UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA SCHOOL OF LAW PRESENTS:
NINTH ANNUAL
WORKING IN THE PUBLIC INTEREST CONFERENCE 03.01.2014
Schedule 9:00 Breakfast (A & B Concourse) 10:00-11:20 Panel 1 Voting Rights Act (Rm. A) 11:30-12:50 Panel 2 Law Enforcement, Community, and Military Tactics: What’s the Conflict? (Rm. A) or Panel 3 Poverty in Suburbia: Are the Poor Out of Reach? (Rm. B) 1:00-2:00 Lunch Sally Greenberg, Executive Director of the National Consumer’s League (A & B Concourse) In the past, Ms. Greenberg has worked at the U.S. Department of Justice Foreign Claims Settlement Commission and as the Eastern States Civil Rights Counsel for the Anti-Defamation League. Ms. Greenberg joined the National Consumers League as Executive Director in 2007 and is their primary spokesperson on a variety of issues. 2:00-3:20 Panel 4 Privatization of Prisons: Costs and Consequences (Rm. A) or Panel 5 Delivering Public Assistance: What Does it Mean to Follow the Law? (Rm. B) 3:30 - 4:30 Keynote Address Abbe Smith (Rm. A) Professor Smith is actively engaged in indigent defense — as both a clinical supervisor and member of the Criminal Justice Act panel for the DC Superior Court. Professor Smith is on the Board of Directors of The Bronx Defenders and the National Juvenile Defender Center, and a longtime member of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, the American Civil Liberties Union, and the National Lawyers Guild.
WIPI’s Mission •
To bring together eminent practitioners in their respective fields, students, and faculty to discuss practical approaches to lawyering which can promote social justice and human rights for all.
•
To highlight dynamic, creative ways to combat social injustice through the vehicle of the law.
•
To institutionalize a public interest law conference in the Southeast because we feel the unique social history, climate, political and economic conditions of the area deserve specialized attention.
WIPI’s History Georgia Law students Kelly James, Rakesh Parekh, Heidi Taylor, and Vanessa Volz founded WIPI in 2005 with the gracious support of Dean Rebecca H. White. We are proud to say that this year marks the 9th Annual WIPI Conference since that founding.
Panel Descriptions Voting Rights Act
Section V of the Voting Rights Act (VRA) required covered jurisdictions to obtain “preclearance” before making changes to voting laws. In Shelby County v. Holder, the Supreme Court held that the formula determining which jurisdictions were covered by Section V was unconstitutional. Following Shelby County, states previously covered by Section V began proposing changes to election laws. If those laws are in fact discriminatory they must now be challenged under Section II of the VRA, which places the burden on plaintiffs to show racial discrimination. This panel will provide an update on proposed and enacted election law changes being made in the South, and it will consider the
future of the VRA, including: (1) the efficacy of Section II for preventing disenfranchisement; (2) the possibility of Congress updating the coverage formula for Title V inclusion; and (3) the role of the public interest lawyer in VRA enforcement. Kareem Crayton Professor Crayton is an innovative scholar whose work integrates law, politics, and race. He is one of the very few academics with formal skills in law and political science whose work addresses the relationship between race and politics in representative institutions. The insights from Professor Crayton’s research have distinguished him as a leading voice in the academy and in public institutions. His commentary, insight, and analysis regularly appear in major media outlets including The New York Times, PBS, and Fox News. Professor Crayton’s scholarship examines the varied effects of state-sanctioned racial exclusion and discrimination on campaign and governance in the political system. His publications employ a variety of research methods to examine ongoing controversies ranging fromin the fields of electoral campaigning, legislative caucus behavior, and partisan competition. Professor Crayton obtained his bachelor’s degree from Harvard University, and earned both his J.D. and Ph.D. in Political Science from Stanford University. Brian Kemp Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp, a lifelong resident of Athens, is a graduate of Clarke Central High School and of the University of Georgia, where he earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Agriculture. Secretary Kemp has served as Secretary of State since January, 2010. Prior to that, Secretary Kemp served in the Georgia State Senate from 2002-2006. Among his current office’s wide-ranging responsibilities, the Secretary of State is charged with conducting efficient and secure elections, the registration of corporations, and the regulation of securities and professional license holders. The office also oversees the Georgia Archives.
Tomas Lopez Mr. Lopez is Counsel for the Brennan Center’s Democracy Program, where his work focuses on voting rights and elections. Prior to joining the Brennan Center, he was a fellow at the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Immigrant Justice Project. There, he worked on litigation and advocacy challenging anti-immigrant legislation in Alabama. Mr. Lopez also previously served as the Bacon Immigration Law and Policy Program Fellow at the University of Arizona, Rogers College of Law, where he supervised workers’ rights cases in the law school’s immigration clinic and co-authored a report on the impact of Arizona’s immigration law on young people. Mr. Lopez is a graduate of Duke University (2006) and Yale Law School (2010).
Law Enforcement, Community, and Military Tactics: What’s the Conflict?
Local law enforcement is a critical community service, and the expense of maintaining a modern and effective police force can be substantial in relation to local resources. At the same time, military equipment, SWAT teams, and aggressive search and seizure tactics have been called into question by the recurring loss of innocent life and Fourth Amendment concerns attendant to the use of overwhelming force. This panel will consider the funding mechanisms available to police and sheriff departments for equipment and capital investments, the incentives these revenues create, and the conflicts between community trust and the atmosphere of counter-insurgency which military style raids engender in marginalized communities. Stacey Cotton Chief Cotton has served as the Chief of Police for the Covington Police Department since 1997. Chief Cotton’s involvement with the Georgia Association of Chiefs of Police has been quite extensive. He was honored to be elected to the Executive Board in 2004 as Fourth Vice-President, and he served the Association as President in 2009-2010. He rewrote the Association’s Constitution and By-Laws with
Association Attorney Michael Caldwell in 2001-2002. Chief Cotton has served on the Legislative Committee for several years, and is often called to the Georgia Capitol to testify as a subject matter expert on proposed laws that affect Law Enforcement. Peter Kraska Dr. Kraska is Professor and Chair of Graduate Studies and Research in the School of Justice Studies at Eastern Kentucky University. He has distinguished himself as a leading scholar in the areas of criminal justice theory, police and criminal justice militarization, and research methods. He has published seven books including Criminal Justice and Criminology Research Methods, Theorizing Criminal Justice: Eight Essential Orientations, and Militarizing The American Criminal Justice System: The Changing Roles of the Armed Forces and Police. Dr. Kraska’s research has also been published in a number of leading journals, including the British Journal of Criminology, Social Problems, Justice Quarterly, and Policing and Society. His recent research interests include a continuation of study into the blurring distinction between criminal justice and the military in the wars on drugs and terrorism. James A. Pikl Mr. Pikl is an experienced trial and appellate lawyer. His practice emphasizes a wide range of commercial and consumer disputes, including class actions and complex litigation involving multiple parties and claims. Mr. Pikl represents both plaintiffs and defendants, and this broad experience enables him to understand and analyze both his client’s and his opposition’s positions for strengths and weaknesses. Mr. Pikl has been lead counsel in dozens of lawsuits all over the U.S., and has participated in 36 appeals, many of which occurred in the Texas Supreme Court, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, and the United States Supreme Court. Additionally, Mr. Pikl has been working closely with The Rutherford Institute on the case of Quinn v. Texas, a case involving police overreach that has recently been appealed to the United States Supreme Court. Mr. Pikl obtained his B.A. from Eastern Washington University and his J.D. from Gonzaga University.
Poverty in Suburbia: Are the Poor Out of Reach?
The story of suburbs in America sweeps in much of this country’s modern history of sprawling land use and the self-segregation of affluent and middle class commuter communities. This panel will explore the current state of the suburbs and ask whether the infrastructure that supports a commuter economy is compatible with changing demographics. Who lives in the suburbs, and who speaks for them in local government? Are the children of lower income communities further disadvantaged in terms of income mobility by virtue of living in the suburbs? What problems arise when affordable housing is located in areas with poor public transportation and few job opportunities? Are poor people being pushed out of urban areas? If so, is greater urban density a more desirable policy option than bringing transportation services to the suburbs? Ellen Dunham-Jones Professor Dunham-Jones is an award-winning licensed architect and professor teaching contemporary architectural and urban design studios and theory. As co-author with June Williamson of Retrofitting Suburbia; Urban Design Solutions for Redesigning Suburbs (Wiley & Sons, 2009) her work has received significant media attention in The New York Times, Harvard Business Review, Harvard Design Magazine, Urban Land, Planning, Architectural Record, TEDx and other venues. Professor DunhamJones received undergraduate and graduate degrees in architecture from Princeton University and taught at University of Virginia and Massachusets Institute of Technology before joining Georgia Tech’s faculty to serve as Director of the Architecture Program from 2001-2009. Dolly Mullen As a Professor and a public servant, Dr. Dolly Mullen has researched and been actively involved in issues of local government, women in politics, urban politics, and the provision of social services. In addition to her many years as a Political Science Professor, Dr. Mullen also has practical expertise in education and local
government from her term of service on the School Board in the city of Asheville, North Carolina and her ongoing participation in public policy debates as an advocate for inclusive public policy. Dr. Mullen has longstanding ties to the Atlanta region. Dwight Mullen As a Professor and activist, Dr. Dwight Mullen has spearheaded initiatives in Asheville, NC to insist on dialogue between local government and residents of the African-American community. He began the project at University of North Carolina Asheville called The State of Black Asheville, which fosters undergraduate research aimed at informing public policy debates concerning access to housing, jobs, medical care, and opportunities for community interaction and integration. Bringing a strong voice to debates within the University of North Carolina Asheville administration with respect to the diversity of the student body, Dr. Mullen is renowned on campus for his analysis of bureaucracy at all levels of government and society. His scholarly activities include panels chaired and papers presented at meetings of the National Conference of Black Political Scientists. Benjamin Roth Dr. Roth has spent much of his career learning about the challenges faced by immigrants in the United States. Now, as an Assistant Professor at the College of Social Work at the University of South Carolina, his research is broadly focused on poverty and inequality among immigrants. More specifically, he studies Latino immigrant youth and how the places where they grow up influence their identity formation and key outcomes, such as high school graduation and getting a job. Dr. Roth looks at how local organizations such as schools, youth programs, and social service providers shape the day-to-day lives of immigrant youth, and how these organizations are themselves influenced by larger laws and policies. He provides fresh insights into questions of immigrant integration by focusing on suburbs and the American Southeast—places that have come to represent the changing geography of poverty and immigrant
settlement in the United States.
Privatization of Prisons: Costs and Consequences
The privatization of prisons is generally undertaken by states to lower the cost to the public of housing prisoners. Whether cost savings actually result is debatable. Importantly, the ways in which private prisons do cut costs are problematic from the perspective of public safety, human rights, and public policy. In some welldocumented cases, prisoners have escaped due to lax security and poorly trained staff. More generally, staff turnover rates are often high and the compensation packages of private prison guards may be inadequate to attract the best candidates. The U.S. Department of Justice produced a report in June of 2013 documenting that over 30% of juvenile detainees were sexually victimized at Paulding Regional Detention Center – a privately run facility northwest of Atlanta. While that facility’s contract will not be renewed, the trend towards privatization of juvenile detention facilities continues. This panel will discuss the consequences of entrusting vulnerable populations to a system run for profit. Alex Friedmann Mr. Friedmann is the Associate Director of the Human Rights Defense Center (HRDC) and managing editor of Prison Legal News. He is responsible for news research, investigative research, editing, advocacy campaigns and other tasks. He also serves in a volunteer capacity as president of the non-profit Private Corrections Institute and is a national expert on the issue of prison privatization. He has testified before a Congressional subcommittee and legislative committees in two states on criminal justice-related issues, and has spoken at numerous conferences and other events -- including Critical Resistance, the National Lawyers Guild, the Children Defense Fund’s annual conference, a Congressional caucus meeting and a Congressional briefing. Mr. Friedmann served 10 years in Tennessee prisons and jails, including six years at a privately-operated Corrections Corporation of America facility. While incarcerated, he litigated his own cases in state and federal court; served as the resources editor of Prison Life magazine, a national publication; self-published the Private Corrections
Industry News Bulletin; and founded and directed a non-profit prisoner organization called the Pledge Program. He manages HRDC’s office in Nashville, Tennessee. Kathryn Hamoudah Ms. Hamoudah joined Southern Center for Human Rights (SCHR) in January 2010. She supports the efforts of the Center through media, legislative and community advocacy. Kathryn is Chairperson of Georgians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, a statewide anti-death penalty coalition. In addition, she is a former Rockwood Death Penalty Abolition Fellow. Ms. Hamoudah received her B.A. in Political Science from the University of St. Thomas in Houston, Texas. Prior to SCHR, she worked at All About Developmental Disabilities, an organization that provides support services to thousands of families in the Metro Atlanta area living with developmental disabilities. Alec Karakatsanis Mr. Karakatsanis is a federal public defender and civil rights lawyer at the Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia, where he litigates cases to reform the criminal justice system. He was recently awarded a grant by his alma mater, Harvard Law School, to found a nonprofit civil rights organization called Equal Justice Under Law.
Delivering Public Assistance: What Does it Mean to Follow the Law?
Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) is the rare public program that provides direct assistance to families in need. Georgia, like other states, receives block grants to administer TANF. What is the current state of the TANF program in Georgia and is assistance getting to those who need it? Should the state be more proactive in reaching out to those who qualify for assistance? Are there times when qualifying families are unable to access benefits due to administrative hurdles and poor customer service? What recourse do families have if they are not treated fairly by TANF administrators? This panel will ask why Georgia has among the lowest rates of TANF
assistance in the country (8% of impoverished families receiving assistance) despite having among the highest rates of poverty (approximately 300,000 families living in poverty). Patrick Cates Mr. Cates is an attorney with the Georgia Legal Services Program (GLSP). GLSP provides legal assistance to indigent individuals in civil cases. Patrick practices in the areas of debt collection defense, family law, landlord-tenant matters, and public benefits. Originally from Fayette County, Patrick now lives with his wife and son in Athens. Keith Horton Mr. Horton serves as the Commissioner for the Georgia Department of Human Services (DHS). In this role, he is responsible for a $1.5 billion agency that oversees the provision of human services throughout Georgia. This includes aging, child welfare and child support services, and public assistance programs, including the Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) program, the Food Stamp program and Medicaid eligibility. Commissioner Horton earned a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from Albany State College and a master’s degree in Individual and Family Development from South Carolina State University. Frances Fox Piven Before joining the Graduate Center at City University of New York (CUNY), Professor Piven taught at Boston University, Columbia University, New York University Law School, the Institute of Advanced Studies in Vienna, the University of Amsterdam, and the University of Bologna. She is past Vice-President of the American Political Science Association, has served as program co-chair of the annual political science meetings, and is a past president of the Society for the Study of Social Problems. She is currently President of the American Sociological Association. She is the recipient of numerous awards, including the President's Award of the American Public Health Association, and the American Sociological Association's Career Award for the
Practice of Sociology, as well as their award for the Public Understanding of Sociology. Her books deal with the development of the welfare state, political movements, urban politics, and electoral politics.
Lunch Speaker Sally Greenberg Ms. Greenberg joined the National Consumers League (NCL) as Executive Director on October 1, 2007. The League’s focus is on five key priority areas: fraud, child labor, LifeSmarts, health care, especially the safe use of medications and medication adherence, and food safety and nutrition. Ms. Greenberg has testified numerous times before Congress on consumer protection issues, including on product safety, fraud, excessive fees on car rentals, consumer rip-offs in calling cards and in support of protections for farmworker children. Ms. Greenberg came to NCL from Consumers Union, where she worked from 1997-2007 on product liability and food safety issues, along with auto and product safety. Previously, Ms. Greenberg worked at the U.S. Department of Justice Foreign Claims Settlement Commission and prior to that, she spent a decade serving as the Eastern States Civil Rights Counsel for the Anti-Defamation League, based in Boston.
Keynote Speaker Abbe Smith Abbe Smith is Director of the Criminal Defense and Prisoner Advocacy Clinic, Co-Director of the E. Barrett Prettyman Fellowship Program, and Professor of Law at Georgetown University. She joined the Georgetown faculty in 1996. Prior to Georgetown, Professor Smith was Deputy Director of the Criminal Justice Institute at Harvard Law School, and a Clinical Instructor and Lecturer on Law at Harvard. Professor Smith has also taught at the City University New York School of Law, Temple University School of Law, American University Washington College of Law, and the University of Melbourne Law School (Australia), where she was a Senior Fulbright Scholar in 2005-06. Professor Smith teaches and writes on criminal defense, legal ethics, juvenile justice, and clinical legal education.
2014 MILNER S. BALL WORKING IN THE PUBLIC INTEREST LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD: Stephen B. Bright Mr. Bright is president and senior counsel of the Southern Center for Human Rights and teaches at Yale Law School and the University of Georgia School of Law. He served as director of the Center from 1982 through 2005, and has been in his present position since the start of 2006. He has taught at Yale since 1993. Subjects of his litigation, teaching and writing include capital punishment, legal representation for poor people accused of crimes, conditions and practices in prisons and jails, racial discrimination in the criminal justice system, judicial independence, and sentencing. He has tried cases, including capital cases, before juries and argued cases before state and federal appellate courts. He has twice argued and won cases before the United States Supreme Court. Both cases involved racial discrimination in the composition of the juries. The Fulton Daily Law Report, Georgia's legal newspaper, named Bright “Newsmaker (and Agitator) of the Year� in 2003 for his contribution to bringing about creation of a public defender system in Georgia.
WIPI’s Board Courtney Poole (Executive Director) Courtney will be receiving her J.D. on May 17, 2014 and is from Monroe, Louisiana, though she currently lives in Atlanta with her husband and 2 dogs. She has spent her third year of law school interning with the Dekalb County District Attorney’s office, and has spent past summers working in plaintiff’s employment law, as well as at an internship with the Georgia Innocence Project. Courtney is passionate about a number of issues that face disadvantaged populations and is eager to spend her legal career tackling those difficult topics. Elliott Gillooly (Deputy Director) Elliott will be receiving his J.D. in May of 2015, at which time he hopes to begin working in the Southeast or in Washington, D.C. After interning in a Federal District Court in 2013, Elliott is currently completing a semester externship with the Department of Justice, Environment and Natural Resources Division. He hopes to be a litigator for the federal government or a non-profit firm working on environmental protection and resource conservation issues. Sarah Bellacicco (Panels Director) Having grown up in Albuquerque, New Mexico, Sarah made the transition to the southern way of life in 2006 when she moved to South Carolina to attend Presbyterian College. Following college, Sarah worked as a case manager at Central Outreach and Advocacy Center in Atlanta, Georgia through the Presbyterian Church (USA)’s Young Adult Volunteer Program. She then decided to pursue her J.D. in the hopes of becoming a better advocate for the lowincome and homeless populations. Sarah currently represents defendants in Athens-Clarke County through the third-year practice act and has worked in both the Athens-Clarke and Dekalb County Public Defender offices. She will receive her J.D. in May 2014.
Imani Carter (Logistics Director) Imani is a J.D. Candidate for May 2015 and is from New Castle, Pennsylvania. She earned her Bachelor’s of Arts degree in Criminology and Investigations from West Virginia University. She has had the privilege of interning with Judge Carla Wong McMillian at the Court of Appeals of Georgia, and is currently working with the Western Judicial Circuit Public Defender Office. She is the president of the Hispanic Law Students Association and an Editorial Board Member for the Georgia Journal of International and Comparative Law. Outside of her studies she likes to be involved in her local church. Imani hopes to give back to her community by beginning her legal career as a public defender. Greg Steele (Public Relations Co-Director) Greg will be receiving his J.D. in May of 2016 and is from Anderson, South Carolina. Directly prior to law school, he graduated from Covenant College with a degree in History. Since coming to law school, Greg has pursued a commitment to public interest work, serving on the Equal Justice Foundation Board and going on the Public Interest Law Council’s Alternative Spring Break. He is unsure about what his plans after law school are, but looks forward to discovering what his future legal career has in store. Anna Fowler (Public Relations Co-Director) Anna will be receiving her J.D. in May 2016 and came to Georgia from England, via South Carolina. Prior to law school Anna has worked in healthcare administration and international finance but hopes to pursue a public interest career after law school, focusing on women’s and children’s issues. Joseph Kim (CLE Director) Joseph will be receiving his J.D. on May 17, 2014. Although he grew up and attended college in Philadelphia, he will be starting his legal career in Texas. Since starting law school, Joseph has interned with the New Jersey State Attorney Generals office, small and mid-size law firms in Athens and Dallas, and domestic and international corporations. Joseph is particularly interested in pursuing a legal career in
business development. Jonathan Tonge (CLE Assistant Director) Jonathan Tonge is a first-year law student from Waycross, Georgia. Prior to law school, Jonathan was the communications manager for the Georgia Wildlife Federation and owned an independent bookstore in Madison and Athens. He received his A.B.J. in newspaper journalism from UGA’s Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communications and lives in Athens with his wife Jessica and son, Sam. Nicholas Patrick Sexton (Hospitality Director) Nick is from Clifton, Virginia and will be graduating from Georgia Law in May. He is currently interning with the Environmental Protection Agency in Atlanta and does research on environmental legislation for the Carl Vinson Research Institute. He is president of the Land Use and Planning Organization, a group that actively works on land use and community issues in the Athens area. After graduation, he hopes to be working on the creation of more sustainable land use policies in communities throughout Georgia. Sakeena Leben-Yearwood (Assistant Hospitality Director) Sakeena is from Brooklyn, New York and will be receiving her J.D in May of 2015. She has a strong interest in criminal law and hopes to use her degree to assist financially disadvantaged individuals facing criminal prosecution. Sakeena is also involved in other student organizations with a strong public interest focus including the Equal Justice Foundation and Street Law. Michelle Yang (Registration Director) Michelle is a first year law student interested in criminal law and public interest law. She has worked with many local Atlanta volunteer organizations and looks forward to doing so in the future. She is also involved with the Equal Justice Foundation and looks forward to Georgia Law’s public interest weekend.
Acknowledgements The WIPI Executive Board would like to thank the tireless efforts of everyone who devoted their time, resources, and experience to help make this conference happen. This list below seeks to thank a few of these people but in no way is an exhaustive list:
WIPI CONFERENCE SPONSORS University of Georgia School of Law Student Bar Association
Food Donors Starbucks
Special Thanks to... Dean Rebecca H. White Tricia Hackleman Cindy Rice Heidi Murphy Jane Disney Kathleen Day Ramsey Bridges
Thank you for attending the 2014 WIPI Conference! We hope to see you next year.