NEW YORK LAWYERS FOR THE PUBLIC INTEREST INC

Who are the people you serve with your mission?

NYLPI provides individual and systemic civil legal services to low-income and marginalized communities in metropolitan New York City, with a focus on clients who are currently underserved because of disability, immigration status, race, or limited English proficiency. These communities experience poor health, educational barriers, high unemployment, discrimination, and poverty, particularly concentrated in communities of color, which account for most of the 1.4 million New Yorkers below the federal poverty line.

How is your organization collecting feedback from the people you serve?

Paper surveys, Case management notes,

How is your organization using feedback from the people you serve?

To identify and remedy poor client service experiences, To identify bright spots and enhance positive service experiences, To make fundamental changes to our programs and/or operations, To inform the development of new programs/projects, To identify where we are less inclusive or equitable across demographic groups, To strengthen relationships with the people we serve, To understand people's needs and how we can help them achieve their goals,

What significant change resulted from feedback?

Responding to ongoing pandemic and community concerns surrounding vaccines and city and state requirements, in late 2021 NYLPI launched our Health Justice Talks, a video series to bridge the gap between expert information and community public health and equity concerns. The videos are presented in multiple languages including English, Spanish, and Mandarin, and cover a range of topics including the Key to NYC program’s requirements and vaccine safety for pregnant and parenting people. The segments feature members of NYLPI’s Medical Providers Network and include additional resources and fact sheets for each topic.

With whom is the organization sharing feedback?

Our staff, Our board, Our funders, Our community partners,

How has asking for feedback from the people you serve changed your relationship?

Client and community priorities power and drive our work. We engage in priority setting in conjunction with community partners - rather than imposing our own priorities, we collaborate with underserved communities to understand their most pressing legal needs. We assess need and community prioritization through intake patterns, long-term relationships with community leaders and grassroots CBOs, organizing and canvassing in the community, and community surveys. Our largest initiatives have steering committees of community members and partners with shared funding. Most of our work beyond individual cases occurs in coalitions or through group representation, with directly affected communities in leadership roles.

Which of the following feedback practices does your organization routinely carry out?

We collect feedback from the people we serve at least annually, We take steps to get feedback from marginalized or under-represented people, We aim to collect feedback from as many people we serve as possible, We take steps to ensure people feel comfortable being honest with us, We look for patterns in feedback based on demographics (e.g., race, age, gender, etc.), We look for patterns in feedback based on people’s interactions with us (e.g., site, frequency of service, etc.), We engage the people who provide feedback in looking for ways we can improve in response, We act on the feedback we receive, We tell the people who gave us feedback how we acted on their feedback, We ask the people who gave us feedback how well they think we responded,

What challenges does the organization face when collecting feedback?

It is difficult to get the people we serve to respond to requests for feedback, The people we serve tell us they find data collection burdensome, It is difficult to find the ongoing funding to support feedback collection, Staff find it hard to prioritize feedback collection and review due to lack of time,