Staff Attorney: Housing and Barriers to Employment

Staff Attorney: Housing and Barriers to Employment

Racine Office

Full-time

February 26, 2026

Are you seeking a rewarding staff attorney position helping others?  Join our team at Legal Action of Wisconsin!  We are currently seeking applications for a staff attorney with 1+ years of experience to join our team at the Racine Office in serving in our Housing and Barriers to Employment practices.

Please submit one PDF with a resume, cover letter, and three professional references with your application.

About Us

Legal Action of Wisconsin, Inc. (“Legal Action”) is a non-profit law firm, funded by the federal Legal Services Corporation, the Wisconsin Trust Account Foundation, and many other sources and supporters. Legal Action provides free civil legal aid to low-income persons in Wisconsin with offices in Milwaukee, Madsion, Racine, Oshkosh, Green Bay, La Crosse and Wausau. Legal Action attorneys and paralegals have expertise in a range of substantive areas, but most of our direct representation is in the areas of housing, public benefits, removing barriers to employment, consumer law, and family law.

Mission Statement:  Legal Action’s mission is to deliver exceptional civil legal services and structural change advocacy, free of cost, to those most in need. Our core values (equity, advocacy, client-centered, integrity and community) guide our work and actions.  Please see our website for a description of the core values and vision that guides our work. 

Office Location: This position will be based in Legal Action’s Racine office, which currently consists of two staff Attorneys, two Paralegals, and a managing attorney. The Racine Office is located at 245 Main Street, Suite 203, Racine, WI 53403. Racine Office staff office-share and have hybrid in-person and remote calendars to best utilize office space.

Governance: Legal Action’s personnel policies govern this position.

Position Description: This position is for a full-time staff attorney who will spend 50% of their time assisting clients in housing matters and 50% of their time in barriers to employment cases. Housing cases include eviction defense work, helping clients maintain or obtain housing benefits, and cases about the habitability of rented housing. Barriers to employment cases include driver’s license recovery, pardons, expungement, and cases involving professional licenses. This attorney may also may be asked to handle cases in Legal Action of Wisconsin’s other civil priority areas – family law, consumer law, and benefits – as needed.

Key Responsibilities:

1.      Legal Action Staff Attorneys are responsible for providing quality and aggressive representation of clients in individual service cases and to undertake impact work (that which has impact on groups of low-income persons or the systems that have the most effect on the low-income community), and for performing all duties associated with such representation.

2.      Attorneys must stay current with the areas of law that pertain to the low-income community as they change and develop, particularly in their area of specialization.

3.      Attorneys are expected to share responsibility for the development and maintenance of good working relationships with community groups and with state and local bar associations and others.

4.      Attorneys will be called upon to provide training and other assistance to volunteers who participate in Legal Action's Volunteer Lawyer Project.

5.      All attorneys perform intake duties and, where necessary, make appropriate referrals to other community agencies.

6.      All Staff Attorneys are responsible for serving on at least one of our Priority Committees: Housing; Employment; Consumer; Public Benefits; and Family. These priority committees are comprised of Legal Action attorneys practicing in those areas of law. They meet quarterly to discuss trends in the law and practicing in that area of law and to strategize the firm’s work on particular matters and issues. This staff attorney priority committee assignment is to be determined.

7.      The Staff Attorneys may be assigned additional duties from time to time.

Required Qualifications:

1.      Juris doctorate degree and 1+ years of experience as an attorney

2     Admission to the Wisconsin Bar upon hire.

3.      A commitment to civil legal aid and to providing quality and aggressive representation to low-income people.

4.      Knowledge of state and federal law and procedure.

5.      A high standard of written and courtroom advocacy.

6.      Ability to communicate both orally and in writing in a clear and concise manner

7.      Ability to work harmoniously with others.

8.      Ability to handle and prioritize many pressing matters in various locations.

9.      Ability and willingness to travel throughout Legal Action’s service area to meet with clients and to attend court hearings.

10.  A deep understanding of the needs of low-income litigants.

11.  A professional commitment to participate in Legal Action’s racial equity legal advocacy.

Preferred Qualifications:

1.      Prior experience in civil legal aid or other relevant experience.

2.      Experience and knowledge of the court systems in Legal Action’s overall service area or in other counties served by the Racine Office area.

3.      One to three years of legal experience.

4.      Prior legal work in the client community or in other programs to aid the poor.

5.      Ability to communicate with persons in the client community who speak a language other than English as their principal language (e.g., Spanish or Hmong), and cultural affinity with the client community.

Salary/Compensation:

Legal Action’s salaries are not negotiable: Our salary scales are based solely on years of experience with each step on the scale equivalent to one full year of experience. We strongly encourage applicants to include detail in their resume about the duties they performed and the months they worked at each employer and in each position so that we can accurately calculate experience and salary. If we make an offer to an applicant, we depend on the resume that the applicant submitted, and we do not allow for revisions after submission. The salary steps for this position range from $57,000-132,028/year.

* Step = years of experience.

Tier 1 and tier 2 staff attorney description & scope of authority:

All staff attorneys are required to utilize and follow Legal Action’s attorney performance standards in performing their duties.

Tier 1 Staff Attorneys are:

Relatively new to providing legal services to low-income clients.
Closely supervised and practices law under close control and structure.
Closely adhering to Legal Action’s guidelines, rules, policies, and procedures and have little or no authority to deviate from them without supervisor’s approval.

 
Tier 2 Staff Attorneys have:

At least 3 years of post-J.D. experience that includes work relevant to the skills required for staff attorneys and;
Skills and abilities to:
consistently perform most Tier 1 Staff Attorney duties with minimal assistance or direction, a high level of efficiency and/or independent initiative, and less immediate, regular supervision than a Tier 1 Staff Attorney;
consistently carry a caseload of substantial size and complexity suitable to an experienced attorney;
consistently adhere to Legal Action administrative and programmatic procedures such as, but not limited to contemporaneous timekeeping and accurate completion of administrative and client service forms; and
Demonstrated initiative and ability to undertake the additional duties that the Tier 2 Staff Attorney level requires such as, but not limited to mentoring, training, and otherwise supporting Tier 1 staff attorneys and others. (Tier 2 Staff Attorneys do not have the authority to discipline others and are not confidential management positions.)

Legal Action’s organizational structure does allow for additional career advancement opportunities, such as: Attorney Managers; Managing Attorneys; Project Managers; Supervising Attorneys; and Priority Coordinators. Legal Action posts these opportunities as they become available.

Fringe Benefits: All Legal Action employees receive a full package of fringe benefits.  It currently includes: employer-paid health and dental insurance for employee, spouse, and family with a Health Reimbursement Account (HRA), employer-paid life and long-term disability insurance; employee-paid income protection benefits; a profit-sharing plan; generous sick leave accrual; and at least four weeks of vacation leave and four personal holidays per year. (Legal Action policies require employees with a spouse to contribute $200/month to the health insurance premium if the spouse has other health insurance available to them.)

Spanish or Hmong Language Frequency Premium:  Legal Action’s Salary Administration Plan includes additional pay of either $2,400 annually or $4,800 annually to those employees who are fluent in Spanish or Hmong.

Flex Work: Legal Action supports flexible work arrangements that meet the goals of the organization and the employee. All employees are eligible to request flexible work, including flextime, compressed work week, and remote work. Flexible work arrangements are defined as alternate work plans that consistently differ from the standard hours and/or work location.

They could include one or a combination of the following options:

-          Flextime: A work schedule with variable starting and ending times. Employees work the same number of scheduled hours as they would under a traditional arrangement.

-          Part-time: A work schedule that is less than full-time (40 hours per week)

-          Compressed work week: A work schedule that condenses a standard work week into fewer, longer days.

-          Remote work: A work arrangement in which employees work at home or alternative worksite. Unless otherwise approved, the scheduled hours are the same as a traditional arrangement. Due to the Racine Office’s set-up, there is a strong presumption that any staff hired would work remotely several days per week.

Supervision: This position will report to Robert Held Vander Wyst, Managing Attorney for the Racine Office

Probationary Period: The position is subject to a probationary period of up to one year.

How to Apply/Deadline for Applications:

1.      Cover letter emphasizing your qualifications for the position, Resume, and Names and contact information for three professional references uploaded as one PDF to the application form 

2.      Law school transcript (only required for applicants who graduated in 2022 or later) and Writing Sample emailed to [email protected]. 

Please submit and upload all the documents required. If the required documents are not submitted on or before the deadline, your application will be considered incomplete and we may not be able to consider you for this position.

DEADLINE FOR APPLICATIONS

The position will be open until filled and will be reviewed on a rolling basis. Please submit applications by Sunday, March 15th, for prioritization.

Legal Action of Wisconsin, Inc. is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer.