Nonprofit workers are the backbone of NYC's safety net, yet this sector remains unsustainable without addressing deeply entrenched inequities in pay and workload. Since 1997, these issues have remained unchecked, leading to a critical situation we can no longer ignore.

At the Urban Justice Center, here’s what we’re up against:

• Non-management salaries at Urban Justice Center (UJC) are $10,000–$15,000 lower than other legal aid organizations.
• Executive leadership takes home six-figure salaries (Our Executive Director, Doug Lasdon, currently earns $286K annually), while the lowest-paid staff member earns just $48K.
• Attorneys and non-attorneys alike are living paycheck to paycheck, while UJC’s 2023 and 2024 tax records show large financial surpluses.

Despite meeting regularly with management since February 2025, they refused to respond to any of our economic demands, including salary, until mid-June, with less than a month remaining before our contract expired. This left no meaningful time to negotiate critical issues, forcing us to strike to compel management to take our demands seriously.

Over the past year, our organization has faced high staff turnover, placing an increasing burden on the staff who remain. This burden is suffocating as staff are forced to manage heavy workloads, denying them the ability to devote meaningful time to each individual client. This issue is being exacerbated by the deep housing crisis that NYC is currently experiencing.

The strain doesn’t just affect workers, it directly harms the clients we serve, a majority of whom are among NYC’s most vulnerable who rely on our services.

Our strike is not just about the UJC. This sectoral strike reflects a broader crisis happening across NYC's nonprofit legal services sector. Dedicated staff members—attorneys, paralegals, social workers, organizers, and other essential staff—are stretched to their limits, managing overwhelming caseloads with little time to provide the high-quality, compassionate care that tenants and low-income communities need and deserve.

Meanwhile, wages remain far below what is needed to live in the very communities we serve, let alone reflect the true value of our work. Many of us serving these communities cannot afford to live in the city we strive to protect. Some of us are confronting the same housing insecurity as our clients, emphasizing the urgent need for fair pay and sustainable working conditions for UJC staff.

The UJCU is striking to win a contract that addresses the core conditions undermining their ability to do their work:

• Fair compensation by increasing the wage floor and cost of living adjustments, as well as consolidating pay scales to ensure the lowest-paid staff see real raises.
• Enforceable caseload caps to prevent burnout and protect clients. Currently, there are no limits on workloads. RTC-specific caps based on sectoral data and generalized language that lets all staff grieve excessive workloads have been proposed.
• Protect Workers from Unjust Discipline and Union-Busting Spin-Offs. We demand protections against unjust discipline and harmful restructuring. Management currently holds the unilateral power to spin off entire projects, which puts workers’ union rights at risk. We are fighting for successorship language to ensure that all workers, regardless of structural changes, retain their union protections and collective contract. Additionally, we seek to eliminate contract language that allows management to discipline or terminate staff without just cause or due process.

These demands are about securing justice, not just for ourselves, but for our clients who rely on stable, supported advocates.

We hope you’ll stand in solidarity with us, and join us in urging UJC's management to recognize the invaluable contributions of UJC's workers by signing this petition. Your support can help usher in a new era of sustainability and justice for those on the front lines of protecting tenant rights and supporting low-income residents.

For all of us who fight to protect NY'ers, we are united in saying: this work matters, and we deserve to do it with dignity.