Jeremy Strauss, Legal Administrative Assistant

Each year, Legal Aid partners with Whitman Walker Health to help hundreds of low-income Medicare recipients navigate the complex system of choosing a Medicare prescription drug plan (also known as Medicare Part D). Beneficiaries receiving the hospital (Part A) and medical (Part B) components of Medicare must independently select a Part D plan during the “open season,” which commences slightly earlier than usual this year, running from October 15, 2011 to December 7, 2011. Due to the fact that many plans change their drug coverage formularies from year to year, switching to a new plan that offers the best coverage at the lowest price is often a necessity for many beneficiaries. 

Legal Aid and Whitman Walker, along with attorneys from area law firms working pro bono, will be meeting with Medicare beneficiaries this fall and winter to help them determine – based on their individual drug lists and dosages – the plan that will best meet their needs and to complete the plan enrollment. 

Beginning November 4, Legal Aid will be sponsoring six free walk-in clinics for low-income Medicare beneficiaries:

 Friday, November 4, 2011: 10am – 1pm, at the Legal Aid Society of DC, SE Site
2041 Martin Luther King, Jr. Ave, SE, Room LL-1 – Metro: Anacostia 

Wednesday, November 16, 2011: 1pm – 4pm, at the Legal Aid Society of DC, NW Site
1331 H St., NW, Suite 350 – Metro: Metro Center or McPherson Sq. 

Tuesday, November 29, 2011:  10am – 1pm, at the Legal Aid Society of DC, NW Site
1331 H St., NW, Suite 350 – Metro: Metro Center or McPherson Sq. 

Friday, December 2, 2011: 10am – 1pm, at the Legal Aid Society of DC, SE Site
2041 Martin Luther King, Jr. Ave, SE, Room LL-1 – Metro: Anacostia 

Tuesday, December 6, 2011:  5pm – 7pm, at the Bread for the City, NW Site
1525 Seventh St., NW – Metro: Shaw-Howard University 

Tuesday, December 13, 2011:  9am – Noon, at the Bread for the City, SE Site
1640 Good Hope Road, SE – Metro: Anacostia

 For more information, call (202) 628-1161 and ask for Jeremy Strauss.

David Steib, Staff Attorney

The DC Language Access Coalition, of which the Legal Aid Society of DC is a member organization, is helping to host Many Stories, One Night, an evening celebrating DC’s immigrant communities on Thursday, November 3 from 6-9pm at the Gala Theater in Columbia Heights (3333 14th Street, NW).  

The celebration will include the screening of a short documentary film entitled “Communities in Translation.” The film, created by documentarian Robert Winn, explores the impact of language barriers during emergencies, specifically focusing on the 2008 fire of an apartment building in the Mount Pleasant neighborhood of Washington, DC.  The celebration will also include the release of preliminary findings of “The State of Language Access in D.C.,” a comprehensive report by the DC Language Access Coalition documenting immigrants’ experiences accessing programs, services, and benefits of the DC government. 

Legal Aid Housing Attorney David Steib will be one of the MCs for the evening. Please join us for an evening of food, film, and discussion.  Interpretation and child care will be provided, and we encourage you to spread the word of this event throughout the immigrant community.  The organizers are suggesting a $10 donation to attend the event, but the donation is entirely optional.  

Please come out and show your support for Language Access!

Lucy Newton, Supervising Attorney

We are pleased to announce that Legal Aid will again be participating in a Public Benefits Training series this Fall.  This training series is a partnership between the Legal Aid Society of the District of Columbia, the Washington Legal Clinic for the Homeless, and Whitman-Walker Health Legal Services with support from Bread for the City and DC Hunger Solutions.  We greatly appreciate the DC Bar Pro Bono Program for partnering with us and hosting this training series.

The trainings are free and an opportunity to learn about eligibility, benefits, application procedures, and practical tips on how to help your clients navigate the system.  It is also an opportunity to hear about new developments or policy changes affecting that benefit program.  We encourage case managers, legal services lawyers, pro bono lawyers, or anyone who works with low-income clients to attend these sessions.  

Registration is required – please email Jeremy Strauss at jstrauss@legalaiddc.org with your name and organization name and the sessions that you want to attend.  We have some space limitations and need to provide counts for each training to ensure we have enough copies of materials so please RSVP.  

Quick List of Training Session Dates & Topics:

• Tuesday, September 20, 2011 – SSI / SSDI
• Tuesday, October 4, 2011 – Access to Healthcare: Medicaid/Medicare/DC Healthcare Alliance/QMB/Health Reform
• Thursday, October 27, 2011 – Medicare Parts A, B, C, & D & QMB
• Wednesday, November 9, 2011 – TANF: Cash assistance for poor families
• Friday, December 2, 2011 – Food Assistance: SNAP/Food Stamps, WIC, and other food resources
• Wednesday, December 14, 2011 – Immigrant Eligibility for Public Benefits

 *All sessions are from noon – 2 pm and will be held at the DC Bar, 1101 K Street NW, Washington, DC.

Additional information can be found on this Public Benefits Training Series Flyer – 2011.  Please feel free to share the news of these trainings widely.

David Steib, Staff Attorney

We are delighted to announce that the Legal Aid Society of the District of Columbia was recently awarded a Flom Incubator Grant to help realize the goal of providing specialized representation to tenants with difficult claims in the Housing Conditions Calendar at DC Superior Court. Legal Aid is one of eighteen organizations nationwide to be awarded a Flom Incubator Grant by the Skadden Fellowship Foundation in July 2011.  The Grants are made possible by a generous testamentary bequest of Mr. Joe Flom, the founding trustee of the Skadden Fellowship Foundation, as well as significant donations in Mr. Flom’s memory by Skadden partners and others in the legal community.

Legal Aid’s Flom Incubator Grant allows the Housing Law Unit to focus special attention on litigating cases in the Housing Conditions Calendar in which tenants suffer from bedbug infestations  and mold . The Grant enables Legal Aid to hire expert witnesses, where necessary, to document the problems of mold and bedbugs in our clients’ homes and to testify about them in court. The Grant also allows Legal Aid both to take more of these cases — with the goal of assisting additional tenants — and, eventually, to create helpful precedent that will be useful to tenants throughout the District. 

If you are a tenant struggling to obtain mold remediation or bedbug extermination from your landlord, or if you know such a tenant, please contact Julie Becker (jbecker@legalaiddc.org; (202) 661-5946) or David Steib (dsteib@legalaiddc.org; (202) 386-6675) for more information.

Eric Angel, Executive Director

I am pleased to announce that Chinh Q. Le will be joining Legal Aid as our new Legal Director.  Chinh brings significant experience and expertise to the position.  Most recently, he has been the Director of the Division on Civil Rights for the New Jersey Attorney General’s Office.  As the state’s chief civil rights officer, Chinh oversaw a staff of 70 lawyers, support staff, and administrative personnel in four offices across New Jersey.  He has been responsible for helping to develop New Jersey’s civil rights agenda, as well as managing a docket of hundreds of active housing, employment, and public accommodation matters.

Chinh has a B.A and M.A in American Government from the University of Virginia (1997, 2001) and a J.D. from University of Virginia School of Law (2000).  After graduating from law school, Chinh clerked for the Honorable Walter K. Stapleton of the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit.  He then worked for the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, first as a Skadden Fellow, then as an assistant counsel.  Chinh has also served as an associate at Jenner & Block, an adjunct associate research scholar at Columbia University School of Law and a practitioner-in-residence at Seton Hall University School of Law in the Center for Social Justice.

Chinh and his wife, Vanita Gupta, Deputy Legal Director of the American Civil Liberties Union, have one son.  We look forward to welcoming Chinh at Legal Aid on July 5, 2011.

Eric Angel, Executive Director

Legal Aid is pleased to announce the DC Fiscal Policy Institute (DCFPI) as the 2011 recipient of Legal Aid’s Partnership Award. Legal Aid’s Partnership Award was created to recognize non-legal organizations or individuals whose work directly increases our ability to serve our clients. Ed Lazere, Executive Director of DCFPI, will accept the award on the organization’s behalf at Legal Aid’s Servant of Justice Awards Dinner, scheduled for Tuesday, April 28, 2011 at the JW Marriott Hotel. Brooksley E. Born, of Arnold & Porter, and The Honorable Thomas E. Perez, of the Civil Rights Division of the United States Department of Justice, will be honored at the same event.

The DC Fiscal Policy Institute is an extraordinary resource for anyone concerned about policy analysis in the District. DCFPI conducts research and public education on DC budget and tax, with a particular emphasis on issues that affect low- and moderate-income residents. By preparing timely analyses that are used by organizations such as Legal Aid – as well as policy makers, the media, and the public – DCFPI informs public debates on budget and tax issues and helps to ensure that the needs of lower-income residents are considered in those debates. DCFPI’s areas of work include: analyzing the impact of tax and other revenue policies on the District’s long-term fiscal health and on the equity of its tax system; working to ensure that programs serving low- and moderate-income residents are well designed, effective, and adequately funded; and conducting research on income and poverty trends in the District and on serious problems facing low-income residents, such as the growing shortage of affordable housing.

DCFPI’s extraordinary, sustained commitment to providing accurate, detailed, practical, and effective policy analysis on issues affecting Legal Aid’s client community have been invaluable to our efforts to serve our clients and better protect their rights. One of Legal Aid’s signature advocacy efforts—to preserve and enhance the workings of the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program—is one of among many initiatives that has benefited from DCFPI’s work over the past several years. DCFPI’s research has dispelled damaging myths about District families who rely on TANF, educated policymakers and advocates about best approaches to the program, helped stave off some of the most punitive and ineffective approaches to moving families off TANF, and inspired a program redesign that should be more responsive to the needs of the most vulnerable District families.

 We are truly delighted to be able to present this award to DCFPI and hope that you will join us on April 28 for what promises to be a wonderful event!

Commentary By Barbara Kagan: Raise My Taxes, Please

December 02, 2010 – With the District of Columbia facing a nearly $200 million budget deficit, city hall is receiving lots of advice about how to close the gap. Commentator and longtime District resident Barbara Kagan has a suggestion that might be surprising:

I’ve lived in D.C. for over 30 years. I’m fortunate that, over these years, my family income has gone up. My quality of life has gone up. And now, as D.C. faces an unprecedented fiscal crisis that puts our city at risk, I want my taxes to go up too.

I am one of the District’s high-income earners, one of the thousands of professionals with a household income of more than $200,000 a year. A moderate increase in my taxes is no more than a daily cup of coffee. But it will mean a lot more to this city.

Right now, the District faces a $185 million budget shortfall. Risking funding for programs crucial to continued progress in the city: education reform, public transportation, innovative housing strategies to name a few. The recession has led to a major drop in savings and investment income — and a major increase in unemployment, which has more than doubled in the last three years in the District. All of this has contributed to a drop in tax collections, making it difficult for the city to pay its bills. At the same time, the financial crisis has greatly increased the number of struggling families looking to the D.C. government for help.

More belt-tightening isn’t the answer. Over the last three years, the city has made so many cuts that this year D.C. will spend — adjusted for inflation — $600 million less than in 2008.

Further cuts would cause great harm. Even well-heeled residents will be affected by a decline in those qualities that make them want to live in the city.

Right now, I pay the same tax rate as someone who earns just $40,000 a year, the city’s top tax rate. So someone earning $400,000, or even $4 million, pays the same rate. And high earners pay a lot less as a percentage of income: about 7 percent compared with 10.5 percent for someone earning $45,000 a year.

As D.C. struggles, we have to either do our fair share to keep D.C. moving forward and continue to be able to enjoy all that the city has to offer, or we can simply watch it slip away with a few more dollars in our pockets. The quality of life of upper-income residents of the city cannot in the long run be sustained while so many others struggle to maintain the basic necessities, like food, housing and medical care.

Who wants to sell their house, leave their neighborhood, and move to the suburbs for what amounts to a grande latte a day at Starbucks?

Mayor-elect Gray and Chairman-elect Kwame Brown, I ask you to support a proposal to raise income taxes on people like me.

Click here to listen to this feature: http://wamu.org/news/10/12/02.php#39024.

We thank Barbara and so many members of the legal community for their steadfast support of access to justice.

Eric Angel, Acting Executive Director

Legal Aid’s work with low-income clients facing foreclosure was highlighted in an article in today’s Washington Examiner.  Many thanks to the Neighbors in Need Fund of the Community Foundation for the National Capital Region for the support that helps to make this work possible.

Jennifer Mezey, Supervising Attorney

In partnership, Legal Aid Society of DC, Washington Legal Clinic for the Homeless, and Whitman-Walker Clinic are pleased to announce our Public Benefits Trainings series again this Fall.  We encourage case managers, legal services lawyers, pro bono lawyers, or anyone who works with low-income clients to attend these sessions.  The trainings are free and an opportunity to learn about eligibility, benefits, application procedures, and practical tips on how to help your clients navigate the system. 

We are requesting that anyone interested in attending RSVP to Jeremy Strauss at jstrauss@legalaiddc.org   since we have some space limitations and need counts on materials.  We greatly appreciate the DC Bar Pro Bono Program for partnering with us and hosting this training series.

 1st Training:  Disability Benefits:  SSI/SSDI/IDA on Tuesday, September 14 from noon – 2 pm.

Please help us get the word out.  Please distribute this e-mail (and attached flyer) widely.  We look forward to a strong turnout! 

Thank you in advance for your help.

Erin Loubier, Whitman-Walker Clinic
Scott McNeilly, Washington Legal Clinic for the Homeless
Jennifer Mezey, Legal Aid Society of DC

Jonathan Smith, Executive Director

“What is really at stake is nothing less than the legitimacy of our legal system and the rule of law.” This is what David Reiser had printed in the program book when the American Bar Association awarded him its Pro Bono Publico Award. The presentation took place on August 9 at the ABA annual meeting in San Francisco. We heartily congratulate David for this well deserved honor.

David is an important part of the Legal Aid team. He joined us as a volunteer in 2004 as we were developing the Appellate Advocacy Project. He worked closely with Barbara McDowell, the first Project director, to help her build the program to be a respected voice on poverty law issues in the D.C. Court of Appeals. David was instrumental in keeping the project going after Barbara’s death in early 2009 and has continued to support and partner with our current Appellate Director, Bonnie Robin-Vergeer. He has dedicated thousands of hours to the project.

David Reiser

David’s contribution has extended far beyond our Appellate work. He has mentored staff on complex trials and been wise counsel on policy issues. But the thing we value most is his commitment to ensuring equal justice for people living in poverty. He is relentless and uncompromising in his advocacy that the Courts must protect the substance of justice – a fair process is not enough. This point was best made in the acceptance essay David wrote for the program book (he was not permitted a speech at the luncheon):

It is a misconception that the legal problems of poor people are easier to solve than those of businesses or wealthy individuals, or that poor people have less need of skillful and experienced lawyers. Although the representation of poor people is sometimes a matter of routine, that is because a lack of resources sometimes makes creativity impossible, not because creativity is any less needed or desired. In the six years of work on the appellate project, we have consistently found that the skills of experienced and highly trained appellate lawyers make a difference in the outcome of cases….

[P]ro bono service is not merely an ethical requirement – a quid pro quo for a bar license – it is a moral imperative because without it the law systematically aids the wealthy and disadvantages the poor, becoming a system of coercion rather than one than honors individual autonomy and choice.

The importance and complexity of the work done for poor clients should not be measured in dollars. For a poor family, the foreclosure of a $100,000 townhouse is every bit as momentous as a $100 million bankruptcy, and may present just as many cutting-edge legal issues. Without the best lawyering, a parent’s connection to a child can needlessly be severed with a penstroke. That is something hard to price…

The ABA prepared a video on David’s work. It can be viewed HERE.

David’s efforts would not be possible without the generous support of Zuckerman Spaeder where he is a counsel.   The firm encourages not only David, but other lawyers to work with Legal Aid.  The firm has taken cases pro bono and helped in innumerable ways.