Author: cunylaw

The American Bar Association (ABA) Standing Committee on the Delivery of Legal Services has named CUNY School of Law’s Community Legal Resource Network (CLRN) as the recipient of the 2010 Louis M. Brown Award for Legal Access.

“CUNY Law is proud of CLRN and its dual mission of fostering access to justice to low-income communities and providing ongoing support to CUNY Law graduates in solo and small practices working in low-income communities,” said CUNY Law Dean Michelle J. Anderson. “CLRN fits squarely with CUNY Law’s aim of law in the service of human needs and we are proud to receive this prestigious award.”

The Louis M. Brown Award recognizes innovative programs that meet the legal needs of those who do not qualify for legal aid yet still aren’t able to afford typical legal fees. In recognizing CLRN, Committee Chair Richard Cassidy noted, “CLRN is a highly innovative program that is changing the face of legal services and at the same time strengthening the communities where these services are provided.” The ABA Committee also expressed interest in replicating CLRN as a model.

CLRN, which has been run by CUNY Law CLRN Director Fred Rooney since its inception in 1998, is a peer-support network of more than 300 CUNY Law alums providing low-bono legal services to their communities. CLRN’s programs are specifically designed to support CUNY Law School graduates as they set up and run solo or small-group practices devoted to serving pressing needs of the poor and disadvantaged in communities that are underserved by lawyers.

CLRN member attorneys range from recent graduates to attorneys in practice over 20 years, practicing in diverse public interest areas including domestic violence, human rights, elder law, immigration, foreclosure prevention, labor and employment rights, landlord/tenant, and criminal defense.

“I am honored to accept this award on behalf of CLRN,” said CLRN Director Fred Rooney. “And, I’m encouraged by the ABA’s interest in working together to explore ways to replicate CLRN’s model.” Internationally, under Rooney’s direction, CLRN has expanded and is now being replicated at Symbiosis Law School in Pune, India. Rooney is also in discussions with law schools in Spain, Israel, and Palestine about how to create CLRN-like programs.

Under Rooney’s leadership, CLRN established an Incubator for Justice project that trains CLRN members, over an 18-month period, in basic business issues such as billing, record-keeping, technology, bookkeeping, and taxes while, at the same time, facilitating Incubator participants’ involvement in larger justice initiatives. Incubator participants are also trained in landlord/tenant, immigration and other areas of the law that are likely to surface as they build their practices.

CLRN also has an active listserv through which member attorneys share their work product, pose questions to colleagues on substantive areas of law or procedural matters in various local jurisdictions, or simply find referrals for clients. “Fred has been at the forefront of developing visionary programs that support CUNY Law graduates,” said Dean Anderson. “CLRN is a tremendous example of how we can continue creating a path to social justice through affordable lawyering.”

Rooney will accept the Louis M. Brown Award on behalf of CLRN at the Committee’s meeting in Orland, Florida on February 5th.

ABOUT CUNY School of Law: Based in Queens, NY, CUNY School of Law is the premier public interest law school in the country. It trains lawyers to serve the underprivileged and disempowered and to make a difference in their communities. CUNY Law consistently ranks among the top 10 law schools in the country in clinical education and has been recognized as being one of the top 10 public interest law schools nationwide. Its pedagogy has been heralded by the Carnegie Foundation for its integration of theory and practice. The Princeton Review ranks CUNY Law as having the fourth most diverse law faculty in the nation. It also ranks CUNY Law in the top10 in the nation for best professors, most welcoming to older students, and most liberal student body.

Contact: Vivian Todini, Communications Director: 718-340-4530

Prof. Robson will be among the panelists at a daylong symposium “From Page to Practice: Broadening the Lens for Reproductive and Sexual Rights.” The symposium brings together leading scholars and practitioners to analyze and address the intersections of legislation, litigation, organizing and education and their connections to securing reproductive and sexual rights. The conference is sponsored by New York University’s Review of Law and Social Change and will take place on February 12, 2010.

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CUNY Law Professor Maria Arias has been appointed to the Family Court. Judge Arias, who has in-depth expertise in issues affecting families and battered women, will preside in Queens County court over custody, visitation and orders of protection cases.

Professor Maria Arias

“Professor, and now Judge, Arias brings tremendous expertise to her new position. Her talent, legal acumen and deep knowledge of family law will bring tremendous value and worth to the Court,” said CUNY Law Dean Michelle J. Anderson. “We are proud of her accomplishment and will miss her presence at the Law School,” she added.

Judge Arias joined CUNY Law almost twenty years ago as a faculty member. During her time at the Law School, she co-founded and co-taught the Battered Women’s Rights Clinic (BWRC). “Judge Arias will bring to the court her strong commitments to the dignity and voice of indigent women in New York City and to the development of young attorneys,” said CUNY Law’s Clinic Director Sameer Ashar. “Her expertise, particularly as it relates to issues affecting immigrants and women of color, shaped the work of our students for almost two decades and for that we are deeply grateful.”

CUNY Law Professor Sue Bryant, with whom Judge Arias co-founded the BWRC, added, “Literally thousand of women and children are in safer homes today as a result of Maria’s work training advocates and representing clients. Maria saw the humanity in everyone she interacted with including her adversaries and their clients. I am sure she will put her deep understanding of families and compassion for their struggles to use as she assumes her judgeship in the Family Court.”

Director of CUNY Law’s Criminal Defense Clinic, Steve Zeidman, who also serves on the Mayor’s Advisory Committee on the Judiciary, comments that, “The Family Court became a better place the very second that Maria Arias was appointed to the Court. Her limitless reservoir of compassion, her ever-present sense of empathy, and her overarching concerns for fairness make her uniquely qualified to be a judge.”

Judge Arias is a member of the Queens Working Group of the Lawyers Committee Against Domestic Violence. She has also received numerous awards for her work on behalf of battered women, most recently The Haywood Burns and Shanara Gilbert Award from the Northeast People of Color Legal Scholarship Conference. Among other articles, Judge Arias co-wrote Case Study: A Battered Women’s Rights Clinic, Designing A Clinical Program Which Encourages A Problem Solving Vision Of Lawyering, 42 Wash. U. J. Urb. & Contemp. L. 207 (1992).

In addition to traditional lawyering and academics, Judge Arias is distinguished by her commitment to forging an innovative approach to pedagogy and to community advocacy. In her work, she advocated for holistic community development strategies to counter domestic violence that combined education, prevention and alternatives to criminalization. While at CUNY Law, she was centrally involved in the Law School’s Contemplative Lawyering Program, which teaches students stress management tools, such as meditation and yoga. CUNY Law Professor Victor Goode, who worked closely with Judge Arias in the Contemplative Lawyering Program said, “”Maria has been a wonderful friend and colleague. Co-teaching with her has truly been a great learning experience for me and I look forward to Judge Arias bringing her ‘contemplative lawyering’ skills from the clinic and classroom into the Queens Family Court. I’m sure that the compassion that she brings to her work will make the usually difficult experience of being in court better for all who are involved.”

Judge Arias received her J.D. from New York University where she was a Root-Tilden Scholar. Upon graduation, she joined the Community Law Offices in East Harlem, where she represented low-income tenants in housing court. Subsequently, she worked for the Council of New York Law Associates (now the NY Lawyers Alliance) where she represented tenant groups involved in the conversion of abandoned housing tenements into low-income housing cooperatives.

Contact: Vivian Todini, Director of Communications, 718-340-4530