Disability Rights Louisiana

In a Nutshell

We’re here to protect, empower, and advocate for the 1.1 million people with disabilities who live throughout Louisiana. For over 45 years, DRLA has protected the civil rights of people with disabilities because they are all-too-often isolated, abused, denied decision-making power, and prevented from participating in their communities. 

We help Louisiana’s disability community achieve access to community-based healthcare, affordable and accessible housing, quality education, meaningful jobs, unencumbered voting access, and safety from abuse and neglect. 

DRLA’s attorneys, advocates, and policy specialists work and live across the state. We work to address injustices and empower people with disabilities to achieve independence and well-being, through direct legal representation and other types of individualized advocacy. We work to change the systems that oppress our community through legislative advocacy and impact litigation

What We're Raising Funds for This Give for Good 

This year, we are raising funds for a legal fellowship position. We need to travel to and monitor child residential facilities and detention centers across the state, because the vast majority of kids within them have disabilities. Behind these closed doors, kids with disabilities are vulnerable to abuse and neglect. They are often isolated and don't have easy access to trusted adults from outside of the facilities. Even worse, these kids don’t typically receive the medical, mental health, or special education services they need.

Your donation will help us send a legal fellow into these facilities across the state. This fellow will meet with the kids with disabilities who are housed there, review their records, and find out how they are doing. Afterwards, the fellow will take action with our legal team to stop abuse they uncover, and to get these kids the services they need in order to grow while they are institutionalized, and thrive once they are back in the community.

Your donation will be twice as powerful because it's being matched by generous support from the Lutz Family who, through Tulane University Law School, is funding half of this legal fellow's salary.

Our Impact 

In recent years, our efforts have resulted in the following outcomes:

• Individual Advocacy: We individually protect, advocate, and empower approximately 3,000 people with disabilities each year. 
• Litigation: Last year, we won a class action lawsuit against the Louisiana Department of Corrections for their unconstitutional treatment of individuals with mental illness, including denial of mental health treatment and cruel and unusual punishment in solitary confinement.
• Policy Advocacy: In the last three years, in coalition with our community partners, we successfully advocated for legislation that (1) will enable 1,250 adults with disabilities to live in the community with home health care, as opposed to institutions, and (2) established Supported Decision Making, a less restrictive alternative to conservatorships that strip people with disabilities of their civil rights.