Rene Heybach and Robin LeFlore, a formerly homeless parent who led the fight for educational rights in Salazar v. Edwards.

The Law Project works to implement, expand and protect the civil and human rights of homeless persons through legal and legislative advocacy, collaboration with other organizations, education and litigation. Examples of this work include:

Providing collaborative trainings and developing materials on the human right to housing

Through a federal consent decree in Norman v. MacDonald protecting homeless families from losing their children to foster care.

Joining national and international advocates in conducting a thematic hearing on the human right to housing in the InterAmerican Commission on Human Rights

Conducting litigation on behalf of individuals who suffer racial discrimination or sexual harassment in school, housing or on the job.

Enforcing the Cook County Human Rights Ordinance, a law enacted through the work of the Chicago Coalition for the Homeless which protects persons from discrimination in employment, housing and public accommodations (including schools) based on "housing status" including the status of having no housing.

Advocating for --and securing-- a judicial process for emancipating unaccompanied homeless minors (16 and 17 yrs old) empowering them to consent to longer term services and housing in licensed Youth Transitional Housing Programs. See (links to law and licensing regs)

Through a Consent Decree in Hill v. Erickson securing stability and services for pregnant and parenting teens in the care of the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services.

Joining and working in the human rights campaign in Illinois led by Heartland Alliance: The Poverty to Opportunity Campaign seeking to implement the United Nation's goal to reduce extreme poverty by 2016 in Illinois

 "Power concedes nothing without demand. It never did and it never will."

- Frederick Douglass