Aspen Institute - DLA Piper attorneys have worked with the Aspen Institute to create, manage and fund the Middle East Investment Initiative (MEII), which is a nonprofit designed to facilitate economic development and job creation in the West Bank and Gaza.  The MEII/CHF Loan Guarantee Facility makes $160 million from Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC) and the Palestine Investment Fund available to guarantee loans made by local banks to small and medium-sized enterprises in the Palestinian Territories. This program is expected to mobilize $228 million in loans to local businesses in a variety of sectors. Loans granted already through eight local banks are supporting activities such as: 

        • Investing in capital equipment for the manufacturing sector; 
        • Expanding or offering new services in the transportation and IT sectors; 
        • Increasing capacity and improving standards in the construction sector; 
        • Adding new production lines for textiles or olive oil.

Transwestern - In Chicago, DLA Piper attorneys and the firm's client, Transwestern, paired up to sponsor a team of City Year AmeriCorps Volunteers. The DLA Piper/Transwestern City Year Team was made up of young adults from diverse economic, racial, and geographical backgrounds who committed to spending a year mentoring and tutoring children at Bethune Elementary School on Chicago's West Side.

Working together, DLA Piper and Transwestern spent a year working on behalf of the volunteers, hosted a book drive for the school, participated in public service days, and hosted "thank you" events for the volunteers. For example, DLA Piper hosted a lunch so that its attorneys, Transwestern staff, and City Year Volunteers could get to know each other. In addition, DLA Piper and Transwestern employees delivered Valentine's Day treats -- along with a much needed dose of encouragement and support -- to the volunteers. In June 2007, DLA Piper and Transwestern were present for the much celebrated graduation of the City Year volunteers.

Accenture – Our Chicago office partners with Accenture attorneys to teach Constitutional Law to fifth graders through the Lawyer in the Classroom program sponsored by the Constitutional Rights Foundation of Chicago. Lessons focus on the Bill of Rights and the court system. At the end of the program, the students stage a mock criminal trial. Every Spring, DLA Piper and Accenture also jointly host a Career Day fair at Barry Elementary, where professionals from both companies spend a day at the school teaching children about their careers. Accenture also joins with the Chicago, Washington, DC, and Northern Virginia offices to regularly volunteer at food bank nights.  Accenture also teamed with us on New Perimeter's Addis Ababa teaching project in Ethiopia.

Pfizer – Pfizer recently launched its Pro Bono Alliance for Health in New York, partnering with DLA Piper and other firms in the Pfizer Legal Alliance (Skadden, Sidley and Ropes & Gray) to provide pro bono assistance to low-income individuals at a monthly clinic at the NYU Cancer Institute.  DLA Piper also partners with Pfizer to conduct a regular seminar series, Strategic Legal Thinking for Not-for-Profit Executives, addressing corporate governance and other legal issues faced by nonprofits. We were pleased to moderate, participate in, and host the webcast of the seminars in our Atlanta, Austin, Baltimore, Chicago, Dallas, East Palo Alto, Houston, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Reston, San Diego, San Francisco, Tampa and Washington DC offices. The topic of the last seminar on June 2, 2010 was Trademarks, Copyrights and the Internet. The March 2010 seminar addressed best practices in compensating your employees and other employment law requirements. The December 2009 presentation covered managing personnel in hard times and smart ways to avoid legal problems while reducing personnel costs, and the October 2009 seminar pertained to IRS Form 990 and the significant changes in reporting requirements for many nonprofits. Since 2006, we have worked continuously to offer the seminar series regularly and have played an ever larger role in organizing each one.

PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP – As part of Access to Education, our New York office's signature project, we partner with PwC executives to advise individual Head Start programs on key transactional, compliance and real estate matters and serve in a general counsel-like capacity. Playing a lead role in this project, PwC is assisting DLA Piper attorneys in providing key compliance and governance training for selected Head Start directors, board members and administrators. Specifically, PwC is leveraging its accounting expertise to provide training regarding financial statements, audit and fraud protection recommendations.

Sears – Real estate attorneys in the Chicago office partnered with Sears attorneys to represent home buyers as part of CHAC, Inc.'s Choose to Own Program, which enables qualified recipients of housing assistance payments (formerly called “Section 8 vouchers”) to use them to purchase single-family homes, condominiums, or cooperatives within Chicago.  This project was offered to the firm by the Community Economic Development Law Project, part of the Chicago Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, Inc.

Hewlett-Packard – In a program done in conjunction with the Law Foundation of Silicon Valley, DLA Piper is working with HP in-house lawyers and staff to help families with legal guardianship issues, which is critical to their ability to access needed medical, educational and financial support not available under informal custodial arrangements.

Pep Boys – DLA Piper and Pep Boys jointly staff legal services clinics conducted by Philadelphia's Homeless Advocacy Project (HAP) at a regional homeless sheltter for families.

United Airlines – DLA Piper has co-counseled with United Airlines on several individual matters, including an expungement matter, an asylum claim, research projects, and training on employment issues for our Head Start program clients.

KPMG – DLA Piper is partnering with KPMG to counsel Head Start programs on key transactional and non-profit matters, as well as providing critical non-profit training to our clients.  In conjunction with our Earth Institute Millennium Cities Project, KPMG co-sponsored a London conference on private investment opportunities in Malawi and Ghana in December 2008.

Verizon - DLA Piper and Verizon launched the largest of its kind national pro bono partnership focused on providing services to clients in the areas of education, veteran's needs and domestic violence throughout the country wherever Verizon lawyers are located.

Academic Institutions - DLA Piper is partnering with academic institutions such as the University of Chicago, the University of Maryland, Universidad Panamericana in Mexico City, Instituto Tecnologico Autonomo de Mexico, Northwestern University, and others on pro bono projects across the world focused on education, rule of law, and economic development.

UPS - DLA Piper lawyers provide mentoring and support to UPS in-house counsel who represent nonprofits.