Taylor Healy

  • Hosted by Bread for the City
  • Sponsored by DLA Piper
  • Service location Washington, District of Columbia
  • Law school Villanova University Charles Widger School of Law
  • Issue area Children/Youth
  • Fellowship class year 2012
  • Program Design-Your-Own Fellowship

The Project

Taylor created school- and community-based legal intake clinics, coordinated and conducted legal education trainings, incorporated organizing strategies to address community-identified needs, and provided legal representation to Kenilworth-Parkside families in conjunction with the D.C. Promise Neighborhoods Initiative (DCPNI).

D.C.’s Kenilworth-Parkside community received national attention as one of only 21 inaugural federal Promise Neighborhoods grantees—a program, based on the Harlem Children’s Zone, aimed at providing a grassroots “cradle-to-college” continuum of services to increase student and family outcomes through place-based programs. Despite the overwhelming need for legal services in this community and the large number of eligible families, Taylor discovered that legal aid providers were noticeably absent from the more than 70 partners currently providing social, medical, academic and financial support through this effort. Similarities in the holistic missions of both Promise Neighborhoods and Bread for the City inspired Taylor to seek out Bread for the City as her host organization.

Fellowship Highlights

During her Fellowship, Taylor:

  • Hosted 53 legal clinics in the DCPNI footprint
  • Provided full representation in 81 cases and brief advice or referrals in an additional 350 matters for clients living in Kenilworth-Parkside
  • Worked with a group of senior tenants to reroute two city bus lines and have a stop constructed in front of their building
  • Created a pilot project to directly solicit and provide representation to tenants who had been sued in eviction cases

Where are they now?

Taylor continues to work at Bread for the City as a senior staff attorney in the Community Lawyering Project.

My clients’ stories continue to fuel my belief that when people are given access to legal services, the judicial system can be a place where the disenfranchised have a voice that is heard by many.

Taylor Healy /
Equal Justice Works Fellow

Meet Other Fellows Like Taylor

View All

Photo of Maria Rodriguez

Maria Rodriguez

Host: Kids in Need of Defense (KIND)

Sponsor: Fish & Richardson P.C., Microsoft Corporation

Photo of Victoria Porell

Tori Porell

Host: East Bay Children’s Law Offices

Sponsor: The Morrison & Foerster Foundation

Photo of Elizabeth Lincoln

Elizabeth Lincoln

Host: Kids in Need of Defense (KIND)

Sponsor: Microsoft Corporation, The Sidley Austin Foundation

Headshot of Tracie Johnson

Tracie Johnson

Host: Community Legal Services of Philadelphia

Sponsor: Greenberg Traurig, LLP