|
|
 THE
PUBLIC INTEREST LAW CENTER OF PHILADELPHIA
Affiliated with the
Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law
|
|
|
|
Support the Law Center today!
|
The
Law Center counts on donors like you to be able to provide exceptional
services to our clients. Please join us in our efforts by making a
tax-deductible gift today.
|
|
|
-The Uniform System of
Citations (the Bluebook), 19th Edition
To make
a donation, please contact:
Lauren Mirowitz lmirowitz@pilcop.org
|
|
Letter from the Executive Director
Amidst the noise and dysfunction in today's
public discourse, the bright spot for me - that which keeps me
convinced that meaningful change is possible - is the commitment shown
by the serious people who run and sustain community groups.
I think of Loraine Carter and the other
African American men and women who are the heart of Concerned Black
Parents, an organization dedicated to improving educational outcomes
for African American students. With us, they are pursuing a litigation
strategy against the Lower Merion School District, which places a
whopping 37% of its 12th grade African American students in special
education, but they also engage the administration and the community in
day-long educational summits which bring together the community, school
officials and experts to explore issues in depth. I think of the
Eddystone Residents for Positive Change, ordinary people confronting
the prospect of a new metal shredding facility in their community with
well-prepared, substantive questions of their public officials. It is a
reflection of the courage it took simply to ask these questions that
some of the officials responded by claiming the residents had
connections with an "anarcho-communist" group. And,
although they are not clients, I think of the scores of strong
neighborhood leaders in the Mantua neighborhood of West Philadelphia
who showed the best that democracy can be last Tuesday with orderly,
dignified and enthusiastic polling places that they staffed as election
judges, poll workers and poll watchers from before the sun rose until
long after it set.
These are the voices and the
faces of the people who have the capacity to change their worlds. And
with your help, the Law Center will continue to be at their side to
make sure that their
voices, with their potential for change, are translated
into the actuality of change.
|
|
|
|
|
|
Exec. Dir
Jennifer Clarke presents Gov. Rendell with the Thaddeus
Stevens Award
|
On September 30, 2010 the Law Center presented our 3rd
Annual Symposium "A Quality
Education for All - The Uses of Law to Translate Theory into
Practice", an in-depth look at
the laws and policies that impact the quality of public education and
how we ensure that those laws help, not hurt, a child's opportunity to
receive a high quality education, featuring local and
national education policy experts. Following the symposium
we presented the Thaddeus Stevens Award to Governor Edward G. Rendell,
Secretary of Policy and Planning Donna Cooper and the Honorable Doris
Smith-Ribner in recognition of their
extraordinary work to advance the quality of public education in
our region.
Photos from the
event | Read more about the
event
Press coverage
of the event:
"Take a stand.
Speak up. Insist on being included in the discussion." The
Notebook, Oct. 11th
"Judge
to be honored in desegregation case", Philadelphia Tribune,
Sept. 27
|
|
Law Center's Environmental Law Clinic
Awarded EPA Grant
 The Law Center's Public
Health and Environmental Justice Clinic received a
$25,000 Environmental Justice Small Grant from the United States Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA) and will use it to collaborate
with residents of the Hunting
Park neighborhood in Philadelphia to convert one
or more vacant lots that have become dump sites into community
gardens. These new green spaces will reduce the health hazards related
to pollution runoff and will be used as outdoor classrooms to further
promote stewardship of the environment.
Read more about the EPA's grants: EPA Awards $1.9
Million in Environmental Justice Grants
|
|
A warm welcome to our newest
attorney, Ben Geffen!
Ben joined the Public Interest Law Center of Philadelphia in October
2010 as a staff attorney, and will work on advocacy and litigation
in each of the issues the Law Center handles. Ben graduated cum laude from
Princeton University with a degree in Philosophy. After working for
several years in the not-for-profit sector in Boston, Ben attended the
NYU School of Law, where he served as Editor in Chief of the NYU Annual
Survey of American Law. Ben came to the Law Center after completing a
clerkship with the Honorable Robert M. Levy, Magistrate Judge of the
U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. Please join us in welcoming
Ben!
|
|
Upcoming: Film Screening and
Marcellus Shale Discussion With Adam Cutler, DEP Sec. John Hanger, and
Others
The Law Center is partnering with WHYY to present
the Wednesday, November 17th Philadelphia premiere of Deep Down,
a documentary exploring the debate around mountaintop removal mining in
an Appalachian Kentucky town. The film will be followed by a panel
discussion about the film and its parallels with the environmental,
social and economic issues around Marcellus Shale drilling, which will
feature Adam
Cutler, Director of the Law Center's Public Health and
Environmental Justice Clinic. John Hanger, Secretary of the Pennsylvania
Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) is a
recent and exciting addition to the panel which will also feature Tracy
Carluccio from the Delaware Riverkeeper Network, Christine Knapp
of PennFuture, and State Representative Tony Payton, Jr., of the
179th District in Philadelphia. The event is free and open to the
public, but registration
is required.
Read more and
register to attend!
|
|
Update
On Lower Merion School District Cases
|
|
|
LMSD client
R.C.
|
Addressing
an issue with local as well as national significance, the Law Center
continues its multi-pronged strategy to improve the quality of
education for African American students in the Lower Merion School District
(LMSD), a disproportionate number of whom are placed in special
education programs and thus do not have access to the rich content
available to their Caucasian classmates. In the federal court
case, the court of appeals recently turned down the plaintiffs' request
for a review of the district court's refusal to certify a class action,
but with the Law Center's help, families continue to file individual
actions both at the administrative level and in federal court. The
overrepresentation of African American students in special education
programs is an issue that Congress recognized in the Individuals with
Disabilities Education Act of 1990 and that has been thoroughly
documented throughout the country. The parties in the Lower Merion
federal case are currently engaged in mediation in an attempt to
resolve the case.
Read more about the
LMSD cases.
|
|
Plaintiffs Continue To
Present Evidence In Florida Medicaid Case
Law
Center attorney Jim
Eiseman traveled to Florida the week of October 18-22
to continue trial in a class action lawsuit on behalf of the nearly two million Florida
children enrolled in or eligible for Medicaid. Jim
joined our Florida co-counsel Boies,
Schiller & Flexner to present evidence that the
state of Florida is not fulfilling its obligations under federal law as
a participant in Medicaid to make medical and dental care services
available to children enrolled in Medicaid with reasonable promptness,
and set reimbursement rates for doctors and dentists at a sufficiently
high level that enrolled children have access to medical and dental
services equal to that of insured children in the same area.
Jim and the rest of the plaintiffs' legal team are
scheduled to return to court November 15th for what they expect will be
the next to last week of testimony in the plaintiffs' case in chief.
The defendants will begin to present their case thereafter.
|
|
D.C. Voting System Hack Shows
Vulnerabilities in Electronic Voting
 During a public testing period to evaluate a Washington,
D.C. internet voting system, a team led by University of Michigan Professor Alex Halderman
successfully hacked and took almost complete control of the system,
which allowed them to change the votes cast by test voters. Professor
Halderman's hack illustrated the vulnerabilities inherent in electronic
voting systems at the center of the lawsuit to challenge the use of
electronic voting machines in Pennsylvania in which the Law Center,
along with Drinker Biddle and private attorney Marian Schneider are
representing the plaintiffs. More...
|
|
 Fight To Preserve Pennhurst
Continues
The
"Pennhurst Asylum" closed on November 7th, but the fight for
a respectful use of the property is far from over. There are now plans
to open the former Pennhurst
State School and Hospital for ghost tours under the
guise of the "Pennhurst Paranormal Association." As we wrote in the
Philadelphia Inquirer, people with intellectual and developmental
disabilities deserve our respect, and the tragedy they endured at
Pennhurst should be treated with solemnity. Instead, this new plan for
the property explicitly exploits the memory of the people who suffered
at Pennhurst.
We
encourage you to make your opposition to this travesty heard.
The East Vincent Township Zoning Board will hold a hearing on the
Pennhurst Asylum at 7:30 pm on November 18th at the East Vincent
Township Building, and we encourage everyone to attend. The Township
Building is located at 262 Ridge Road, Spring City, PA 19475. Also, a
new website, Respect Pennhurst,
has more information about how to get involved to oppose the continued
exploitation of Pennhurst's tragic history.
|
|
Law Center
Joins Coalition of Organizations Seeking School Wide Positive
Behavioral Support in Pennsylvania
In September, the Law Center joined a coalition of advocacy groups as a
signatory to a letter that calls on governor-elect Tom Corbett and Dan
Onorato, his opponent in the gubernatorial race, to implement School-Wide Positive Behavior Support
(SWPBS) in schools across Pennsylvania. SWPBS, an evidence-based,
proactive strategy to improve school safety and establish a
positive educational environment, is an alternative to reactive
disciplinary systems such as zero tolerance policies, which have failed
to improve student behavior or school safety but have proven to be
tragically effective at pushing adolescents - especially racial
minorities - out of school
and into the juvenile justice system.
Read the letters and
learn more about SWPBS
|
 Meet our Volunteers!
The
Law Center's day-to-day operations rely in large part on the hard work
of its wonderful volunteers. A big thank you to our volunteers and
interns for their contributions to the Law Center's success! Our
current volunteers are Jim
Kostman, Dean Williams, Michael Federer, Jessica Washington,
Eileen Somers,
and Karen
Wheeler. We're grateful to all of our
volunteers for spending their free time to help our clients!
At right, Karen and Jim greet visitors at the front
desk.
|
|
Remembering Alan Lerner
Alan
Lerner,
a member of the Law Center's board from 1978-1989 and a longtime friend
of the Law Center, passed away on Thursday, October 7th. Throughout his
distinguished career as a lawyer and later a professor at the
University of Pennsylvania Law School, Alan was a passionate advocate
for and defender of civil rights.
"Alan
was a true believer in equal opportunity for all, and he never backed
down in his willingness to devote his time and energy to fight
against those who would deny it," says Law Center attorney Michael
Churchill. "In the earliest years of the Law Center, Alan took on
some of the hardest discrimination cases against construction unions
that Ned Wolf, our first Executive Director, had. Later at Penn, Alan
was an innovator in thinking about how to inject knowledge of what
works for children and what they need to flourish in place of the
folklore that has held sway in our courts about children's needs since
almost forever." Read more about
Alan's life.
|
|
Join Us at These Upcoming
Events:
"Ask
Absolutely Anything" Education Public Information Sessions
When:
Fridays,
November 12th & 19th, December 10th & 17th, 3-7pm
Where:
92 Greenfield Avenue in Ardmore, PA (Zion's Annex)
Cost: FREE, first
come, first served.
Our clients, Concerned Black Parents, are hosting these weekly sessions
during which, Law Center attorneys will respond to questions from Lower
Merion students and their families on general and special education
issues.
Deep Down
Film Screening and Panel Discussion With Law Center's Adam Cutler
When:
Wednesday, November 17, 2010, 6:30pm (doors open 6:00pm)
Where:
WHYY Public Media Commons, 150 N 6th Street, Philadelphia PA
Cost: FREE and
open to the public
Registration
required: http://whyy.convio.net/deepdown
The Law Center
joins WHYY and the Independent Television Service (ITVS) as a
community partner for the Philadelphia premiere of Deep Down,
a documentary exploring the debate around mountaintop removal mining in
an Appalachian Kentucky town. After the screening,
Law Center
attorney Adam Cutler will participate in a panel discussion about
the film and its parallels with the issues around drilling in
Pennsylvania's Marcellus Shale rock formation.
"Settlements
and Mediation: Getting to Yes Without Giving Up Your Rights"
When: Tuesday, December 14,
2010, 1:30 - 5:30pm
Where: United
Way Building, 1709 Benjamin Franklin Parkway, Philadelphia, PA 19103
Cost: $200
for attorneys, $100 for non-attorneys, Scholarship requests welcome
from those on a limited income. Visit registration site for more
info.
The 6th in a
yearlong series of courses on special education issues presented by
Sonja Kerr, the Law Center's Disability Rights project director.
Designed for parents and other individuals who work with children who
experience disabilities, this seminar will focus on how to obtain
settlements through informal meetings, resolution sessions or mediation
without giving up important rights in the process.
Online Registration is NOW OPEN | View full course
outline.
|
|
|
|
|
The Public Interest
Law Center of Philadelphia is dedicated to advancing the Constitutional
promise of equal citizenship to all persons irrespective of race,
ethnicity, national origin, disability, gender or poverty. We use public
education, continuing education of our clients and client organizations,
research, negotiation and, when necessary, the courts to achieve systemic
reforms that advance the central goals of self-advocacy, social justice
and equal protection of the law for all members of society. www.pilcop.org
The Public Interest Law Center of Philadelphia is a
registered charitable organization. A copy of the official registration
may be obtained from the Pennsylvania Department of State by calling toll
free within Pennsylvania 1.800.732.0999. Registration does not imply
endorsement.
|
|
|
