NNews March 2024

8 March 2024 F or many organizations, having one person not only know their full history, but also having had been involved in creating nearly all that history, is rare. Legal Action Center (LAC) is one of those exceptional entities. Soon after it was founded in 1973, Paul N. Samuels, JD, worked there while he attended Columbia Law School. He joined the team full- time in 1979, became Executive Vice President in 1983 and has served as Director/President since 1992. “In law school, I knew I wanted to do civil rights work and I volunteered on a project with the Legal Aid Society to deal with the horrible conditions in a county jail. I sawfirsthand the horrible health care and other inequities in the criminal justice systemand I wanted to help make positive changes. A professor connectedme with LAC,” Samuels shared. Legal Action Center Builds Partnerships to Protect Rights and Increase Access to Services LAC has made “many ground- breaking victories through the decades using litigation and through public policy on the local, state and federal levels. We create and protect legal rights for people with substance use disorder (SUD), mental illness, HIV and/or criminal justice backgrounds. We also open opportunities for necessities, including housing, benefits, school and employment,” Samuels stated. Deborah Steinberg, JD, Senior Health Policy Attorney, a much newer LAC teammember, shared, “I’ve been doing mental health advocacy all my life. After law school, I provided direct legal services for people who were denied mental health and/or substance use treatment; I appealed the denials,” she said. “I wanted to do advocacy for an organization that also provides direct legal services. LAC does this and has strong ties to the policy and community work.” “What amazes me is we have smart leaders coming up with new polices and seeing them implemented,” Steinberg said. For example, Samuels and Tracie M. Gardner, Senior Vice President of Policy Advocacy, developed the Medicaid Reentry policy, and EllenWeber, JD, Senior Vice President for Health Initiatives, conceptualized the Medicare Addiction Parity Project (MAPP). LAC, NJAMHAA and Others Partner to Increase Medicare Coverage of SUD Treatment In fact, the MAPP is the most recent of many examples of partnership between LAC and NJAMHAA, which joined the MAPP Learning Collaborative in 2023. The MAPP was launched in 2021 to improve access to SUD treatment for individuals aged 65 and older and younger individuals with long-term disabilities, and has resulted in U.S. Senators making Medicare a priority.