Tzedek DC End of Summer Update

Friends:

As we wrap up the summer of our third year at Tzedek DC, we are proud to report that, thanks to your critical support, we have been able to serve over 1000 vulnerable DC families. In full representation cases, we are saving clients an average of over $1,500 per case, the equivalent of more than two weeks wages at the DC minimum wage. For those who we are able to serve with current resources, our work is enabling community members to avert crippling default judgments, negotiate feasible repayment plans, repair credit, and recover from financial abuse crimes before such problems overwhelm their lives. Through this work, we are both building bridges and increasing access to the justice system for DC residents who tell us that now, often for the first time, they feel the legal system is finally working for them.

We are deeply grateful for the growing recognition of our work from supporters old and new, D.C.’s legal community, and commentators (see “Tzedek DC in the news” below). At the same time, we are ever mindful of the continuing attacks on our most vulnerable neighbors from federal policy, including attacks on our immigrant households and the evisceration of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and other consumer safeguards -- attacks that have helped lead to a 172% increase in debt collection filings in DC Superior Court since 2016 and that both strain our resources and reinforce our determination.

2019 highlights at Tzedek DC include:

• Taking on a referral of 412 cases from the Office of the Attorney General for the District of Columbia for residents victimized by a debt collector’s use of fraudulent robo-affidavits and fraudulently obtained judgments in DC Superior Court;

• Launching ¡Sin Deudas, Sin Dudas! (Spanish for “No Debts, No Doubts”), an outreach campaign in support of DC’s Latinx community, which has been the subject of the Trump administration’s immigration practices that chill residents’ participation in the civil court system; and

• Systemic advocacy to end DC’s ongoing denials of driver license renewals for those with debts to the DC Government, regardless of their ability to pay.

For a deeper dive, just keep on reading – or scroll down here and click (on non-mobile devices) on the links to specific update topics.

Meanwhile, we hope that you can join us at the third annual Eat Well, Do Justice! celebrations, coming on September 23rd. This year our celebrity chefs (including Barack Obama’s former personal chef!) will be battling to see who makes the best knish – it’s an event not to be missed, with guest judges including Congressman Jamie Raskin and Dahlia Lithwick of Slate. Click here to buy a ticket or donate for Eat Well Do Justice!

Thank you again for making our work at Tzedek DC possible.

With gratitude,

 

Ariel Levinson-Waldman
Tzedek DC

 

Serving DC Superior Court Residents Defrauded by Midland Funding

At the request of DC Attorney General Karl Racine, Tzedek DC has accepted referrals for 412 DC residents in connection with allegedly fraudulent robo-signed affidavits by debt buyer Midland Funding. Following a multi-state investigation, Midland settled and DC consumers will receive credits totaling $577,783. However, Midland also sued and obtained Superior Court judgments against most of the residents affected by this alleged fraud. Those court judgments are the focus of our work in the cases. We are seeking to vacate the judgments obtained in those cases and ensure that residents’ records are no longer harmed by Midland’s alleged fraud and abuses.

 

¡Sin Deudas, Sin Dudas! (“No Debts, No Doubts”).

This bilingual campaign encompasses diverse partnerships, bilingual training sessions, workshops, and tailored informational materials for client community members and partner staff on topics like finding legal assistance, avoiding default judgments, managing credit, and spotting economic crimes. We are also working to get our existing Spanish-language TV and radio PSAs aired on the region’s major Hispanic media outlets, while developing new PSAs microtargeted to Spanish speakers who listen to music on their cell-phones or computers (for much wider distribution, at much lower cost). This work is done in coordination with our community-facing partner organizations like CARECEN.

 

Reforming DC’s wealth-based drivers license revocation scheme

Building on our successful prior efforts to end DC's automatic drivers license suspensions for unpaid traffic tickets, Tzedek DC is working to end DC’s automatic denial of driver license renewals for those with debts of over $101 to the DC Government, regardless of ability pay. Denial of renewal is, in effect, a slow-motion suspension. Residents with lower incomes, needing to get to work and elsewhere, often drive anyway on suspended licenses. When caught and arrested, as over 7,000 were between 2015-2017 (80% of them African-American), they then face spiraling fines, fees and penalties that they are even less able to pay than the original traffic debt. To see our oversight testimony to the DC Council, click here.

Tzedek DC Public Interest Fellow Rebecca Azhdam sharing know your rights information with DC residents at risk of losing their licenses for unpaid debts

Tzedek DC Public Interest Fellow Rebecca Azhdam sharing know your rights information with DC residents at risk of losing their licenses for unpaid debts

 

Tzedek DC in the 2019 New

 

Tzedek, Tzedek, Tirdof
“Justice, justice shall you pursue …”

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Again, we deeply appreciate your support of Tzedek DC’s work.
Thank you for making it possible.
https://www.tzedekdc.org/donate-now/

Tzedek DC Year-End Update

Friends:

As 2018 draws to a close, we send heartfelt thanks for your ongoing support of Tzedek DC’s mission and work. It’s also a good time to reflect on why Tzedek DC was launched in the first place, less than two years ago, and to catch you up on our past few months.

Tzedek DC was established because a high percentage of low-income DC residents, notably in our communities of color, experience formidable problems with debt and debt collectors. However these residents neither get nor in many cases are given a meaningful opportunity to seek the legal help that could resolve or mitigate those problems. Tzedek DC opened our doors in February 2017 as the first and only organization to focus principally on this issue, with a three-part game plan to prevent debt, court judgments and credit report harms from setting off catastrophic financial, housing, employment and family crises for some of our most vulnerable neighbors.

  • First, we provide free legal services. And as the number of debt collection suits against low-income DC residents has continued to rise, we have seen more and more people in need of our direct legal services. In 2018, now with an in-house staff of four attorneys and a robust cadre of 60+ pro bono lawyers, we have helped approximately 450 DC families with their debt-related legal problems. A substantial increase from 2017! To hear the perspective of our client Esan on the impact of that work, go to https://www.tzedekdc.org/mission/

  • Second, through our partnerships for community education and outreach, we co-lead preventative and practical education regarding debt, credit, economic fraud and consumers’ rights. This year, we added several new partners – Little Lights Urban Ministries, the DC Metropolitan Police Department’s Office of Neighborhood Safety and Engagement, the Victim Legal Network of DC, and East of the River Casehandlers among others – to provide their clients and staff with help on debt management, credit repair and reporting, and pre-bankruptcy issues.

  • Third, we engage in policy and systems reform work to make existing DC laws and practices fairer. Our advocacy, in partnership with the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Washington and a strong coalition of anti-poverty groups, paid off spectacularly in 2018. First, the DC Council ended the automatic suspension of drivers licenses for those unable to pay their traffic debt. Second, the Council voted to end drivers license suspensions for unpaid court debts. Third, and just this week, on December 18, the DC Council passed the wage garnishment reforms that our coalition has been pushing for the past year: making the garnishment rules much less onerous for the city’s lowest income earners, protecting earnings up to DC’s minimum wage from garnishment, and for the first time requiring notice before a person’s wages can be garnished. 

  • We're especially proud that the wage garnishment reform results in part from testimony delivered by our client Cecile, who powerfully shared her story in the Council’s Judiciary Committee proceedings on the bill. Here is a picture taken just after her testimony (Cecile is second from the left):

 
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I'm pleased to report that we have exceeded the goals we set for ourselves a year ago in relation to number of clients served, volunteer attorneys and interns trained, partnerships and presentations made, advocacy goals won or advanced, and new staff hired. We were named by the Catalogue for Philanthropy as “One of the Best” charities for 2018-2019 in the DC region. We also exceeded our financial goals, thanks to generous foundation and individual gifts, and our hugely successful (and by all accounts just plain fun!) second annual Eat Well Do Justice event with celebrity chefs. Join us for the third annual Eat Well Do Justice in September 2019. Knishes anyone?...

In January, we’ll be moving into renovated offices at UDC’s David A. Clarke Law School, where we are proudly headquartered, from where we will aim to serve more clients, grow our roster of community partners, and further pursue systemic reforms. It will be a lively space and we welcome visitors and volunteers.

Unfortunately, the needs that Tzedek DC was originally created to address show no signs of abating and, in fact, are continuing to increase. We seek your continued support, to enable still more progress on our mandate of helping low-income families facing debt and debt collection abuses. Please make as generous a year-end gift as you can – click on https://www.tzedekdc.org/donate-now/ – share our work with others in your circle, follow us on social media, and help us continue to send the message that we are all in this together.

With gratitude, and wishes for a good holiday season.

B’Shalom,

 

Ariel Levinson-Waldman
Tzedek DC

 

Tzedek, Tzedek, Tirdof
“Justice, justice shall you pursue …”

mlk and heschel.png
 

Again, we deeply appreciate your support of Tzedek DC’s work.
Thank you for making it possible.
https://www.tzedekdc.org/donate-now/

Mid-Summer Update on Tzedek DC

Friends:

Tzedek DC’s mission is to safeguard the rights of low-income DC residents of all faiths and backgrounds facing debt-related crises.  As we mark the completion of Tzedek DC’s first 18 months of full-time operations, we wanted to pause and share some exciting updates with you.  Since launching, we have:

As a result of our work, we are both building bridges and increasing access to the justice system for hundreds of low-income, unrepresented DC residents who tell us that now, often for the first time, they feel the legal system is finally working for them.

We are deeply grateful for the growing recognition of our work from supporters old and new, D.C.’s legal community, and commentators.  At the same time, we are ever mindful of the continuing attacks on our most vulnerable neighbors from federal policy, including attacks on our immigrant households and the evisceration of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and other consumer safeguards -- a set of assaults that makes our work especially timely and essential, and reinforces our determination.

For a deeper dive, just keep on reading – or scroll down here and click (on non-mobile devices) on the links to specific topics. And we hope to see you on September 17 at Eat Well, Do Justice 2018! Battle of the Blintzes, details here so that we can celebrate this work together.

Thank you for making our work possible, 

 

- Ariel

Ariel Levinson-Waldman
Founding President & Director-Counsel
Tzedek DC  

 

Legal Services

Clients served & money saved. In our first year and a half, Tzedek DC has provided free legal help to over 430 families. We are saving our clients about $1,046 per “full representation” case, representing about two weeks of wages (at the new minimum wage of $13.25 per hour). We are also saving our client families attorneys’ fees (often sought through fee-shifting demands by plaintiffs in debt cases), longer-term costs, and future problems avoided by not receiving an adverse judgment.

 

Our Clients Send Their Relatives to Us for Help. As of last month, our past and current clients represent the single largest source of referrals (over 1/3) of new clients. This is something we are both proud of and, we believe, highlights the possibility of spurring the long-term paradigm change we seek in the delivery of legal services for debt as, over time, access to help becomes the norm rather than the rare and lucky exception it has been.

 

Sample Case in focus. Erica Folds is a single, unemployed 28-year-old mother with a daughter, who receives public assistance. Her partner became physically, verbally, and financially abusive. As part of the financial abuse, he opened credit cards in her name while they were together. After she fled, he filed income taxes in her name (a common tactic by abusive partners to fraudulently receive income tax refunds). In response, Ms. Folds filed a joint complaint to the IRS and the Federal Trade Commission. But after learning she was still being sued by a third-party debt collector for $924 on a Wal-Mart card her ex-partner had opened in her name, she planned to pay -- just so she could put the conflict behind her. Tzedek DC took on Erica’s case and obtained dismissal of the debt collector’s suit against her, allowing her to get back on the path towards stability.

 

Our First Equal Justice Works Fellow. Sarah Hollender, our fantastic Associate Director of Litigation, and I were joined last month by our third full-time lawyer, Bianca Smith -- thanks to a prestigious, two-year $128,000 grant award from the Equal Justice Works Crime Victims Justice Corps Legal Fellowship program. Bianca’s focus is on assisting and empowering victims dealing with all forms of economic exploitation and fraud, from identify theft and imposter scams, to exploitation by lenders and debt buyers. Bianca comes to Tzedek DC as a 2017 graduate of Catholic University Columbus School of Law, where she was Executive Director of the Black Law Students Association, and after completing a judicial clerkship as well as internships with the U.S. Capitol Police and a public defender’s office.

 

Our Pro Bono Volunteers. Our pro bono attorney partners are indispensable allies in handling our caseload. This growing cadre now boasts over sixty members, and includes a retired appellate judge, along with lawyers from large and small law firms, federal agencies, and in-house corporate offices of general counsel, collectively ranging in age from their twenties through their seventies. We’re grateful to the law firms of Venable, Steptoe, and King & Spalding, each of which has hosted (and fed!) our pro bono volunteers at training sessions. We encourage all of you lawyers reading this to consider getting trained to take on cases, and non-lawyer friends to reach out to us about other volunteer opportunities to get involved!

 

Preventative Financial Education / Community Outreach

Building on our initial partnerships with UDC, United Planning Organization and Little Lights Urban Ministries, we are also continually taking advantage of connections -- typically made through our Board members, funders and colleagues -- to build productive new working relationships.

Our most recent partners include:

  • DC’s Metropolitan Police Department Office of Neighborhood Safety and Engagement, where we train program participants in managing credit and responding to court paperwork;

  • the DC Public Defender Service, where we provide civil legal assistance to residents facing the criminal justice system, including help with credit issues, identity theft, and avoiding the suspension of drivers licenses; and

  • the Victim Legal Network of DC (VLNDC), a network of ten legal services providers that share information within a secure IT system, to immediately match crime victims with the most appropriate providers for all aspects of their cases. Just this week, for example, we received a referral from VLNDC to help a client fight financial abuse that has led to identity theft. 

 
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Know Your Rights Trainings. We have also continued to seek out additional venues for offering preventative trainings in familiar community settings, along with distribution of our English and Spanish educational materials -- with respect to financial literacy, credit, debt collectors and lawsuits, the importance and availability of legal counsel, and citizens’ rights. These efforts will grow the pool of people over time who are aware of and comfortable seeking legal help. For example, residents at the Potomac Gardens Public Housing Complex recently attended a credit repair and Know Your Rights training we did in partnership with Little Lights Urban Ministries. 

 

Advocacy for Policy and Systemic Reforms

1. Ending Automatic Drivers License Suspensions for Traffic Ticket Debt

Tzedek DC has been the lead organization for ending the DMV’s constitutionally dubious and patently unfair practice of automatically suspending DC drivers’ licenses for unpaid traffic debt, with no inquiry regarding the ability to pay. The DMV suspended over 126,000 licenses on these grounds since just 2010.

A version of the bill we drafted targeting ticket-based suspensions was passed unanimously by the full Council on July 10 and is awaiting the Mayor’s signature.

Our coalition advocacy letter is here.

A Washington Post article on this reform includes quotes from Tzedek DC and is here.

 

2. Ending Automatic License Suspensions for Court Debt

A second bill with a related proposal we put forth – to end the suspension of drivers’ licenses for court-based debt (debt arising from court judgments that favor insurance companies in certain automobile-related cases) –  was considered by the Council’s Transportation Committee at a July 6 hearing.  Tzedek DC’s client Billy Peterson  -- a senior citizen, Ward 5 resident and U.S. military veteran  --  testified about an insurance company’s threats to coerce him into making payments. Tzedek DC Senior Advisor Janet Lowenthal read into the record a letter from another client of ours. And we as an organization, alongside our partner the Jewish Community Relations of Greater Washington, testified on the legal, equity, and policy reasons compelling this reform.  At the end of the hearing, the DC Government Executive branch witness announced that she had no objections to the proposal.  Committee Chair Councilmember Cheh announced her intention to move forward with the reform.

3. Reforming DC’s Wage Garnishment Rules

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In coalition with other DC legal service providers, we are also supporting a bill that would update the District’s wage garnishment law, which currently authorizes up to 25% of wages to be garnished for even those who make barely more than minimum income. The bill proposes using a practical, straightforward calculation tied to the District’s minimum wage, to make garnishment limits more protective of low-wage workers’ earnings, and would also require creditors to give prior written notice to affected employees, before a garnishment order could go into effect. This bill received a hearing on June 7, 2018 from the Council’s Judiciary Committee –where Tzedek DC testified along with our client Cecile Tshibuabua. DC Council Judiciary Committee Chair Charles Allen has publicly indicated his intent to move forward with the bill.

 

Recognition for Our Work

Our progress over the past months rests heavily on the support of all who have volunteered their time, and all those institutions and individuals who have contributed financially.  In May, Tzedek DC was deemed by the Catalogue for Philanthropy as “one of the best,” and selected for inclusion by the Catalogue for a four-year listing that will provide recurring support for our work through 2021.  

In another form of recognition, Tzedek DC has been asked by the DC Superior Court to serve on the Small Claims Committee as one of two legal service provider members. This involves meeting with judges and staff from Superior Court to discuss ways of improving the Court’s processes, forms and procedures, such as identifying ways to reduce wait times for our client community, which can significantly increase both parking costs and time missed from work.

The impact of our work has also been recognized in articles, interviews, or postings by the Washington Post, Huffington Post, National Review, Washington Jewish Week, Kol Ha Birah, the Forward, the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, WPFW Pacifica Radio Jazz & Justice, and Sound Advice, where Dean Shelley Broderick of the UDC David A. Clarke School of Law interviewed me and Tzedek DC Advisory Council member and pro bono counsel Danielle Conley on drivers license suspension reforms.

 

Eat Well, Do Justice 2018!
Battle of the Blintzes.
September 17, 6:30 pm, at UDC

On September 17, top DC chefs will donate their finest creations of the traditional staple, blintzes.  Guest Judges include Karl Racine, Attorney General of the District of Columbia, Marcia Greenberger, co-founder, National Women's Law Center, Ruth Marcus of  The Washington Post Editorial Page, and Alex Levin, Eat Well, Do Justice! winner 2017, Schlow Restaurant Group.

 

Tzedek, Tzedek, Tirdof
“Justice, justice shall you pursue …”

mlk and heschel.png
 

Again, we deeply appreciate your support of Tzedek DC’s work.
Thank you for making it possible.
https://www.tzedekdc.org/donate-now/

Tzedek DC and Coalition Members File Amicus Brief in Support of Acting CFPB Director Leandra English

Agency’s Independence Is Necessary to Its Mission, Groups Say

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) independence from external political influence is crucial to the agency’s mission of protecting consumers, Tzedek DC and nine other groups told a court today in an amicus brief filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

Along with Tzedek DC, the groups are Public Citizen, Americans for Financial Reform, Center for Responsible Lending, Consumer Action, National Association of Consumer Advocates (NACA), National Consumer Law Center (NCLC), National Consumers League, National Fair Housing Alliance (NFHA) and U.S. Public Interest Research Group Education Fund (U.S. PIRG Education Fund).

In the case, Deputy CFPB Director Leandra English is seeking a preliminary injunction allowing her to serve as acting director of the CFPB while litigation over the lawful acting director – herself or U.S. Office of Management and Budget Director Mick Mulvaney – proceeds. In their amicus filing, the groups explain that the public has a strong interest in English serving as the acting director while the court further considers the legal issues.

“The CFPB’s independence is critical to its effectiveness in protecting our client community of low-income D.C. residents, who often face debt, credit and predatory lending crises, as well as unjust debt collection activities,” said Ariel Levinson-Waldman, president and director-counsel of Tzedek DC. “The Bureau, to say the least, should not be run by a member of the president’s Cabinet. The court should act to ensure compliance with Congress’s intent in Dodd-Frank of having an independent CFPB.”

The organizations’ amicus brief is here.

Tzedek DC supports bill introduced in DC Council to end automatic suspension of low-income drivers’ licenses for unpaid debts

Contact: Sarah Hollender, sh@tzedekdc.org

Washington, D.C., December 7, 2017 — D.C. Councilmember Elissa Silverman earlier this week introduced legislation that would end the automatic suspension of low-income residents’ driver’s licenses for the nonpayment of tickets and certain kinds of court debt. The Driver’s License Revocation Fairness Amendment Act of 2017 would end the city’s current practice of suspending driver’s licenses for failure to pay debts as low as $100 from parking tickets, traffic tickets, or certain court judgments.

Existing District law allows the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) to suspend a person’s driver’s license for any unpaid government-issued ticket over $100, only reinstating the license once the bill, including any added fees, is paid. The legislation introduced this week aims to protect lower-income residents and working families who are not able to pay the ticket by setting income limits for license suspensions, reinstating licenses for eligible residents, and ending license suspensions as a tool for private debt collection.

Including Councilmember Silverman, six of the thirteen DC Councilmembers co-introduced or co-sponsored the bill. Co-introducers included At-Large Councilmember Anita Bonds, Ward 1 Councilmember Brianne Nadeau, Ward 7 Councilmember Vincent Gray, and Ward 8 Councilmember Trayon White. At-Large Councilmember David Grosso was a co-sponsor. The bill was referred to the Council’s Committee on Transportation and the Environment.

Ariel Levinson-Waldman, President and Director-Counsel of Tzedek DC, said:

“Suspending DC residents’ driver’s licenses for nonpayment of debt is unfair, counter-productive, and legally problematic.  Tzedek DC thanks Councilmember Silverman and each of her Council colleagues working to advance the changes embodied in the bill.  We will continue to work with the Council and our coalition partners in advocating for these protections. 

It is time to end this irrational and harmful practice. Suspending low-income DC residents’ licenses makes them less able to afford their debt, and, importantly, increases their risk of exposure to criminal charges for driving without a license when they must drive a car for critical life tasks.  Not surprisingly, many low-income DC residents are arrested and charged for driving without a license, a criminal charge that carries a punishment of up to a year in prison and a $5,000 fine for the first offense.  Suspension doesn’t just perpetuate poverty.  It criminalizes it.” 

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For links to further background on the issue of drivers license suspension reform: