Kevin Keenan says ACLU used to focus on civil rights, now it focuses on "relationships"

See all posts on San Diego ACLU from this blog.

Kevin Keenan says ACLU used to focus on civil rights, now it focuses on "relationships".

Unfortunately, the "relationships" that ACLU lawyers focus on are too often with lawyers, such as school attorneys, who are defending violations of civil rights.

San Diego ACLU attorney David Loy has gone out of his way to support violations of the First Amendment such as Judge Judith Hayes' December 11, 2010 injunction. Mr. Loy gave me legal advice without being my lawyer. He told me to erase all mention of Stutz Artiano Shinoff and Holtz from my website. Also, see this update on that case.

from: ACLU of San Diego and Imperial Counties
date: Fri, Jan 4, 2013 at 2:48 PM
subject: New year, new ACLU

"We've changed from the local civil-rights powerhouse that you know to a more community-connected, relationship-based, comprehensive advocacy organization. I don't have a good name for what that is...It may just be the new ACLU." – Kevin Keenan, Executive Director.

As you may have read in the San Diego Union Tribune last week, the ACLU of San Diego & Imperial Counties will celebrate its 80th anniversary this year. To put it simply, "We've come a long way, baby."

Thanks to a long legacy of members, volunteers, board members, and staff in San Diego, we have had a solid foundation on which to build. Thanks to your most recent support, we have been able to triple in size over the past six years. We are now a staff of twenty-one, including teams of legal, policy, and organizing experts who work proactively on the issues most affecting our community today.

With this growth, we are adapting to our new proactive, community orientation and keeping up with changes in the area. We've promoted our organizing director Norma Chavez-Peterson to the new position of Associate Director in charge of supervising our array of justice-making programs and tools.

Norma's ability to build strong relationships with the community to affect positive change reflects a new emphasis in the way we work. It was exemplified most recently in a campaign to enlist local volunteers to mobilize thousands of Latino voters in Escondido – a city fraught with civil liberties abuses.

Our relationships with you, the community, and lawmakers, combined with our organizing, litigation, and advocacy capacity, will help us move closer to our vision of an equitable and just society.

Please share your thoughts and ideas on the new ACLU with us. You can respond to this email, "like" us and post on our Facebook page, and follow us on Twitter.

Thank you again for making us more effective through your consistent support. Happy New Year!

Kevin Keenan
Executive Director
ACLU of San Diego & Imperial Counties

Comments on ACLU Facebook page:

James Thinkstoomuch
decent article, but the local ACLU has seriously dropped the ball on local police accountability issues - especially with respect to their illegal and criminal acts during the suppression of Occupy San Diego. December 31, 2012 at 3:14pm ·

Maura Larkins
Unfortunately, the "relationships" that San Diego ACLU lawyers focus on are too often with lawyers who are defending violations of civil rights, such as school attorneys. San Diego ACLU attorney David Loy has gone out of his way to support violations of the First Amendment such as Judge Judith Hayes' December 11, 2010 injunction. The Court of Appeal disagreed with David Loy that I should remove all mention of Stutz Artiano Shinoff & Holtz from my website.