Author Archives: CUNY Law Review

VAWA @ 20: A Collection of Essays

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CUNY Law Review is excited to announce the publication of a fifteen part series about the legacy and impact of the federal Violence Against Women Act (VAWA)
This year marked the 20th Anniversary of VAWA, which was signed into law on September 13, 1994.

In collaboration with CUNY Law professors Julie Goldscheid and Ann Cammett, as well as a range of authors across several disciplines, CUNY Law Review is presenting fifteen brief, insightful pieces offering different perspectives on the impact of VAWA and potential directions for future reform.

These pieces will be published on our website in two parts: the first will go live on November 21, 2014, at 8pm, and the second on November 30, 2014.

They are available at VAWA @ 20 above or by clicking the picture!

Digital Program — The Long Crisis: Economic Inequality in New York City

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The City University of New York Law Review is proud to present “The Long Crisis: Economic Inequality in New York City”, a panel event focusing on the role that economic inequality and injustice play within the context of social justice legal issues and practical solutions lawyers and activists are employing to help overcome the inequality.

The Law Review thanks our fellow student organizations for endorsing this event: Law Students for Reproductive Justice (LSRJ); Latin American Law Students Association (LALSA); Labor Coalition for Workers’ Rights and Economic Justice; CUNY Law’s National Lawyers Guild Chapter (NLG); Iraqi Refugee Assistance Project (IRAP); Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP); CUNY Law Association of Students for Housing (CLASH).

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Panel Event: The Long Crisis — Economic Inequality in New York City

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The City University of New York Law Review is proud to present “The Long Crisis: Economic Inequality in New York City” on November 12, 2014, at 6:00pm, at the CUNY School of Law (2 Court Square, LIC, 11101).

“The Long Crisis” will reflect the theme of CUNY Law Review’s 18th volume: the role that economic inequality and injustice play within the context of social justice legal issues and practical solutions lawyers and activists are employing to help overcome the inequality.

The panel features Fahd Ahmed, acting executive director of DRUM–South Asian Organizing Center; Tom Angotti, professor of Urban Affairs and Planning and Director of the Hunter College Center for Community Planning and Development; Stanley Aronowitz, Distinguished Professor in the Ph.D. Program in Sociology at the CUNY Graduate Center; Jennifer Jones Austin, CEO and executive director of Federation of Protestant Welfare Agencies; Shawn Blumberg, legal director of Housing Conservation Coordinators; and Robin Steinberg, founder and executive director of The Bronx Defenders. A free dinner reception will follow the panel.

The event is completely free and open to the public, but it’s necessary to register at bit.ly/long-crisis

CUNY Law Review’s Brett Dolin Quoted in The Gothamist

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Notes & Comments author and Cunity Conversations discussion leader Brett Dolin was quoted in The Gothamist about his research on BIDs:

Brett Dolin, a law student at CUNY who has been researching the legal history of BIDs in New York City, argues that the determination of whether a BID should be established in the first place has drifted away from the original intention. According to the 1989 BID Act, a BID can be formed in a neighborhood that is in a “deteriorated condition.”

“But a lot of times the BID Act has been used to to fund totally different kinds of initiatives that have nothing to do with improving the quality of life or the commercial environment,” Dolin said. His research has focused on how a variation on a BID was being used to attempt to fund Hudson River Park in Manhattan by having a specific district of residents and business owners pay a fee for a park everyone in the city can use.

“Not only is this unfair for residents of the area, but the governing structure of a BID doesn’t lend itself to democracy,” Dolin says. “Property owners, by law, must hold a majority on a BID committee, and if they’re governing a public space, isn’t that a violation of the equal protection clause?”

Check out the rest of the article here!

CUNITY Conversations: One Condo, One Vote: Democracy and Local Government in New York City

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Come join us for the second installment of our new discussion series, CUNITY Conversations!

As you recall, CUNITY Conversations is a discussion series designed to create discussion around a particular topic.   The discussion leaders are the Law Review’s Note and Comments student authors, along with professors and practitioners.  It is an informal time to get together, hang out, and talk about a relevant social justice issue.

The next installment of the CUNITY Conversation series is Wednesday, October 8, from 6-8pm, in the Community Room, 3/116.

The Law Review’s Notes and Comments author and 3L, Brett Dolin, and CUNY Law Prof. Andrea McArdle will be co-leading this month’s conversation, revolving around the topics of Brett’s law review article:

Can a plan to pay for an underfunded public park lead to unchecked privatization of city services and threaten to compromise voting rights under the Equal Protection Clause? Brett’s Notes and Comments article, “One Condo, One Vote: The New York BID Act as a Threat to Equal Protection and Democratic Control” examines the role of an obscure city government device, the Business Improvement District, in the privatization of city services and restriction of district voting power to property owners.

The CUNITY Conversation will begin with a discussion of one proposed BID, designed as a funding source for Manhattan’s Hudson River Park, and focus on issues of privatization of government services and democratic control over local government.

Brett Dolin is a 3L at CUNY Law School. His article examines the role of an obscure city government device, the Business Improvement District, in the privatization of municipal services and restriction of fiscal decision-making power to property owners. While in law school, Brett has interned with the Economic Justice Project and Elder Law Clinic at CUNY, with the Government Benefits Project at MFY Legal Services, and with a Justice of the New York Supreme Court. Before law school, Brett worked as assistant curator of a private art collection.

Andrea McArdle, Professor of Law at City University of New York School of Law, teaches a variety of experiential courses, including seminars she designed in judicial rhetoric and in urban land use and community lawyering. Andrea begins her sixth year as chair or co-chair of the Law School’s Curriculum Committee, and, as Director of Legal Writing, has shaped the development of CUNY’s writing-intensive curriculum. In 2013 she received a teaching award from the graduating class. Before joining the CUNY Law School faculty, she taught in the Lawyering Program at NYU School of Law, served as Lawyering Faculty Coordinator and, as NYU Lawyering Theory Workshop Coordinator, developed an interdisciplinary faculty workshop series to provide a framework for thinking about how lawyers work.

Vol. 17.1

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Explore the digital version of our most recent print edition, Volume 17.1.

Public Interest Practitioners Section (PIPS)

Natural Disasters, Access to Justice, and Legal Services by Jordan Ballard, Julia Howard-Gibbon, Brenda Munoz Furnish, Staff Attorneys in NYLAG’s Storm Response Unit., and Aaron Scheinwald, Staff Attorney in New York Legal Assistance Group (NYLAG)’s Mobile Legal Help Center.

Fighting for Educational Stability in the Face of Family Turmoil by Michael R. Mastrangelo, SSES Project Coordinating Attorney, The Children’s Law Center. J.D., Brooklyn Law School.

 Executive Articles

“He Got in My Face So I Shot Him”: How Defendant’s Language Impairments Impair Attorney-Client Relationships by Michele LaVigne, Clinical Professor of Law, University of Wisconsin Law School, and Gregory Van Rybroek, Director/CEO, Mendota Mental Health Institute, Madison, Wisconsin.

Single-Room Occupancy Housing in New York City: The Origins and Dimensions of a Crisis by Brian J. Sullivan, Senior Staff Attorney, MFY Legal Services, Inc., SRO Law Project. J.D., Georgetown University Law Center, and Jonathan Burke, Staff Attorney, Community Legal Aid. J.D., New York University School of Law.

Fostering the Human Rights of Youth in Foster Care: Defining Reasonable Efforts to Improve Consequences of Aging Out by Ramesh Kasarabada

Considering the Individualized Educational Program: A Call for Applying Contract Theory to an Essential Legal Document by Bonnie Spiro Schinagle, J.D., LL.M., Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law.

Notes & Comments 

Male Asylum Applicants Who Fear Becoming the Victims of Honor Killings: The Case for Gender Equality by Caitlin Steinke, J.D. 2013, Hofstra University School of Law.

If I Marry a Man in New York, Could I Marry a Woman in Kentucky?: The Problem of the Fundamental Right to (Straight) Marriage by Philip R. Hsiao, Graduate Fellow, J.D. Candidate 2014, CUNY School of Law.

 

 

Vol. 16.2

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Explore the digital version of  Volume 16.2.

Public Interest Practitioners Section (PIPS)

The Continued Marginalization of People Living with HIV/AIDS in U.S. Immigration Law by Cristina Velez, Supervising Attorney of Immigration at the HIV Law Project, a non-profit based in New York City.

Challenging the Practice of Solitary  Confinement in Immigration Detention in Georgia and Beyond by Azadeh Shahshahani, director of the National Security/Immigrants’ Rights project at the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Georgia & Ayah Natasha El-Sergany, an attorney based in Seattle, Wash., and 2010 graduate of the University of North Carolina School of Law.

Executive Article

J. McIntyre and the Global Stream of Commerce by Frank Deale, Professor of Law, CUNY School of Law.

Notes & Comments 

Not Guilty By Reason of Gender Transgression: The Ethics of Gender Identity Disorder as Criminal Defense and the Case of PFC. Chelsea Manning by Madeline Porta, J.D. 2013, City University of New York School of Law.

Because Parents Owe it to Them: Accompanied LGBTQ Youth Enforcing the Parental Duty of Support by Maria Roumiantseva, J.D. 2013, City University of New York School of Law and Staff Attorney, The Legal Aid Society, Juvenile Rights Practice.

Event

Work, Work, and More Work: Whose Economic Rights? A conversation between Professors Stanley Aronowitz, Distinguished Professor of Sociology in the Ph.D. Program in Sociology at the CUNY Graduate Center and Director of the Center for the Study of Culture, Technology, and Work & Shirley Lung, Professor of Law, CUNY School of Law and former Executive Director of the Center for Immigrants’ Rights. Moderated by Professor Ruthann Robson, Professor of Law and University Distinguished Professor, CUNY School of Law.

 

 

CUNITY Conversations: Reproductive Justice and the Foster Care System

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The CUNY Law Review is excited to introduce a brand new discussion series called CUNITY Conversations. This series is designed to be an informal space for students and professors to discuss a particular guided topic each month.

The September installment of CUNITY Conversations is this Wednesday, September 10, from 6-8pm in the Community Room (3/116).

The Law Review’s Notes and Comments student author and 3L, Kara Wallis, will be co-leading a discussion on reproductive justice and the foster care system with Farah Diaz-Tello, CUNY alum and staff attorney at National Advocates for Pregnant Women (NAWP).

Kara’s Notes and Comments article, “No Access, No Choice: Foster Youth, Abortion, and State Removal of Children,” tracks the way systems fail to provide a youth in foster care with resources necessary to make autonomous choices about her reproductive life. The CUNITY Conversation around this piece will focus particularly on legal and social barriers to terminating pregnancy, including judicial bypass proceedings, and remaining a parenting youth while being a ward of the state.

Please attend for a riveting discussion with your peers and colleagues. This series is not a question-answer panel, but a DISCUSSION, so attend, eat snacks, and feel free to speak up, ask questions, or suggest your own ideas and thoughts on this month’s topic at the event next week.

Kara Wallis, student author, is a 3L at CUNY Law. Through  the narrative of the life course of a foster youth, her piece tracks the way the system fails to provide foster youth with resources necessary to make autonomous choices about their reproductive lives, focusing particularly on barriers to terminating pregnancy and remaining a parent after giving birth. Before law school, Kara worked at National Advocates for Pregnant Women (NAPW) as a program associate, and has since interned at the Bronx Defenders and Brooklyn Family Defense Practice, defending low-income parents against accusations of abuse and neglect, work she dreams of continuing after graduation. Kara is a co-chair of CUNY Law’s Law Students for Reproductive Justice, and a student member of the New York Bar Association’s Sex & Law Committee.

Farah Diaz-Tello, JD, is a staff attorney at National Advocates for Pregnant Women (NAPW), a 501(c)(3) that works to secure the human and civil rights, health and welfare of all women, focusing particularly on pregnant and parenting women, and those who are most vulnerable to state control and punishment – low income women, women of color, and drug-using women. Farah is a graduate of CUNY Law, where she was a Haywood Burns Fellow in Civil and Human Rights. Her work at NAPW has focused on the rights to medical decision-making and birthing with dignity, and on using the international human rights framework to protect the humanity of pregnant women regardless of their circumstances. A proud Texan, she is an alumna of the University of Texas at Austin.

Event: Back to School Bash

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For a fun time and to learn more about the CUNY Law Review’s fall issue theme, to meet and greet new and old staff members, and to hear about future events for this semester, join us at the Creek and Cave for our Back to School Bash!

This event is for EVERYONE, not just Law Review staff members!

The Creek and Cave is a Cal-Mex restaurant just down the street from school, within walking distance. They offer an entire menu of food and drink, including non-alcoholic beverages. Feel free to purchase food, or just a soda, during this event too. If you choose to purchase and drink alcohol, please also bring your CUNY student ID for the happy hour $5 margarita special.

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IMPROVING LAW SCHOOL FOR TRANS* AND GENDER NONCONFORMING STUDENTS: SUGGESTIONS FOR FACULTY

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Gabriel Arkles*

Click here for a recommended citation and to download a paginated PDF version of this article.

Introduction

In a way, creating accessible, nondiscriminatory, and effective law school experiences for trans* and gender nonconforming[1] students is easy. All of our skills as educators apply; we can simply extend our existing strategies and best practices. Like all students, trans* and gender nonconforming students benefit from professors who care about their learning and expect the best from them, create respectful classroom dialogue on difficult issues, provide meaningful feedback, and so on.

In another way, creating accessible, nondiscriminatory, and effective law school experiences for trans* and gender nonconforming students is fantastically difficult. Simply acknowledging trans* existence and accepting gender nonconforming people on their own terms requires an overthrow of a deeply entrenched view of gender in our society: that gender is a binary, fixed, universal, apparent, and apolitical truth. Many everyday classroom practices and longstanding university policies created with the best of intentions can harm trans* and gender nonconforming students because they are based on assumptions about gender that just don’t hold up. Partly because of these policies and practices, relatively few openly trans* and gender nonconforming people hold positions—especially the most powerful and prestigious positions—as faculty, staff, or students in law schools. Fortunately, more and more trans* and gender nonconforming people are entering law schools and many cisgender[2] people want to learn how to work with them respectfully and effectively.

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