Columbia Legal Services seeks an experienced Staff Attorney to join our statewide advocacy team. Our staff attorneys engage in systemic, multi-forum legal advocacy and community engagement to dismantle the structures that perpetuate poverty, racism, and other injustices in Washington. The candidate may choose to be based in any of our five offices. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, CLS staff have primarily been working remotely. Once it is safe to fully reopen the offices, this position may still do some remote work but will also require some physical presence at the office, as well as an ability to attend required meetings at the office and in the community.
Responsibilities: • Collaborate with advocates on complex trial, appellate, and class action litigation in state, federal, and administrative forums. • Advance policy advocacy in the state legislature and at the local and federal level. • Investigate practices and laws identified by the communities we serve that adversely affect their rights or benefits and devise creative strategies for addressing these problems. • Collaborate with community groups to support their initiatives and strategies. • Coordinate with other advocacy groups, legal services organizations, and the private bar to identify opportunities to advance the law for our client populations and communities. • Analyze complex problems using a race equity lens and develop creative, practical, systemic solutions in conjunction with clients and communities most impacted by these problems.
In addition to the above responsibilities, experienced attorneys have these additional responsibilities: • Develop legal and litigation skills of more junior staff attorneys, including being a thought partner on research projects and development of cases and investigations. Who We Are Position Summary Staff Attorney (Experienced) Page 2 of 3 • Initiate and develop new cases and supervise and manage cases. • Mentor and support advocacy team members. This job description is not designed to contain a comprehensive listing of activities, duties or responsibilities that are required of the employee, and others may be assigned.
TO APPLY
Send a cover letter, resume, and a 5-10 page writing sample in PDF format to careers@columbialegal.org. Please make Staff Attorney (Experienced) your subject line. We accept applications on a rolling basis, with priority given to those received before December 20. CLS will contact you only if we decide to pursue your application.
If you need a reasonable accommodation for the application process, please contact the above email. We are committed to an environment of mutual respect, collaboration, and equal opportunity for all employees, and strongly encourage applications from people of color, immigrants, people who have been affected by mass incarceration, and other underrepresented and historically marginalized groups. We believe in building and sustaining an organization that is reflective of the communities we serve, and is diverse in work background, experience, education, race, color, national origin, sex, age, religion, marital status, veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity, ancestry, national origin, or sensory, mental and physical abilities. We believe that the resulting diversity is both a source of program strength and a matter of fundamental human fairness.
