NEWS STATEMENT 06.16.20 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

IMMIGRATION WOES AND COVID-19 CONCERNS LEAD SUMMER GRANTMAKINg - Impact Fund Makes Quarterly Summer Grants of $158,700 to Support Impact Litigation

Berkeley, CA – The Impact Fund, the nation’s only charity providing broad support to advance the use of impact litigation as a tool to achieve economic, environmental, racial, and social justice, has just made recoverable grants totaling $158,700 in its summer cycle to fund six lawsuits to protect the rights of marginalized communities threatened by uncaring corporate interests and small-minded government.

“In spite of and indeed because of the economic downturn, we remain as committed as ever to supporting the communities that suffer,” said Impact Fund Executive Director, Jocelyn Larkin.

Among the hardest hit are immigrants, especially those applying for asylum. Two of the cases funded touch on that issue. The first, to Capital Area Immigrant Rights Coalition, is to address the unfair process that has sharply increased under the current administration, which is detaining more immigrants who have family and community ties, and little to no criminal history. The other is to help with an appeal being made by Catholic Legal Immigration Network, Inc., seeking to safeguard family-based particular social group asylum claims and protect families that have survived or will face persecution based on their family relationships.

In another class action case funded, Connecticut Legal Rights Project is seeking to mitigate patient death and infection from COVID-19. Patients confined in Connecticut state psychiatric hospitals are suing for preliminary and permanent injunctive relief for an order for the state to take action to ensure constitutionally safe conditions of confinement.

The remaining three grants are to the Heiltsuk Tribal Council seeking relief from an oil spill, Community Legal Services in Philadelphia seeking to remedy a local culture of “surprise evictions,” and to Southern Legal Counsel fighting the state of Florida for adequate health insurance for transgender workers.

A full list of the organizations and cases funded, with a brief synopsis of each, is attached.

Recognizing the impact of COVID-19 on potential new cases that might emerge during this crisis, and how the pandemic is disproportionately impacting communities of color, we have also increased our capacity to make more rapid response grants and fast track applicants who apply later in the quarterly cycle.

Helen Kang, chair of the Impact Fund’s Grant Advisory Committee said: “Communities of color are most often the last in line , when it comes to justice. The cases we fund largely seek to redress that imbalance so that all communities, regardless of their resources, can have their day in court.”

Letters of inquiry for the Impact Fund’s fall grantmaking cycle are due July 14. 

ENDS

For more information and photography, contact:

Teddy Basham-Witherington 415.845.1206 / twitherington@impactfund.org 

About The Cases Funded

Heiltsuk Tribal Council for a case seeking to challenge the constitutionality of Canada’s oil spill response, compensate Heiltsuk for losses from a marine oil spill in traditional territory, and establish Heiltsuk Aboriginal title to specified reserve and marine lands. In 2016, the grounding and sinking of the Nathan E. Stewart spilled over 110,000 liters of diesel and other pollutants into the waters and environment. The spill occurred adjacent to a culturally important ancient village and important Heiltsuk harvesting sites for clams, other food, and medicine. The diesel spill contaminated an ecologically intact area, a rich ecosystem that, until the spill, had been harvested using traditional, sustainable practices for millennia.

Capital Area Immigrants' Rights Coalition for a class action lawsuit on behalf of immigrants who are detained in Maryland to challenge the adequacy of immigration court bond hearings. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”) detains nearly 1,000 noncitizens in Maryland at any given time, the majority of whom are indigent. Although bond hearings are meant to protect against arbitrary detention, they routinely result in the unnecessary and prolonged detentions of individuals based solely on their lack of financial resources. The number of such individuals detained under this unfair process has sharply increased under the Administration, which is detaining more immigrants who have family and community ties, and little to no criminal history.

Catholic Legal Immigration Network, Inc. (CLINIC) for an appeal to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals of a precedential attorney general decision, Matter of L-E-A-, that seeks to limit the ability of asylum seekers to seek asylum, based on the family-based particular social group protected ground. Last July, Attorney General Barr decided Matter of L-E-A-, in which he found, contrary to decades of precedent, that an “average” or “typical” family will ordinarily not be a particular social group. The consequence of Attorney General Barr’s decision is that, unless your family is famous, powerful, or prominent, violence directed at a person because they share kinship ties with another will not qualify a person for asylum. Because gangs, organized criminals, and authoritarian regimes frequently target the family members of their opponents, the previously well-established principle that families are particular social groups was perhaps the most frequent basis on which Central American asylum seekers prevailed in their cases. By challenging Matter of L-E-A- at the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, the appeal seeks to safeguard family-based particular social group asylum claims and protect families that have survived or will face persecution based on their family relationships.

Community Legal Services, Philadelphia for a action case against officers of Philadelphia's Municipal Court for due process violations actionable under 42 U.S.C. 1983, seeking to remedy local culture of "surprise evictions," wherein tenants often do not receive notice of their evictions. In a city that has the highest rate of deep poverty in the country, and is also struggling with a housing crisis where eviction rates are 150% of the national average, this litigation seeks to address another major problem: Philadelphia’s culture of "surprise evictions." In Philadelphia, tenants are often evicted by ambush, uninformed about the date they are to be locked out of their homes, and unaware of the statutory right to stay in their homes by paying the cost of the judgment prior to that date.

Connecticut Legal Rights Project, Inc., for a five-plaintiff proposed class action against two state psychiatric hospitals for immediate injunctive relief to mitigate patient death and infection from COVID-19. The five named plaintiffs and the patient class are suing for preliminary and permanent injunctive relief for an order for the state to take action to ensure constitutionally safe conditions of confinement. The complaint alleges unsafe conditions of confinement and deliberate indifference and reckless indifference to the health, safety, and welfare of the patients for failure to mitigate the risk of infection and death from COVID-19. The case will have a direct impact on the approximately 700 patients confined in unsafe conditions of confinement in state psychiatric hospitals.

Southern Legal Counsel for a multi-plaintiff civil rights case by transgender state employees against the state of Florida challenging employment discrimination due to the state's exclusion of gender-affirming care from their employer-provided health insurance coverage. Plaintiffs are transgender individuals who need medically necessary gender-affirming care to treat their gender dysphoria. Gender dysphoria is the medical diagnosis for the clinically significant distress that sometimes results from the incongruence between a person’s gender identity and their sex assigned at birth. Left untreated, this serious medical condition often leads to debilitating distress, depression, anxiety, impairment of function, and self-harm, including suicide.