The Family Center’s Legal Wellness Institute (LWI) serves NYC residents affected by serious illness or severe disability such as Cancer, HIV, Intellectual Disabilities, and other life-limiting conditions. We also serve non-parent caregivers of children: grandparents raising grandchildren, siblings raising siblings, and others affected by parental absence. We prioritize clients who cannot afford a private attorney.
Some specific projects of LWI include:
Prince and Jahnique lost their mother to breast cancer so now their grandmother is raising them.
The Judge Judith Kaye Project
The Judith S. Kaye Project at The Family Center sustainably strengthens vulnerable NYC women and families impacted by breast cancer. Named in honor of Judge Kaye and her service to New York’s most vulnerable, The Family Center’s Judith S. Kaye Project provides integrated legal, social and healthcare coordination services to low-income, minority women, who are confronting a breast cancer diagnosis. The Judges and Lawyers Breast Cancer Alert (JALBCA) generously funds this Project.
The Maite Aquino Program
The Family Center’s Maite Aquino Program helps low-income, minority mothers who have been diagnosed with breast cancer, and their young children and families, cope with the legal issues that can follow diagnosis. JALBCA generously funds this Program, named in honor of Maite Aquino, who practiced law at Sullivan & Cromwell LLP, before losing her own battle with breast cancer.
The Continued Care Project
We help families obtain the legal authority they need to care for an intellectually or developmentally disabled adult. The Project is generously funded by The O’Neill Foundation.
The Economic Justice Project
Project Talk
Family Ties