About the Western NY Law Center: The Western New York Law Center is a not-for-profit law firm organized to promote equal access to justice for all. Our legal services program fills in the gaps in traditional legal services representation and advocates for people in need.

1. Western NY Law Center
The Western NY Law Center, Inc. is a notfor-profit corporation formed in 1996. The
center represents low-income Western
New Yorkers in civil matters.
237 Main Street, Suite 1130 Buffalo, NY 14203
Telephone: (716) 8550203 Fax: (716) 270-4005
http://wnylc.com/
EMail: wnylc@wnylc.com

2. Mission
Statement:
The Western New York Law
Center is a not-for-profit law
firm organized to promote
equal access to justice for
all. Our legal services
program fills in the gaps in
traditional legal services
representation and
advocates for people in need.

3. What We Do
Represent low-income Western New Yorkers in
civil matters:
How We
Got
Started:
Assists in areas restricted by LSC.
Help low-income people receive a full range of
free civil legal services:
This includes “non-traditional” legal assistance like
policy advocacy and legal education.
Statewide technology support center for legal
services programs:
Help statewide legal services offices use technology
in a cost effective manner to better serve their clients
in this time of diminishing resources.
Target populations are legal services
managers, attorneys, paralegals, clients and support
staff.
The Western NY Law
Center was formed in
1996 after Congress
restricted the types
of cases that Legal
Services Corporation
(LSC) grantees could
handle.

4. Our
Work:
Legal
Technology

5. Free Legal
Services
Our
Work:
Legal
Direct representation of homeowners facing
foreclosure.
 Fair lending advocacy, education and
outreach to community residents and real
estate professionals.
 File class action litigation on behalf of our
clients.
• Foreclosure Assistance
 Offer community clinics and legal
assistance programs for victims of unfair
debt collection practices.
• Fair Lending Advocacy
• Class Action for Timely
Processing of Public
Assistance applications

6. Legal - Class Action
Litigation:
Cases filed on behalf of Western New
York residents whose applications for
public assistance were not being
processed in a timely manner.
Successfully litigated these cases in
partnership with the National Center for
Law and Economic Justice.
Monitoring the settlements on an
ongoing basis.
Erie County:
Martin v. Weiner, 06-CV00094S
Steuben County:
Kari C. and April M. v.
Muller, 6:09-CV-06367
Niagara County:
Public Assistance benefits are crucial to the health and
well-being of those living in poverty. As a result of
processing delays, Western New York’s poorest residents
needlessly faced great hardships putting food on their
table and making ends meet.
McCoy v.
Restaino, 1:2013cv0711

7. Legal Accomplishments
Martin v.
Weiner, 06CV-00094E
In 2006, a lawsuit, Martin v. Weiner, 06CV00094S, was brought claiming that the
Erie County Department of Social
Services (“ECDSS”) was not processing
applications for food stamps, Medicaid
and public assistance on time. The lawsuit
also asked the court to require the State
of New York to supervise ECDSS.
Plaintiffs asked the court to certify the
case as a class action on behalf of Erie
County residents who, since June
1, 2005, had or would apply for or seek to
apply for food stamps, Medicaid and/or
public assistance.

8. Legal
CLARO functions under the auspices of the Western
New York Law Center (WNYLC), BFNC HOPE
Center, SUNY Buffalo Law School Financial
Advocacy Clinic, and volunteer attorneys, with the
support of the 8th Judicial District Courts and
sponsorship of The John R. Oishei Foundation.
The aim of CLARO is to educate unrepresented
debtors regarding their rights as consumers and to
help them through the legal process. CLARO aims to
maximize legal resources to those in need by
providing limited scope legal advice to unrepresented
litigants, as part of the larger pro se movement.
Civil Legal
Advice and
Resource
Office
(CLARO)
FREE legal advice & help from an
attorney on:
• Collections
• Garnishments
• Frozen bank accounts
Court cases or judgments related to
credit card debts, medical
debts, student loans, car
loans, utilities collections, lines of
credit, charge
accounts, foreclosures.
TUESDAYS FROM 5 PM – 7 PM
BFNC Hope Center
2495 Main Street, Suite 260
Buffalo, NY 14214

9. Our
Work:
Technology
 On-line Resources
 Cases
WNYL
C
WNYLC
 Tutorials
 Advocacy
 Email Hosting
 Spam Control/Filtering
 Discussion Groups

10. Technology
Online
Resource
Center:
Supports legal services advocates and pro bono attorneys
by providing free online training and support materials:
 Training modules
Some eligible for CLE credit
 Caselaw
 Disability Forms
 Health Care Resource
Information
 Fair Hearing Bank
 Benefits Database
 Tenant Advocacy
 Domestic Violence Law
CATRAP (Computer Assisted
Tenant Representation Advocacy
Program)
 Summaries of Federal Court
Decisions
Social Security, Disability
 Agency Directives
Database
Services allow legal professionals to assist the impoverished,
disabled or disenfranchised using up-to-date technology.
WNY Law Center maintains
the Online Resource
Center with the Empire
Justice Center and other
legal organizations that
contribute to it.
We videotape, edit and
stream online trainings for
IOLA (Interest On Lawyer
Account fund) grantees in
NYS.

11. Technology
A sign-up page for email
discussion groups is available at:
WNYLC Email Discussion Groups
(http://service.wnylc.com/email.signup/email.signup.cgi)
Questions about these lists can be
sent to wnylc@wnylc.com
The list archives are here.
(http://wnylc.net:8100/Lists/)
Email
Discussion
Groups:

12. Technology
 Email accounts are hosted on the law center’s Linux
server which is attached to two high speed fiber
connections. Email is passed through two mirrored
Barracuda appliances and is filtered for spam and
viruses.
 The Barracudas are automatically updated hourly, and
if one appliance is offline, the other takes over so email is
almost never interrupted. IOLA grantees who do not host
their email on the WNYLC server are welcome to use the
barracuda appliances for email filtering.
Email
Support:
We provide email
addresses, with a
wnylc.com
extension and with
other domain
extensions,
for IOLA funded
grantees in NYS.

13. Our
Work:
Other
Services
 Events
 Job Boards
 Website
 Facebook
 Collaboration

14. Other Services
Job
Posting
Center:
http://wnylc.net/jobcenter/

15. Other Services
News &
Events:
The Western
NY Law center
website
maintains a
page posting
relevant news
and events.
Events and
articles are
archived.

16. Website
Find Us
Online:
http://wnylc.com/

17. Facebook
Follow
Us:
https://www.facebook.com/wnylc

18. Collaboration
Other
Organizations:
The Western NY Law Center has
worked with with a number of
organizations:
 National Center for Law and
Economic Justice
 Empire Justice Center
 IOLA (Interest On Lawyer
Account fund)
 CLARO (Civil Legal Advice and
Resource Office)
 SUNY Buffalo Law School
Financial Advocacy Clinic
 BFNC HOPE Center (Buffalo
Federation of Neighborhood
Centers)
 The John R. Oshei Foundation
 SEFA (State Employee
Federated Appeal)

19. Support Us
Donate:
You can donate to us
through SEFA. Our
SEFA number is 5700375
SEFA, the State
Employee Federated
Appeal is a joint
venture of State
employees, public
employee unions,
management and notfor-profit organizations.
SEFA pledge form

20. Thank You!
Note: some photographs used in this work are
licensed under
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/