Elder Law and Disability Rights Center

Through advocacy, education, and the provision of free and low-cost legal services, the ELDR Center strives to ensure dignity and justice for members of our communities who are elderly, living with disabilities, or experiencing homelessness.

We began our pursuit to fill a gap in the justice system in Orange County when we opened our doors in 2017. Our founders recognized that the need for legal services for distinct perpetually disenfranchised groups was far beyond what was available, if available at all. The founder’s solution included three main elements. One part was creating the first sliding scale legal service organization in Orange County to serve seniors and people with disabilities who cannot afford private attorneys. Another was focusing on impact litigation and direct representation cases that no one else could take related to combating homelessness and disability rights violations. The third prong was engaging with all of the different parties interwoven through the projects to educate about the law and coordinate comprehensive solutions to immediate and systemic issues.

Over the course of the last 8 years, including through challenging COVID restrictions, our small but mighty firm aided our low income and underserved community members in multiple areas including estate planning, conservatorships, elder abuse, public benefits, housing disability accommodations, special education, medical care while incarcerated, and civil rights. We transformed the landscape of homeless services in Orange county through impact litigation in Federal Court, and maintain this focus to find civil and disability rights justice for those with the most need .

Through all of our work, we faithfully meet our clients where they are. So many of those that seek help have endured daunting trauma, and we prioritize reducing our clients’ hardships. Our team dedicates energy toward trauma-informed care, and actively seeks solutions that incorporate attention toward diversity, equity, and inclusion principles.

ELDR Center hit the ground running in 2017, and since then, the tight knit group of lawyers, limited support staff, and countless volunteers aided thousands of severely disenfranchised people through community outreach events, direct representation, and impact litigation. We helped families who often miss out on establishing generational wealth retain homes and assets to pass on to their children. We protected elders from mental, physical, and financial abuse so they could live with better security and autonomy. We removed barriers to housing so those without homes could progress toward permanent housing and independence. We held municipalities accountable to make sure people living on the streets retained their civil rights and influenced the increase in the number of shelters and homeless services in Orange County.

In the last year, we aided hundreds of individual shelter residents improve their paths toward permanent housing. We ensured shelters provided the necessary resources and care including case management, housing navigation, and disability accommodations. We verified that shelters followed due process guidelines so residents could properly challenge disputes. We settled a major impact case that protected the civil rights of those without homes so their property would not be confiscated and destroyed by government agencies without due process to claim and secure that property. When a senior woman with disabilities was denied her rights to secure permanent housing, we held the housing companies accountable for their discrimination. The woman received compensation for her loss and the companies were required to implement disability rights training through their organizations. Our clinics for end of life planning and conservatorships blossomed in 2024, which has lead to hundreds of county residents establish critical advance health care directives, powers of attorney, and limited conservatorships of their loved ones.

ELDR Center set the foundation of a firm capable to take on immense challenges through dedicated staff fixed on bettering the world, and an attitude to do whatever it takes to elevate those who have nowhere else to turn. We tripled in staff size since the early days, and now advance toward exponential growth and success. One goal through the next year is further development of our infrastructure and funding exploration so we can properly manage adding staff, engagement with volunteers, and an expanding case load. We will continue to pursue impact litigation matters in Orange and surrounding counties to defend the civil rights of people experiencing homelessness. At the base of these large targets, we will sustain and bolster our direct services to individual clients.

The need for legal aid in Orange County is hefty, and we see it swelling every day. And Orange County needs lawyers to serve the large population of low-income and extremely vulnerable residents. The burdens the residents face are pervasive and calamitous, and so many of the issues no one is able or willing to step in to help. However, ELDR Center cannot let people suffer because they do not have a legal advocate on their side. ELDR Center prides itself in its ability to adapt to changes as the needs of the residents develop. Through your generous support, we will preserve and proliferate our ability to chip away at the legal challenges so many of our low income community members face.

We strive to not let anyone who needs help slip through the cracks. Now is the time for us to continue our growth to meet this goal. We identify multiple segments of our organization that need development and sustained funding. The first component at the core of all other needs is infrastructure. We maintained remarkable success through the years with limited administrative and operations development, but the current policies, practices, and team will not sustain a larger staff and caseload without growth in administrative capabilities.

Our staff is extraordinary, but there are not enough hours in the day to cover everything we want to do. As our primary output is the services our staff delivers, the way to cover more hours is by adding staff. With additional attorneys and support personnel, we will take on more clients, pursue more impact litigation, and reach out to more community partners to educate about the law and team up to tackle systemic challenges. On a similar note, once we expand our pro-bono development team, our positive effect will amplify exponentially. Every pro-bono attorney we enlist will increase the number of matters we can pursue with negligible cost, and many of these attorneys will be subject matter experts that can take on cases that we could not do on our own without that expertise.

ELDR is a lean organization that utilizes every benefit and nonprofit discount we can obtain. However, some quality tools like legal software and expert witnesses may be beyond our grasp due to limited funds. We hope to secure enough money that we can allot a portion toward these critical tools.

Predominantly Orange County but we engage in impact litigation cases in surrounding counties. Also, we provide services in Special Education throughout Southern California as well as remotely throughout the state.