Dear Jonathan,

As 2023 winds down, we'd like to take a moment to celebrate the progress we've made with our clients and partners for a more equitable Pennsylvania. And we'd like to thank our supporters for making that work possible. While many challenges lie ahead, together, we'll stand up for strong public schools, safe and healthy homes and neighborhoods, the right to vote, and much more, in 2024.

Supporters like you help us take on discrimination, inequality and poverty. Thank you for being there this year, next year, and every year. We need you!

On February 7, 2023, in our historic victory for Pennsylvania's public school students, the Commonwealth Court declared that Pennsylvania's public school funding system violates the state constitution. In short: the students who need the most support have the least, because of where they live, and this must change.

Since that decision we've worked to hold our General Assembly and the Governor accountable to the court's order and the state constitution's charge, with our partners at Education Law Center-PA and O'Melveny. The decision was not appealed: the only thing left for our leaders in Harrisburg to do is to comply with the court's order. The Basic Education Funding Commission (BEFC) held public hearings across Pennsylvania in the fall, developing a plan to respond to the court's ruling. Dozens of educators and experts described the same reality: our current funding system is defined by stark inequality, and students are going without the basics. We are $6.2 billion short of a benchmark for adequate funding based on what academically successful school districts currently spend.

Left: Kindergarten teacher Nicole Miller of William Penn SD, a petitioner in our school funding lawsuit, speaks in Harrisburg on Nov. 14.

"The court’s decision is clear: every child can learn, and it is up to us to make this promise a reality in Pennsylvania public schools," Superintendent Brian Costello of Wilkes-Barre Area School District, one of our clients, told the BEFC. "Invest in the future of Pennsylvania, and let our students show you what they can do.” 

We are now at a fork in the road: in just two weeks, the Basic Education Funding Commission will release their report, and their recommendations for a new, constitutional school funding system to the General Assembly and the Governor. Our senior attorney Claudia De Palma and Education Law Center-PA legal director Maura McInerney lay out the stakes in a new op-ed for Penn Live. "The petitioners that brought this challenge will uphold the rights of their communities and of Pennsylvania’s children to the education they deserve," they write. "Rather than staring down enforcement litigation, the governor and General Assembly can get this right."

The historic win in our school funding case wasn't the only way our clients stood up for students this year. Representing A.P., a 19-year-old student with disabilities and his family, we filed a federal class action lawsuit against the Pennsylvania Department of Education, challenging state policies that aged students out of special education services at the end of the school year in which they turn 21, earlier than federal law requires. We were joined by co-counsel from Berney & Sang. In August, we reached a settlement, and Pennsylvania changed its policy, allowing students to receive special education in public schools until their 22nd birthday. This change allows hundreds of students to access additional months of services at a crucial juncture in their lives.

In 2023, we continued to expand our work standing up to source-of-income discrimination against renters who use housing assistance. 2023 began with a successful settlement in a federal case brought by our client Housing Equality Center of Pennsylvania against a large landlord under the Fair Housing Act for racial discrimination and source-of-income discrimination, resulting in the landlord agreeing to encourage and accept voucher applicants in all its properties. The widespread practice of refusing to consider tenants who use Housing Choice Vouchers is illegal in Philadelphia, and we are the only organization enforcing this vital protection for renters.

In August, joined by Dechert LLP, we sued one of Philadelphia's largest property management companies, which refused to accept vouchers at any of its more than 3,000 properties, including affordable units in areas of opportunity. Source-of-income discrimination furthers racial segregation and the concentration of poverty in Philadelphia, and the majority of renters impacted by this illegal practice are Black. In 2024, we will continue working to make sure all our neighbors can find a safe and healthy place to live, no matter how they pay.

We also continued to support Renters United Philadelphia (RUP), which pairs organizing and legal strategies to build renter power. RUP’s membership has grown from 15 tenant-members at the start of the pandemic to 85. In 2023, RUP provided housing rights education and legal consults for hundreds of renters and organized dozens of direct actions. RUP, led by its organizing leadership committee of renter-members, has pressured landlords to make repairs; stopped displacement; won repayment agreements for renters in substandard housing; and fought rent increases. 

Right: Leaders of Fletcher Street Urban Riding Club check out the new stables

In Southwest Philadelphia, working-class Black neighborhoods have faced the unchecked proliferation of unsafe auto-body shops and scrapyards. In April, we represented three homeowners in a public and private nuisance case against an auto body shop that has disrupted their lives for years, blocking their shared alley with junked cars and littering the neighborhood with trash, tires and debris. We were joined by co-counsel from Hausfeld LLP. As a result of our lawsuit, the auto body shop was evicted and the 25 homes that bordered the shop enjoy an improved quality of life.

This year, we helped preserve a Black-led, community-rooted institution for years to come, representing Fletcher Street Urban Riding Club in their search for a new home with co-counsel from Saul Ewing LLP. Since 1980, the Club, founded in Philadelphia’s Strawberry Mansion neighborhood, has taught thousands of Philadelphia children and young adults how to ride and care for horses, and all the responsibility that entails. We were on hand for the unveiling of the new stables at the Cliffs in Fairmount Park on November 21.

We continued to take on barriers to employment, particularly for workers with criminal histories. In June, we filed a constitutional challenge to an outdated state law, the Private Detective Act, that blocks workers with most criminal histories from jobs as unarmed security guards for life. We were joined by Community Legal Services.

Right: We honored our clients in the firearm preemption case with the Thaddeus Stevens Award at our annual celebration.

Our clients are also standing up to demand that Pennsylvania clear the roadblocks to local action against gun violence. Since 2020, joined by co-counsel from Hogan Lovells and the Philadelphia Law Department, we've challenged Pennsylvania's firearm preemption laws in court, representing Philadelphians and Allegheny County residents who have lost loved ones to gun violence and CeaseFirePA. On September 13, 2023, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court heard oral argument on appeal in the case, led by our co-counsel Jasmeet Ahuja of Hogan Lovells.

With our case, we aim to clear the way for common-sense local laws, like a limit to how many handguns can be purchased in a month, that evidence shows will save lives. "Anything that we can do as human beings to save another human being's life, it should be on the table," our client Stanley Crawford said.

This year, we stood up for the rights of voters to make use of provisional ballots, a crucial safety net in our electoral system. Our clients, three long-time senior voters in Delaware County, cast provisional ballots in the May 16 primary election after election officials informed them that their mail-in ballots would not be counted, due to a clerical mistake on their ballot declarations.

Though it's clear in Pennsylvania election law that provisional ballots "shall be counted" after county officials confirm that a voter's mail-in ballot will not be counted, the Delaware County Board of Elections rejected our clients' ballots.

We challenged this decision shortly after the primary, joined by co-counsel from ACLU-PA with assistance from Dechert LLP. On September 21, a Delaware County court ruled that provisional ballots submitted to cure rejected mail-in ballots must be counted. In 2024, we will do everything we can to make sure every eligible citizen in Pennsylvania can vote and have their vote lawfully counted.

Supporters and friends like you make everything we do happen. With your help, our clients will continue to take on discrimination, inequality and poverty in 2024 and beyond.

All donations received by midnight on December 31 are tax deductible for 2023.

We wish you a healthy and happy New Year! 

Sincerely,

Mimi McKenzie

Legal Director and Interim Executive Director, Public Interest Law Center