NYCLA JUSTICE CENTER AND FORDHAM LAW SCHOOL’S FEERICK CENTER FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE HOST CONFERENCE ON CONSUMER DEBT

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

CONTACT: Anita Aboulafia 212-267-6646, ext. 225, aaboulafia@nycla.org

 

NYCLA JUSTICE CENTER AND FORDHAM LAW SCHOOL’S FEERICK CENTER FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE HOST CONFERENCE ON CONSUMER DEBT

 

June 11, 2008 – NEW YORK, NY- On Thursday, June 19 the New York County Lawyers’ Association’s (NYCLA) Justice Center and Fordham Law School’s Feerick Center for Social Justice are co-sponsoring an all-day conference, “New York City Consumer Debt Working Conference: A Blueprint for Reform,” beginning at 8:30 AM at Fordham Law School’s McNally Amphitheatre at 140 West 62nd Street. Conference attendees will identify concrete and achievable reforms and strategies that can be implemented to help low-income New Yorkers stabilize and improve their financial health, build wealth, enjoy the benefits of a fair financial services market and be better protected against deceptive and abusive practices.

 

The keynote speaker will be Tamara Draut, director of the Economic Opportunity Program at Demos, a public policy center based in New York City. In her role at Demos, Ms. Draut oversees the research, policy and advocacy work on economic security issues. She has written numerous reports, appeared as a television commentator and, most recently, published her first book, Strapped: Why America’s 20-and 30-Somethings Can’t Get Ahead.

 

Other presenters include: Hon. Fern A. Fisher, Administrative Judge, New York City Civil Court; Gina Calabrese, professor, St. John’s University School of Law; Laura Greco, deputy general counsel, New York State Consumer Protection Board; Matthew Diller, associate dean, Fordham Law School; Mark Fleischer, deputy bureau chief, New York State Attorney General’s Office, Consumer Frauds and Protection Bureau; April Newbauer, attorney-in-charge, The Legal Aid Society; Brian D. Rauer, executive director and general counsel, Better Business Bureau; and Kenneth Rosenfeld, director of legal services, Northern Manhattan Improvement Corporation.

 

A series of plenary sessions will take place in the morning of the all-day conference, followed by working group break-out sessions in the afternoon from 2:15-5:00 PM.

 

The issue of consumer debt is gaining increasing attention – from the public and private sectors to community-based service providers and academia. New York City’s Civil Court has experienced exponential growth in consumer debt cases; debt collection efforts have grown and become a concern for low- and moderate-income Americans in New York City and throughout the United States.

 

This conference is among the myriad events sponsored by NYCLA throughout its Centennial year. NYCLA (www.nycla.org) was founded in 1908 as the first major bar association in the country that admitted members without regard to race, ethnicity, religion, gender or sexual identity. Since its inception, it has pioneered some of the most far- reaching and tangible reforms in American jurisprudence and has continuously played an active role in legal developments and public policy.

 

# # #