HLS Students Spend Winter Break Assisting New Orleans Hurricane Victims

BY LEE BRANSON

Tent City on Scout Island, New Orleans City Park where students worked with the People’s Hurricane Relief Fund to improve the living conditions of day laborers.

Ehren Brav (2L) and Rita Lomio (2L) help clear a backlog of work in the offices of New Orleans Legal Assistance.

Twenty-five Harvard Law School students volunteered a week of their winter break, providing free legal and humanitarian assistance to area residents and community organizations in Southeast Louisiana. Additionally, seven Harvard Law School students worked with the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights in Washington, DC and the Gulf Coast throughout January earning clinical course credit.

“There is a huge backlog of legal issues left over from the hurricanes,” said second year student Ehren Brav, “most of these involve people being evicted from their apartments often severely damaged for not paying rent, appeals to FEMA over benefit decisions, and fights over insurance. Often, the challenge is just finding our clients. I spoke to New Orleans residents in Texas, Nevada, Oklahoma, and Mississippi. They’re constantly on the move between residences and cities.” Only about 30 percent of people displaced by the hurricanes have returned, but the legal aid community is bracing for a possibly massive return of residents once the FEMA grants begin to dry up.

In addition to this housing work, they did outreach to hotels and did intake at FEMA Disaster Recovery Centers, interviewed immigrant laborers, and analyzed figures and data on how prisoners in the criminal justice system have been impacted. The students worked with a range of national and local organizations providing free legal services including New Orleans Legal Assistance in their New Orleans and Shreveport offices, People’s Hurricane Relief Fund, and a public defender in Alexandria. Additionally, several students worked with Common Ground, a grassroots non-profit group providing humanitarian support to returning residents.

Harvard Law School funded airfare and transportation for the trip while students stayed in free housing provided by churches, staff of collaborating organizations, and friends. Additional funds will be needed for even more students anticipated to volunteer for an upcoming spring break trip, and the school is planning ways students can provide legal assistance from a distance.

“From the first day of school in September, our students were so eager to contribute to hurricane relief efforts, but organizations in the Gulf Coast weren’t yet ready to use volunteers. Students organized fundraisers in the fall, but the opportunity for them to use their legal skills in hands-on work this January was what they had really been waiting for,” said Lee Branson, HLS’s Assistant Director for Pro Bono Programs.

“I was challenged by the extent of devastation and the amount of work that needs to be done,” said Tracey Kim, a second year student who worked to improve the working and living conditions of day laborers. “But I was also inspired by the people [we worked with] and all the other relief organizations trying to make a difference”

The trips were coordinated by the Harvard Law School Office of Clinical and Pro Bono Programs and the Student Hurricane Network. The Student Hurricane Network (www.studenthurricanenetwork.org) is a student-run coalition that works to involve law students from across the country in efforts to provide long-term legal aid and disaster relief to the Gulf region, through service trips, research projects, and fundraising. Harvard Law School is one of over fifty law schools represented. In addition to 33 students from Harvard Law School, nearly 200 law students from across the country spent a part of their winter break in Mississippi and Louisiana.