Pro Bono Week ’20: Meet Our Volunteers!

As part of our 2020 year-end reports, Volunteers of Legal Service today launches the new Pro Bono section of our website, featuring profiles of volunteer attorneys who join us in service to the community. This blog post includes highlights and links to their stories.

The pandemic has given rise to an outpouring of volunteerism, including new efforts at VOLS to provide free legal services to small business owners, unemployed workers, and frontline & healthcare workers. We continue our work to assist immigrant youth, seniors and older veterans; children and families at hospitals and schools; and mothers in prison or jail. Our clients are disproportionately affected by the pandemic, and the legal services they receive can be life changing.

Thank you to all have worked with us over the past few months during this very challenging time.

Sincerely,
Sara

Sara Effron
Director of Pro Bono & Strategic Initiatives
Volunteers of Legal Service

SUPPORT VOLS’ YEAR-END CAMPAIGN

In the last year, VOLS’ free legal services directly benefited 5,384 low-income New Yorkers. Through the pandemic and beyond, our work is made possible through generous voluntary and financial contributions from friends across our community.

Please make a year-end donation to VOLS today: click here.

Serving Seniors & Frontline Workers: VOLS Life Planning Volunteer Profiles

For National Pro Bono Week, the American Bar Association President Patricia Lee Refo centered this year’s theme around the work of pro bono attorneys who have “risen to meet the challenges” of the COVID-19 Pandemic. Here at VOLS, we can’t think of a better way in which pro bono attorneys have stepped up to meet the unprecedented challenges of the public health crisis than through the work of our volunteers providing valuable and vital life planning documents (wills, powers of attorney, etc.) to seniors, veterans, and frontline healthcare workers.  

Pro bono lawyers working with VOLS have not only stepped up to provide a needed public service in the form of legal services, but also some relief and peace of mind for our clients during these challenging times. Through the VOLS Elderly Project and Veterans Initiative, our volunteers have thought creatively to tackle the digital divide that prevents many home-bound seniors from remotely securing their documents. Our VOLS Frontline & Healthcare Workers Initiative has partnered with District Council 37, a union for the city’s municipal public employees, to provide these services to our city’s essential workers.  

To celebrate the work of our pro bono attorneys working within these projects, we invited several to share their stories. Coming from different law firms throughout the city, they share a common passion that we hope inspires other attorneys to pursue pro bono opportunities.  

Click on a link below to read our volunteer profiles:

VOLS Immigration Project: A Conversation with Simpson Thacher’s Pro Bono Coordinator

Simpson Thacher & Barlett LLP has supported the VOLS’ Immigration Project for over 10 years. Pro bono attorneys are a huge part of making our work possible, and we thank all pro bono attorneys for their dedication.
In addition to the countless attorneys who assist us, many other staff members from our partner firms have stepped up to support our efforts. As part of Simpson’s Team are Pro Bono Coordinator, Maria T. Gonzalez, and Jenifer Guzman, Community Advocate for VOLS’ Immigration Project. They play a vital coordinating role and make significant contributions to the success of the Team.

In recognition of National Pro Bono Week, click here to read an interview between Jenifer Guzman and Maria T. Gonzalez as they reflect on working pro bono behind the scenes.

Click on the links below to:

Protecting Our Small Businesses: Spotlighting McDermott, Will & Emery LLP

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the VOLS Microenterprise Project recruited volunteers from McDermott, Will & Emery LLP to support small business tenants in research and drafting resources. Attorneys, including partner Vanessa Barmack and associate Jeffrey Ruskin, collaborated with VOLS Senior Staff Attorney Ivia Cardozo on this commercial tenant support project.

For National Pro Bono Week, we spoke with Vanessa and Jeff to get their perspectives on pro bono service and its significance for them, particularly during these challenging times. 

Click on the link below to:

Serving Our Unemployed Workers: Rohit Malik Shares Experiences

Senior Vice President and Assistant Vice Counsel at Citi, Rohit Malik, spoke at last October’s VOLS’ On the Grounds Briefing. Introduced by Legal Director Peter Kempner, Malik shared with us his involvement and experiences as volunteer with the VOLS Unemployed Workers Project.

Click on the links below to:

Pro Bono Information

Law firms and companies interested in joining the VOLS pro bono network, please contact Sara Effron, Director of Pro Bono & Strategic Initiatives, at seffron@volsprobono.org.

When you partner with VOLS, you will:

  • Provide needed legal services to under-resourced New Yorkers
  • Gain confidence in taking on pro bono matters
  • Learn a new area of law
  • Receive matters that are pre-screened by our staff
  • Respond to the COVID-19 crisis

Please visit the Pro Bono Page on our website, where we will be providing updates about our work.

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