Support WERC

WERC is a 501(c)(3) charitable educational organization, so all contributions are deductible to the maximum extent permitted by law. Individual and foundation donations are gratefully accepted.

Donations to WERC may be made in two ways:

• You may print out our donation form and mail in your contribution. Download a printable donation form (PDF)
  Get Acrobat Reader (required to view PDF formats).
• You may make an online contribution by accessing Golden Gate University's Online Giving site.
  Be sure to check the "Other" box at the bottom of the page and indicate that your gift is designated for WERC.

Please contact Clinic Director Marci Seville for donations of stocks and securities.

Since its inception, WERC has offered a one year Graduate Law Fellowship to a recent graduate, generally a former WERC student, to join the WERC staff as a junior attorney and student supervisor. Our law fellows have gone on to work at the California Division of Labor Standards Enforcement, the National Labor Relations Board, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal, California Public Employee Relations Program at the U.C. Berkeley Institute of Industrial Relations, Weinberg, Roger & Rosenfeld, Siegel and Lewitter, Hoffman & Lazear, Law Offices of Robert C. Goodman, and other private employment law firms.

The Fellowship is currently unfunded. WERC seeks generous donors including former WERC Fellows to contribute $1000-$5000 towards the Fellowship for 2008-2009; although, any amount is welcome. If you are interested in supporting the Fellowship, donations can be made through our donation form and mailed. In addition, WERC seeks permanent funding for the Fellowship. If you are interested in setting up a permanent Fellowship Fund, please contact Clinic Director Marci Seville.

Designating WERC as a Class Action Cy Pres Recipient is another way to support our work. Class action attorneys negotiating settlement or litigating the remedy in their actions must often address the probability that not all class members will be located, or that defendant's conduct has made full restitution to all injured victims impossible or unfeasible. Under such circumstances, the courts may approve a charitable donation out of the unclaimed residue of class action funds, or a direct grant in lieu of damages to any entity that will vindicate class member rights in the future. Please consider designating WERC as a Cy Pres Recipient.

Spearheaded by GGU adjunct professor Bart Selden, Bay area attorneys recently established a WERC fund in memory of SF employment attorney Robert Lazo, who died in December 2004 at the age of 41. Lazo's friends and colleagues wanted to establish a memorial fund to honor Lazo and felt the Clinic best reflected his work and values. Lazo founded the San Francisco's Employment Lawyers' Group to represent employees who had been discriminated against, harassed, or otherwise mistreated because of race, gender, or sexual orientation.

Lazo successfully advocated for workers denied bathroom breaks at a processing plant and for a gay, Latino postal worker who suffered years of verbal and physical harassment. In his most famous case, he served as co-counsel in the wrongful death suit brought by Sharon Smith whose partner, Dianne Whipple was fatally mauled by neighbor's dogs outside their San Francisco Pacific Heights apartment. The lawsuit became the first in the country in which a same-sex partner was given survivor standing in a wrongful death case.

In a 2001 article in the San Francisco Daily Journal, Lazo wrote, "Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. had a dream that one day we all would be judged by our character, not the color of our skin . . . I see myself participating in that dream as an advocate for civil rights in the workplace." The funds raised in Lazo's name will be used to support WERC's graduate law fellowship.

To read more about the Lazo fund, see pages 10-11 of the article in the law alumni publication at: Golden Gate University School of Law Class Action, Spring/Summer 2006