Impact Litigation

Newly established in 2009, Public Counsel's Impact Litigation Project (ILP) builds on Public Counsel's longstanding economic justice and civil rights community practice.  The ILP brings suit in federal and state courts to challenge systemic and recurring discrimination and civil and economic rights violations that affect low income persons and persons of color.  The lawsuits this project initiates necessarily affect large groups of people within Public Counsel's service focus. 

 To date, our docket has included: 

• successful litigation on behalf of a class of 5,000 students in south and east Los Angeles middle schools who suffered grossly disproportionate teacher layoffs as a result of the Los Angeles Unified School District's budget tightening effort
  
• successful litigation to reinstate services for autistic children to whom the East Los Angeles Regional Center arbitrarily denied essential therapies
  
• ongoing litigation on behalf of California farm workers challenging the State and Cal/OSHA for failing to protect workers from heat illness and death when they pick fruits and vegetables in grueling summer temperatures
  
• representation of tenants in ongoing litigation against HUD and private owners challenging early termination of section 8 contracts that provide low-income housing for more than 150 families in Venice, California