Click on the photo to the right to find out how you can be a Defender!
Welcome to the birthplace of...
THE PERMANENCE PROJECT
You are reading about the Children’s Law Center of Washington, PS ("CLCW"), an exciting non-profit law clinic radically changing the lives of countless children in Washington State as well as across the country.
As an adoptions attorney and foster and adoptive parent of three, I recognized the terrible injustice against innocent children occurring in my own community of the Puget Sound region of Washington State. I witnessed firsthand where children were separated from their grandparents and placed into foster care simply because their relatives couldn’t afford legal services that would ensure permanency. I saw other kids forced to languish in foster care longer than necessary due to the lack of affordable legal services made available to their caregivers.
This injustice couldn't be ignored any longer. After years of dreaming and careful planning, we are thrilled to open the CLCW in Bellevue, Washington State. The CLCW is a revolutionary non-profit legal clinic. A tax-exempt organization under the IRS tax code section 501c3 (Download CLCW IRS Ltr 947 (501c3)), the CLCW offers free and low cost legal services to provide permanence for Washington’s orphaned and vulnerable children. Legal services include adoptions, non-parental custodies, guardianships and general advocacy for at-risk or trafficked youth. The CLCW's typical clients are the care-providers, but the real beneficiaries of our services are the kids themselves.
Within the first two years of operation, the CLCW quickly helped more than 100 kids find permanent families.
But Washington State is only the beginning. Our greater vision is to inspire people like YOU across the country to be part of the change. If we can do it here in Washington State, you can do it in your community as well! This vision of a nation-wide movement is what we call The Permanence Project.
All kids deserve a permanent family. Legal fees can be a barrier to permanence. By offering free or significantly reduced-fee services, law clinics across the country like the CLCW will reduce the number of kids in foster care, bring more vulnerable kids into safety, and ensure every child has a permanent family.
The CLCW works with all people, married or single, regardless of citizenship, faith or no faith, rich or poor. We simply believe every child deserves a permanent family. Will you help us make this a reality? We cannot do it without your support.
If you would like more information about the CLCW, including how you might start your own Permanence Project law clinic, please contact us. To find out how you can support this important work, including signing up as a "Defender", please click on the “Donate” button to the right or at the top of screen.
Won't you join us and work until every child has a permanent family?
Andrew Schneidler
Founder of The Permanence Project and Practicing Attorney
Children’s Law Center of Washington, PS
8201 164th Ave NE, #200
Redmond, Washington, 98052
Federal EIN# 46-0696480
“Defend the weak and the orphan; uphold the cause of the poor and oppressed.” Psalm 82:3