California Rural Legal Assistance, Inc. (CRLA) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit

Non-profit organization

Nonprofit organization is neither a legal nor technical definition but generally refers to an organization that uses surplus revenues to achieve its goals, rather than distributing them as profit or dividends...

 legal

Advocate

An advocate is a term for a professional lawyer used in several different legal systems. These include Scotland, South Africa, India, Scandinavian jurisdictions, Israel, and the British Crown dependencies of Jersey, Guernsey and the Isle of Man...

 and political advocacy

Advocacy

Advocacy is a political process by an individual or a large group which normally aims to influence public-policy and resource allocation decisions within political, economic, and social systems and institutions; it may be motivated from moral, ethical or faith principles or simply to protect an...

 group that promotes the interests of migrant

Human migration

Human migration is physical movement by humans from one area to another, sometimes over long distances or in large groups. Historically this movement was nomadic, often causing significant conflict with the indigenous population and their displacement or cultural assimilation. Only a few nomadic...

 laborers and the rural

Rural

Rural areas or the country or countryside are areas that are not urbanized, though when large areas are described, country towns and smaller cities will be included. They have a low population density, and typically much of the land is devoted to agriculture...

 poor

Poverty

Poverty is the lack of a certain amount of material possessions or money. Absolute poverty or destitution is inability to afford basic human needs, which commonly includes clean and fresh water, nutrition, health care, education, clothing and shelter. About 1.7 billion people are estimated to live...

. The organization provides legal assistance in the areas of housing and eviction, public benefits, and educational access. It also sponsors legislation.

Based in San Francisco

San Francisco, California

San Francisco , officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the financial, cultural, and transportation center of the San Francisco Bay Area, a region of 7.15 million people which includes San Jose and Oakland...

, the organization operates 24 regional offices throughout California

California

California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...

. CRLA has an annual operating budget of $10 million, and employs 138 staff, 51 of which are attorneys. José R. Padilla, a lawyer and activist, has been the executive director since 1984.

History

California Rural Legal Assistance was founded in 1965 as part of the Johnson

Lyndon B. Johnson

Lyndon Baines Johnson , often referred to as LBJ, was the 36th President of the United States after his service as the 37th Vice President of the United States...

 administration's War on Poverty

War on Poverty

The War on Poverty is the unofficial name for legislation first introduced by United States President Lyndon B. Johnson during his State of the Union address on January 8, 1964. This legislation was proposed by Johnson in response to a national poverty rate of around nineteen percent...

. From 1965 until 1981, it was funded by the federal Community Services Agency (CSA). When the Reagan Administration

Reagan Administration

The United States presidency of Ronald Reagan, also known as the Reagan administration, was a Republican administration headed by Ronald Reagan from January 20, 1981, to January 20, 1989....

 defunded the CSA, it came under the auspices of the government's

Federal government of the United States

The federal government of the United States is the national government of the constitutional republic of fifty states that is the United States of America. The federal government comprises three distinct branches of government: a legislative, an executive and a judiciary. These branches and...

 Legal Services Corporation

Legal Services Corporation

The Legal Services Corporation is a private, non-profit corporation established by the United States Congress. It seeks to ensure equal access to justice under the law for all Americans by providing civil legal assistance to those who otherwise would be unable to afford it...

 (LSC). It also receives funding from private foundations such as The California Endowment and businesses such as the Union Bank of California

Union Bank of California

Union Bank, N.A., formerly known as Union Bank of California, N.A., is a full-service commercial bank providing an array of financial services to individuals, small businesses, middle-market companies, and major corporations...

.

Between 2000 and 2006, CRLA was investigated six times by LSC or by its Inspector General

Inspector General

An Inspector General is an investigative official in a civil or military organization. The plural of the term is Inspectors General.-Bangladesh:...

. The subject of the investigations ranged from issues of timekeeping, to facilities sharing, to CRLA affiliations with non-LSC agencies. The CRLA maintained that the investigations were political fallout for obtaining over one million dollars in settlements from dairy farmers

Dairy farming

Dairy farming is a class of agricultural, or an animal husbandry, enterprise, for long-term production of milk, usually from dairy cows but also from goats and sheep, which may be either processed on-site or transported to a dairy factory for processing and eventual retail sale.Most dairy farms...

.

Padilla contends that organizations such as CRLA are "seemingly singled out for special political
harassment, through more intense investigations".

CRLA was also the subject of two complaints from the National Legal and Policy Center

National Legal and Policy Center

The National Legal and Policy Center is a right-leaning 501 non-profit group that monitors and reports on the ethics of public officials, supporters of liberal causes, and labor unions in the United States. Among the NLPC's more high-profile targets have been Reverend Al Sharpton, Reverend Jesse...

, both for apparently "violat[ing] the Legal Services Corporation Act and regulations regarding fee-generating cases"

Successes

The CRLA claims amongst it successes the initiation of the proceedings that lead to the ban of DDT

DDT

DDT is one of the most well-known synthetic insecticides. It is a chemical with a long, unique, and controversial history....

, legal challenges to the practice of placing non-English

English language

English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...

-speaking students in special education

Special education

Special education is the education of students with special needs in a way that addresses the students' individual differences and needs. Ideally, this process involves the individually planned and systematically monitored arrangement of teaching procedures, adapted equipment and materials,...

 classes, and the ban of the cortito, the short-handled hoe.

External links

• Official site
• California Dairy Workers Face Danger and Abuse article about CRLA campaign from September/October 2004 issue of Dollars & Sense
  Dollars & Sense
  Dollars & Sense is a magazine dedicated to providing left-wing perspectives on economics.Published six times a year since 1974, it is edited by a collective of economists, journalists, and activists committed to the ideals of social justice and economic democracy.It was initially sponsored by the...
  
  magazine