaurants! It is a $28 billion industry.

The new thing is internet payday lending. Even if your state, such as Ohio, has outlawed payday lending by restricting APRs to a modest 35% (from 1400% which is effectively what payday lenders charge), individuals can still end up getting payday loans over the internet, where the lender is in another state, and the bank may be incorporated in another country! Stu gave the example of a client in Boston (Massachusetts does not allow payday lending) who went on the internet and got a payday loan from a company in Chattanooga, TN, but the bank underwriting the loan was in Grenada! (remember we invaded them in the 80s? It's payback time!)

Another major problem is check bounce loans. This is when an account gets overdrawn due to an ATM or debit transaction, and the bank "covers" the amount, but then charges you fees and interest. These fees can be upwards of $35 PER TRANSACTION. Stu gave an example of a California case: It was December 31, New Years Eve. A woman left work at Noon, and, since she got paid via direct deposit on the 15th and the last day of each month, assumed she had money in her account. She went and got her dress from the dry cleaners for NYE celebrations, then went to the grocery to buy cheese and crackers, and then went to the liquor store to get a bottle of champagne. Unbeknownst to her, the bank did not count her paycheck as deposited until 5pm that day. She therefore "overdrew" her account at the drycleaners, and the bank assessed her a $35 fee. They assessed her another $35 at the grocer, and then ANOTHER $35 at the liquor store, for a total of about $115. Then, at 5pm, when her check was considered deposited, they recouped the fees! If you consider the amount she spent at the three merchants as being about $30, the cost of her loan was almost 400% for a five-hour period! Stu quipped that there isn't a calculator that can figure the APR on that! (My rough calculation was that it was 700,000% APR).

Anyway, NCLC is litigating that case.

Dave

Garnishment workshop part two

Today's garnishment workshop, "Protecting Federal Benefits from Creditors and Defending against Garnishments and Set-offs" was a no-brainer for me to attend, given LAN's work on the issue over the past year. The panel included Johnson Tyler of South Brooklyn Legal Services, who gave advice to LAN attorneys based on his experience as lead counsel in Mayers v. New York Community Bank Corp., et al, in which SBLS sued three banks for freezing the completely exempt account of three plaintiffs. (the case survived the defendents' motion for SJ and is now in discovery). Also on the panel was Gerald McIntyre of the National Senior Citizens Law Center and Darrin Brown of AARP.

Essentially, the issue is this: certain federal benefits are exempt from creditors. Nevertheless, since about 80% of federal benefits are directly deposited into bank accounts by the US Treasury Department, creditors use state garnishment proceedings to freeze bank accounts, putting elderly and other marginalized populations at risk. A lot of the creditors are credit card companies and the debt is often medical. And, the federal government has set as a goal of 100% electronic direct deposit, i.e. no paper checks.

I'll attach a PDF of the outline when I return. Some bright spots are the fact that the feds have said that they will issue proposed REGULATIONS which will alleviate the problem. The buzz is that the feds will issue a bright line rule which says that banks HAVE to look and see if the creditor is trying to attach a protected (i.e. SSI, et al) account, and then protect 2X the benefit rate of that individual from the freeze. E.g., if an individual gets $630/month in SSI, $1260 would automatically be protected from freezing. The good thing about this would be the implicit cost of living adjustment worked in, as SSI and other benefits increase with a COLA every year.

Dave

Garnishment workshop

Great workshop on garnishment this afternoon. More on this later...

Colin Bailey

Younger attorney from Northern California Legal Services. NCLS has incorporated race based advocacy in their entire service delivery. Here is the outline of his talk. I thought it was interesting. I am not sure how well it would translate in Nebraska, where most of our clients are white. I like their focus on getting out into the community. He says, "Don't let your front door determine your client base." Lots of good stuff on GIS and environmental justice.
----

Social cognition and race-based advocacy (RBA) in legal services.

“The Race Equity Project” (REP)

-Education and Support Materials
-Be explicit about race-analysis
-Share and Disseminate
-Race-conscious lens
-RBA tools
-Client empowerment
-Change in the law

Background of REP - 2003
-Prop. 54 – Ward Connerly
-Brown v. Board – 50th anniversary
-Clearinghouse Review – race issues
-All staff retreat
-Colorblindness & Personal Responsibility – staff’s own complicitness
-Social Cognition (SoCog)

Tools:
Social Cognition
Social Frames/Models (white triangle example)
Implicit Association/Unconscious Bias
Fallacy of Content Neutrality
Undisputed science; meaning
Breaks “Blame Frame”
Combat with Consciousness
Implementing SoCog
i. Race-Conscious Case Selection/Intake
ii. Implicit Association Test (IAT)
iii. Cultural Competence/Consciousness
iv. Be explicit about race
1. Clients
2. Decision-makers
Ratify or Remedy Racial Impact
Long process, but it has to start sometime and somewhere--Might as well be now and here
Structural Racialization
Diagnostic tool
Reframing tool
Breaks “Blame frame” – there’s a broken structure that needs to be fixed to get equal opportunity
GIS mapping
GIS
Diagnostic tool
i. Mapping client population
Reframing/advocacy tool
i. Shows race graphically
Led to community lawyering
“Can I present my case graphically?”
Can use maps to even explain the issue to the client. The client often buys into color-blindness and personal responsibility
Community lawyering
Cultivate client advocacy skills
Client-centered, directed advocacy
Get out of the office
Community outreach
i. Dialogue on race
ii. Spend 10% of time out of office at community things.- how to manage??
Litigation
SoCog & Structural Racialization in the Courts
Part of multi-forum advocacy
Cases:
1. Mental Health Payments – public payments for mental health FOIA request – whites received 2X plus mental health services – asked the race question.
2. Annexation & Municipal Services Denied – Rural African American community been seeking annexation which would have led to increased municipal services. Municipality changed the rules for annexation mid-stream – used mapping
3. Inclusionary zoning outreach – Pacific islanders, etc.
4. Natural Gas Storage Facility – env. Justice – proposal to pump into a geological formation potentially hazardous stuff right by a low-income community of color. Used maps to demonstrate
5. Hmong mediation project – recent immigration population – high degree of isolation. Leaders felt frustrated by relations with court system especially in family court. Leaders formed a corporation with legal aid help – the corporation would then train judges in cultural competency.

Lessons learned
Don’t create an elite group – teach tools to all advocates and follow them
Get out of the office – 10% community time – can’t define client population as those that come through your doors
Take the journey with your clients
train periodically and by example
implement change in way that works for you

www.lsnc.net/equity - REP website
Look at Clearinghouse Review article.

Prof. Powell

Excellent talk. This guy is on the cutting edge of thinking through race issues as they play out today. Here's the rough sketch, in which he argues for "systems thinking" in addressing racial discrimination, and against the traditional model:

Traditional model: Victim/perpetrator, with intent, and decision-maker self awareness (transparency of mind). “I’m not Archie Bunker”

Systems Thinking: focuses on a web of relationships and processes and not on a linear, singular causation or the intent of one or even a few individuals. Actions and inactions have multiple effects, and the delayed or distant consequences are often different from more proximate effects. Interdependence of objects and their attributes, holism, goal seeking, transformation of inputs into outputs.

I'll attach my notes later.

Great stuff.

Dave

Kimberly Thomas Rapp

Ms. Rapp is the director of policy advocacy at the Equal Justice Society. She introduced to us the concept of social cognition studies as a scientific basis to understand and address structural racialization in overcoming "intent" in racial discrimination cases. She said, "All of us, regardless of race, have cognitive biases that influence how we perceive and make decisions. The behavior of human beings is often guided by racial and other stereotypes of which we are completely unaware."

As this concept is scientifically-based, it can be used to turn the tide against the intent-based, color-blind status of race discrimination jurisprudence.

She then introduced the keynote speaker, Professor John Powell.

Camille Wood

After Don, Camille Wood, Director of Training & Community Education of NLADA spoke to introduce the morning's panel. The morning session was focused on structural racialism, and getting beyond the intent model of civil rights litigation.

She said that the focus was going to be on "What we can do. We can address issues of race. We have a common history with the civil rights movement, the anti-poverty movement. We must find places where our common advocacy can work together for the common good."

She then introduced the first speaker, Kimberly Thomas Rapp, of the Equal Justice Society.

Sunday morning - Don Saunders

After breakfast and reconnecting with a couple of Jersey folks, I attended the morning sessions. Don Saunders of NLADA started us off with some brief introductory remarks, including a quip about the other conference in the hotel--ironically about wealth management, Anthony Robbins-style. Don seems to be optimistic about the future with the current status of the upcoming elections, and there will be a lunchtime panel tomorrow that will speculate on post-election possibilities for advocacy.

Don said that the faculty for this conference consisted of the best in the states, and he also noted that many in the audience could be faculty. He hoped that the conference would be an opportunity for peer-to-peer dialogue.

SF at night

A quick snapshot of SF at night, from the intersection of Market St. and 4th.

side note on SF

I noticed today that hotels parking garages in SF offer significant discounts (e.g. this one) for drivers of hybrids...any chance of that happening in Omaha?

Dave

post-reception

Just back from the reception. Networked with folks from programs in Idaho and Detroit. The Detroit program, which houses both civil practice AND defender work, has moved ahead significantly on becoming a paperless office. They are going to be converting to Practice Manager case management software in the fall. Since I am looking to set up e-record storage protocol for LAN in the near future, I was happy to make this contact to get more information.

Otherwise, the reception was fairly low key. There are about 200 people registered for this conference and I think about 40 attended the reception. On the bright side, there was hummus!

I learned that the NLADA Civil Impact Leadership conference, which was to have taken place immediately prior to the LADC conference here in SF, has been postponed until February of 2009, and it will take place in Washington, DC. I don't think they told people until after they showed up, it seems.

After breakfast, tomorrow starts with an all-morning session of keynote speakers addressing the topic: "Toward a Transformative Agenda Around Race: Redefining Legal Services Practice for the 21st Century." The main keynote speaker is Professor John A. Powell. I have high expectations!

Dave

on second thought...

There's no way I am going to post all of those materials! I'll make them available to LAN-ers when I get back next week.

Dave

registered, heading to the reception

Just got back from registration. As usual, the NLADA conference materials are on a CD ROM. I will try to get the materials on this blog if/when possible.

Also went for a fairly challenging run around the city. Got the route from here.

Off to the reception!

Dave

arrived in SF

Greetings! The purpose of this blog is to discuss and reflect on this year's National Legal Aid & Defender Association Litigation and Advocacy Directors Conference, being held this year at the Marriott San Francisco. The agenda looks packed, with a primary focus on the current status of race and poverty issues as well as several workshops on hot consumer law matters. I look forward to checking in with thoughts as we go on through the next few days.

The conference starts tonight with a reception, and finishes on June 24.

I flew in to Oakland Airport early this afternoon, and took the BART to SF to save Legal Aid of Nebraska a few bucks. The Powell stop is only a couple of blocks from the hotel, which was great.

More to come!

Dave