The Right to Counsel NYC Coalition is a tenant led broad based coalition that formed in 2014 to disrupt Housing Court as a center of displacement and stop the eviction crisis that has threatened our families, our neighborhoods and our homes for too long. Our Coalition is made up of tenants, organizers, advocates, legal services organizations and more! Our work is rooted in principles of equity, dignity, humanity, diversity and justice. After a hard fought, 3 year grassroots campaign, we won and became the first city in the nation to establish a Right to Counsel for tenants facing eviction. Our campaign has inspired a movement across the country. 

We believe Right to Counsel isn’t just about ensuring tenants have attorneys in housing court. It’s about fighting to reclaim our city and our communities, to keep people in their homes and to de-normalize the violence of evictions.  We are building campaigns for an eviction-free NYC and ultimately for a right to housing. Because our work is grounded in a history of tenant organizing and a belief that housing is a human right, we are now working to ensure that the Right to Counsel law is implemented in a way that upholds the right, that builds tenant power and that transforms the nature of the courts, furthering the dignity and humanity of every tenant.  We are running direct action campaigns against NYC’s worst evictors, changing the laws to stop evictions, supporting the development of passionate and zealous attorneys committed to tenant power, and expanding and strengthening Right to Counsel so that it extends to all tenants. 

See here for more about how we won this historic new right for New Yorkers and here for a brochure that gives an overview of the coalition. 

Coalition Members Include: New Settlement's Community Action for Safe Apartments, Housing Court Answers, NYC Central Labor Council,  The Urban Justice Center, LiveOn NY, Coalition for the Homeless, IMPACCT Brooklyn, Flatbush Tenant Coalition, New York Legal Assistance Group, Legal Services-NYC, The Legal Aid Society, Mobilization for Justice, Goddard Riverside Law Project, Housing Conservation Coordinators, South Brooklyn Legal Services, Brooklyn Legal Services Corporation A, Brooklyn Defender Services, DC 37, CAMBA Legal Services, Bronx Defenders, Interfaith Assembly on Homelessness and Housing,Catholic Migration Services, Communities Resist, Take Root Justice, Anti-Eviction Mapping Project, Justfix.NYC, Neighborhood Defender Service of Harlem, AARP, Northwest Bronx Community and Clergy Coalition (NWBCCC), Center for Independence of the Disabled, Community Service Society, Northern Manhattan Improvement Corporation (NMIC), list in formation.

Supporters Include: Impact Center for Public Interest Law at New York Law School, Fifth Avenue Committee, Met Council on Housing, MinKwon Center for Community Action, Lenox Hill Neighborhood House, Tenants & Neighbors, CAAAV, Brooklyn Tenants United, National Center for Access to Justice, VOCAL-NY, National Coalition for a Civil Right to Counsel, Touro Law Center, Human Rights Institute at the Columbia Law School, Chhaya CDC, West Side Neighborhood Alliance, The Bronx Jewish Community Council, Homeless Services United, Inc., Hudson Guild, UAW Local 2325 - Assoc. of Legal Aid Attorneys (AFL-CIO), New York Immigration Coalition, Ebbets Field Tenants Organization, Urban Homesteading Assistance Board (UHAB), Cooper Square Committee, The Borough Board of Manhattan, The Borough Board of Brooklyn, The Borough Board of the Bronx, The NYC City Bar Association, Association of Neighborhood and Housing Development (ANHD), Housing Works, The West Side Commons, City Meals on Wheels, JASA/Legal Services for the Elderly in Queens, the Coalition for Housing and Health, Legal Services Staff Association, UAW/NOLSW 2320.