Entrepreneurship Law Clinic: Supporting Black Lives
The ELC has been selected to participate in the 2020-2021 Clinical Cohort for Law for Black Lives.
The clinical cohort is a 1-2 semester long program where Law For Black Lives partners movement organizations with law school clinics to co-create resources, conduct legal/policy research for campaigns and generally support the efforts of transformative grassroots organizations. Given the present moment, the Clinical Cohort's focus will be on Defund, Invest/Divest and Land campaigns in order to align with the priorities and campaigns of the movement.
In addition to the work products, Law for Black Lives provides opportunities for clinical students and professors to build relationships with movement actors and ground clinical students and professors in the theory, practice and politics of movement lawyering.
The ELC is researching community-based solutions to combat housing insecurity and blight, two forces which undermine neighborhood and community stability. Our research includes investigating opportunities to leverage land-use and property laws; community-based land-ownership models; stake-holder governance and other community-based accountability measures. The research will help inform grassroots advocacy efforts, including pursuing local legislative changes.
Land-use laws and blight tend to be the purview of local governments, with minimal input from the community. This research is designed to support community groups that are taking a more proactive approach. Rather than waiting for over-extended local governments to act, they wish to have greater input and power in combatting housing insecurity, land speculation, and blight in their own neighborhoods.