Legal services staffers and housing lawyers rally for a raise, warn of potential strike
- Staffers could strike in early March, potentially impacting hundreds of tenants across the city
- Unionized attorneys and workers want a $62,000 minimum salary for Legal Services NYC employees
Members of a legal aid group marched Monday afternoon in front of Queens Civil Court.
Brick Underground/Celia Young
Attorneys and staff of a major New York City legal aid group picketed outside Queens Civil Court Monday, kicking off a week of rallies as they seek to negotiate higher pay and a more flexible work from home policy with their employer.
Legal Services NYC (LSNYC) workers—who handle housing, immigration, and discrimination cases, among others, could strike if negotiations are unsuccessful, potentially impacting hundreds of tenants city-wide. LSNYC is one of a handful of organizations that represent low-income tenants for free in housing court cases through the city’s right to counsel program
“We’re not on strike right now,” said Rachel Guffey, a staff attorney for Queens LSNYC, on Monday’s picket line. “If we don't get a good contract, that's a signal from management that they think they can handle the cases without us.”
The Legal Services Staff Association (LSSA 2320), which represents more than 500 attorneys and support staffers, voted to authorize a strike if members reject the proposed contract at the end of the month, LSSA 2320 President Corinthia Carter told Brick Underground.
Negotiations, which began in October last year, are ongoing, and the union hopes to secure a base salary of $62,000 per year as well as more flexible work-from-home options, Carter said. Currently, the union’s lowest paid member earns around $53,000 per year, she said.
“A lot of our members are also tenants,” Carter said. “Many of them are long-time New Yorkers or come to Legal Services and want to establish a life in New York. Being able to do that requires having fair pay.…they love the work they do, but they can’t do it if they’re struggling.”
LSNYC has offered percentage raises that would raise the lowest salary to at least $60,000 by the third year of the contract, according to the organization. But Carter said that a raise only in the contract's final year was “unacceptable.”
Shervon Small, executive director of LSNYC, said he was eager for the union to make a counter offer so negotiations could conclude.
“Amid a hostile political landscape with constant threats to our funding and to the vulnerable communities we serve, Legal Services NYC is trying hard to come to an agreement with LSSA 2320 as quickly as possible to avoid a strike,” Small said in a statement. “We continue to bargain in good faith and greatly value the work our staff does to protect vulnerable New Yorkers, which is why our proposal addresses pay parity within our organization.”
What tenants need to know
For now, LSNYC attorneys aren’t on strike. But tenants represented by these attorneys could be impacted at the start of March if the union does strike.
Alex Jacobs, an attorney in LSNYC’s Queens housing practice, said that each of the roughly 30 attorneys representing Queens tenants can have up to 40 cases at a time. The impacts of a strike would be “massive,” particularly on LSNYC’s immigration unit.
“I don't think anybody wants to strike, but if we're not getting a fair wage, and if management has all this money to give themselves raises each year, why can't we get our own?” Jacobs said at the Monday picket.
David Guerrero, an organizer with LSSA 2320, said that pay raises would ultimately serve LSNYC’s clients by helping the organization retain staff.
“Experience is really crucial to organizations like Legal Services of New York City, to be able to rely on attorneys who have spent 10 or 15 years cutting their teeth in a housing court,” said David Guerrero, an organizer with LSSA 2320. “That all benefits the clients.”
