Who We Are

We are extremely passionate, quixotic, energetic, love tackling tough problems, and believe in continuous personal growth. We think it’s possible for everyone to be able to get quality legal help.

We’re a group of lawyers, paralegals, communication professionals, counselors, social workers, administrators, recruiters, and more passionate about justice. We are fortunate to benefit from the help of hundreds of volunteers.

Our staff is at the core of our work to pioneer universal access to civil justice in the most marginalized parts of San Francisco.

See Our Staff

I learned more in three months working with them than in three years of law school.

-Kimberly, volunteer

Our board makes sure we keep moving in the right direction

See Our Board

Before I met Open Door Legal, I had no idea people couldn’t get legal help. They have really opened my eyes to the importance of legal aid.

-Erika, supporter

We started with nothing but a dream. No money, no experience, and no connections. We’ve been able to triple our operating budget every year thanks to the power of one very simple idea: that everyone should have access to the law.

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More About Us

We’re proud to be supported by hundreds of individuals, companies, law firms, and foundations who believe in our dream of universal access to civil representation.

We’re Innovative

We were named by Google as one of the 10 most innovative nonprofits in the Bay Area, in 2015.

We Believe in Partnership

We think the only way to truly transform individual lives is through a constellation of professional high-touch services.

We Love Data

We test our work through systematic data collection and analysis.

We’re Growing

We’ve been able to triple our operational budget every year, year after year, since 2013.

Our Story

Our organization started when we realized that it was in fact possible to ensure universal access to civil representation for everyone. For years, we had watched existing legal aid nonprofits turn away more people than they helped. We had seen the government grossly underfund legal aid and attach ever-more restrictions on who could be helped. We had witnessed the private sector invest atrociously little of its accumulated wealth into legal aid.

The result of this is predictable: legal aid has become the least resourced social need in the United States. Most low and moderate-income Americans can’t get help, and as a result can’t properly enforce their rights.

We realized that by combining program innovations, new strategies for generating earned income, and a focus on fundraising from the general public we could create a system that solved this massive problem and guaranteed access to legal representation for everyone in a community, on every issue.

We decided to prototype this system in Bayview/Hunters Point because it was the only high-need neighborhood of San Francisco without a legal aid office in the neighborhood. In late 2012 we raised about $8,000 in seed funding from some generous private donors and decided to put our theories to the test.

We opened our doors on January 7th, 2013. In our first year, our core staff worked tirelessly on minimum wage to deliver services to dozens of clients. The heating in the office didn’t work, the furniture was rotten, and we couldn’t afford a receptionist. We had to scrounge office supplies and equipment from people we knew.

But we proved that our model could work. We never turned away someone for services who lived in the local community, and by rigorously tracking our outcomes we were able to get more and more support from people that hadn’t funded legal aid before. We tripled our budget between our first and second year and tripled it again in our third year.

We’ve come a long way since the days when we had to hand shred everything because we couldn’t afford a shredder. We’re excited by what the future can bring and look forward to growing our model out to encompass more and more people.

Client Confidentiality

As a legal aid provider, we are bound to strict ethical obligations regarding client confidentiality. We are not allowed to disclose any information learned in the course of representation, or while the client was seeking out services, without their express permission.

All clients displayed on our site gave their informed, written consent to be displayed.

The names of our clients and of adverse parties are changed in our stories to maintain their anonymity. We do not want adverse parties to retaliate against them. The images used in our stories may or not may be the likeness of the described client. All other information in our stories, including the type and dates of actions and life histories of our clients, are accurate.

Clients may or may not be available to meet with donors. It is often harmful to our clients to meet with donors during the pendency of a case. After the case is over, we provide forums where former clients and donors can meet. A client's participation in these events is entirely voluntary.

Thank you for your help creating a safe space where all our clients feel welcome.

Who We Are

We’re a group of lawyers, paralegals, communication professionals, counselors, social workers, administrators, recruiters, and more passionate about justice. We are fortunate to benefit from the help of hundreds of volunteers.

I learned more in three months working with them than in three years of law school.

Before I met Open Door Legal, I had no idea people couldn’t get legal help. They have really opened my eyes to the importance of legal aid.

We’re Innovative

We Believe in Partnership

We Love Data

We’re Growing

Our Board of Directors

Katharine Chao, President

Jared Leiderman, Treasurer

Amy Chiu

Tyra Fennell

Bart Volkmer

Michelle Carrington

Mira Park

Melanie Hamburger

David Lisson

Our Story

Client Confidentiality