The Legal Aid Society’s Civil Practice has one or more staff attorney positions in the Brooklyn Neighborhood Office as part of a new initiative, created by Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman, Legal Hand in Brownsville, Brooklyn. Co-located in the Brownsville Community Justice Center, Legal Hand creates neighborhood storefronts staffed by trained community volunteers who provide free legal information, assistance and referrals to help resolve issues in areas such as housing, family law, benefits, employment law and consumer law and prevent problems from turning into legal actions. The staff attorneys will provide back-up training and assistance to the community volunteers assisting the community with legal information at the Legal Hand office in Brownsville.
In this position, you will: represent clients in administrative hearings, City, State and federal court proceedings and affirmative litigation, and advocate with local, State and federal agencies; train and engage in community outreach and education for individuals, community volunteers, local community-based organizations and advocates; conduct policy advocacy; coordinate and collaborate with other groups and organizations; work with pro bono lawyers; conduct off-site intake, including during evening hours; provide advice, counsel and advocacy to community members in Brownsville, Brooklyn on a variety of legal and consumer issues; train and supervise community volunteers to provide other local community members with legal information on a range of civil legal matters. This includes substantive law and skills training and day-to-day monitoring of volunteers; conduct and supervise intake and assessment for clients, and facilitate referrals to partnering service providers; complete administrative tasks as assigned by supervisor, such as those related to grant reporting; perform additional tasks as assigned by supervisor; and other duties as assigned.
The ideal candidate must: have a J.D. degree; be a member in good standing of the New York State Bar; have excellent written and oral advocacy skills; the ability to work independently as well as collaboratively in a team and manage a high volume of cases; the ability to coordinate and collaborate successfully with other groups and organizations; excellent organizational skills; the ability to work with pro bono lawyers; experience in providing civil legal services in consumer law; the ability to manage a demanding case load; have excellent time management, priority-setting and organizational skills; and have proficiency in languages other than English is desirable, but not required.
The Legal Aid Society is reducing its carbon footprint and therefore paper applications are not accepted. All applicants must submit a cover letter, resume, current writing sample, transcript, references, the Applicant Questionnaire (http://www.legal-aid.org/questionnaire.html) and the Applicant Information Form (http://www.legal-aid.org/info_form.html) electronically in a single PDF document by 1/20/16 to: [email protected] and include the Job Reference Code: CIVIL-2015-070 in all correspondence and in the subject line of your email.
IF ONE OR MORE OF THE REQUIRED ITEMS ARE MISSING OR IF THE APPLICATION IS NOT IN A SINGLE PDF, YOUR APPLICATION WILL NOT BE PROCESSED.