Senior Staff Attorney, Youth Defense Practice, Bronx

The Center for Family Representation Inc. (CFR) is an award-winning, innovative law and policy organization that serves primarily Black and Brown families and youth in Queens, Manhattan, the Bronx, and Staten Island with an interdisciplinary legal defense model that serves more than 2400 clients every year. CFR was originally founded in 2002 to dramatically change the trajectory of indigent parents being prosecuted by the City’s Administration for Children’s Services (ACS).

Our goal is to defend and protect our clients’ rights, reduce the harm of family separation and prevent or minimize the time any child spends in the foster system.

CFR provides interdisciplinary family defense with a model that was unique at our founding and that is now being replicated nationally: we assign every client an attorney and a social work staff member. As an agency committed to securing justice for families, we built the Youth Defense practice (YDP) to defend youth at risk of family separation through incarceration. YDP uses the same interdisciplinary model to represent youth being prosecuted in Queens and Manhattan in Supreme Court Youth Parts, during Probation Adjustment and in Delinquency proceedings in Family Court in Manhattan, Queens and the Bronx.

CFR’s Home for Good program provides legal and social work services to CFR clients in immigration, civil legal services and criminal defense matters, to afford clients an efficient and well-coordinated one-stop solution to a range of issues that threaten family stability.

Recognized as experts in our fields, we annually train over 500 practitioners in the city, state and around the country on strategies to promote family preservation and interdisciplinary representation, and we provide community based “Know Your Rights” presentations to parents, youth and service providers. We advocate at the city, state and national level for policies that reduce the harm of family separation, and promote parent engagement and justice for youth and families.

CFR has an immediate opening for a Senior Staff Attorney in its Youth Defense Practice (YDP) in Bronx Family Court
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Under the supervision and guidance of CFR’s Youth Defense Director and Supervisors, the Senior Staff Attorney’s core responsibilities will be to represent clients charged on juvenile delinquency (JD) and Person in Need of Supervision (PINS) matters in Family Court.

The candidate will work collaboratively with legal teams, composed of attorneys, social work staff, an investigator, and paralegals (clients’ legal teams may also involve staff from CFR’s immigration or housing/public benefits units).

Senior Staff Attorneys may supervise one or two staff attorneys, so prior supervisory experience, even if informal, is preferred. Senior Staff Attorneys also write professional development reviews, periodically coordinate case practice and attorney workgroup meetings, and from time to time, develop practice materials useful for staff at CFR.

The candidate should also expect to maintain new and evolving youth defense data in CMS and client legal notes; keep files up to date; keep additional data related to deliverables for private funders supporting the Youth Defense Practice, and/or to meet with prospective and current funders; and help to inform and grow CFR’s Youth Defense Practice. This role will occasionally require the candidate to support and cover in other boroughs when emergencies arise.

The candidate may be asked to assist in training new staff and in other continuing legal education and the stewardship of the Bronx Youth Defense Practice in partnership with their social work counterpart. This person should expect to participate in community based outreach and presentations for youth and families who are impacted by or are at risk of juvenile justice involvement as needed.

The ideal candidate will enjoy the opportunity to wear multiple hats, learn a lot and enjoy working with teams.

Salary Information:

Salary range:
Staff Level L3-L15 + Senior Staff Stipend

The salary for a Senior Staff Attorney with three years of work experience is: $100,800/year.

The salary for a Senior Staff Attorney with eight years of work…