Serving Those Who Serve Our Country
Providing legal and community support to veterans, active duty military personnel, and their families in San Diego.



San Diego - Serving those Who Serve Our Country

In May 2008, the San Diego offices launched a Signature Project, Serving Those Who Serve Our Country, which is dedicated to providing legal and community services to the veteran and active duty military population of San Diego County, who frequently have difficulty accessing many services they need. San Diego is home to numerous Navy, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard installations, as well as many military personnel and families. With such a large military presence in San Diego, the lawyers and staff of the San Diego offices have a deep connection to the veteran population and active duty military and their families and are eager to give back to those who have served our country.

In keeping with DLA Piper’s model for signature projects, the goal of this project is to dedicate 5,000 hours of pro bono legal work, in addition to community service projects, during each of the next three years. The project also reflects the firm’s ongoing commitment to partner with local legal services and community organizations, to ensure that service priorities are established based on a true understanding of community needs. Accordingly, our San Diego offices have partnered with organizations such as Veterans Village of San Diego, San Diego Volunteer Lawyers Program, Operation Homefront and National Veterans Legal Services Program, to provide litigation and transactional support to veterans, as well as to participate in community service projects to support both veterans and active duty military.

The San Diego offices will host a public launch reception on November 19, 2008 to celebrate the efforts of the San Diego Signature Project to date and the future plans for this project.

Our Partners

Veterans’ Village of San Diego

Veterans Village of San Diego (VVSD), also known as Vietnam Veterans of San Diego, is dedicated to extending assistance to needy and homeless veterans of all wars and eras and their families by providing housing, food, clothing, substance abuse recovery and mental health counseling, job training and job search assistance. VVSD offers a wide variety of services to veterans through residential and non-residential programs as well as employment training programs. As part of its work, VVSD has been the primary sponsor of Stand Down, an annual grassroots event which brings a plethora of essential services to homeless veterans each year in a single location.

San Diego Volunteer Lawyers’ Program (SDVLP)

Since 1983, the San Diego Volunteer Lawyer Program (SDVLP) has operated San Diego county’s oldest and largest pro bono legal services program, providing representation and general advice to more than 6500 low-income clients and non-profit organizations per year. SDVLP provides services in a wide range of cases, including those involving domestic violence, elder abuse, immigrants, HIV/AIDS sufferers, and veterans, leveraging the talents of a small staff of attorneys and thousands of volunteers to provide high quality legal services to those in need.

National Veterans’ Legal Services Program (NVLSP)

Recognizing that the problems faced by San Diego veterans are often seen by national organizations committed to the well-being of men and women who have served their country, when planning the scope of the Signature Project DLA Piper reached out to the National Veterans’ Legal Services Program (NVLSP). NVLSP, which is headquartered in Washington D.C., is a non-partisan, non-profit, veterans service organization which has worked for the past 25 years to help veterans receive the government benefits for which their service qualifies them. NVLSP is one of the nation's leading advocates for the rights of veterans to receive effective medical treatment and benefits for service-related illnesses and disabilities.

Homeless Court Alliance Program

Created through a partnership between VVSD, the San Diego Public Defenders’ Office, the San Diego District Attorney and the San Diego County Superior Court, the Homeless Court Alliance seeks to facilitate the full re-entry into society of veterans who have successfully undergone treatment for their disabilities. This is accomplished by providing a court mechanism to resolve, in a streamlined fashion, any outstanding misdemeanor and infraction citations (and related fines) which may hinder a veteran’s ability to engage in activities critical to his or her success (such as obtaining a valid drivers’ license.) Three judges of the San Diego County Superior Court conduct court sessions outside their regular courtrooms at VVSD's main campus, and volunteer lawyers (who serve as Deputy Public Defenders) provide direct representation to veterans appearing before Homeless Court. Veterans who appear before Homeless Court are given the opportunity to make a truly fresh start by eliminating old legal impediments to reestablishing themselves as productive members of society.

Operation Homefront

Operation Homefront is a non-profit community service organization working nationwide to provide emergency assistance and morale to troops working in all branches of the armed forces and their families, and to wounded warriors upon their return from the theater of war. Nationwide, Operation Homefront has processed more than 45,000 cases, including more than 2,100 involving wounded warriors, providing help with a wide variety of needs, such as shelter, food, vehicle repair, computer access, and emergency financial needs.

Our Activities

Homeless Court Representation

Approximately fifty percent of all homeless persons in San Diego are veterans, and Homeless Court is an excellent opportunity for our attorneys to provide legal advice and advocacy in support of formerly homeless veterans. Homeless Court is a specialized court session designed to adjudicate the misdemeanor offenses of formerly homeless individuals who have taken great strides to move forward with their lives. Our attorneys serve as deputy public defenders, working with the Public Defenders Office on a monthly basis to counsel individual clients and then represent them at the court hearing in which their misdemeanor offenses are adjudicated. We have trained more than a dozen attorneys since May 2008, and we plan on having quarterly training sessions to introduce new attorney volunteers for this program.

Appellate Disability Claims Advocacy

Our San Diego attorneys have been representing individual veterans referred by National Veterans Legal Services Program (“NVLSP”). These veterans have applied for veterans disability and/or medical benefits and had those claims denied. Our attorneys, with the assistance of mentor attorneys from NVLSP, have been handling the appellate work for these matters, with prosecuting appeals before the Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims and U.S. Court of Veterans Appeals.

Project SALUTE

As part of its Signature Project, DLA Piper San Diego has also provided support to University of Detroit Mercy Law School’s Project SALUTE. Project SALUTE is the country’s only mobile veterans’ legal services clinic, and provides general advice, screening and lawyer referral services to veterans throughout the United States. The San Diego downtown office hosted a region-wide training in veterans law on October 10, 2008 as part of Project SALUTE’s San Diego tour. DLA Piper attorneys are now assisting six San Diego veterans with their initial claims and follow-up legal work, including appellate level advocacy as necessary, to ensure that veterans’ claims are efficiently and correctly handled and their needs ultimately met.

Outside Counsel Support to Signature Project Partners

As part of the Signature project, attorneys from DLA Piper’s Labor and Employment group in San Diego are providing ongoing outside counsel support to VVSD, providing general labor and contracts advice, compliance assistance and representation in employment matters as needed. Attorneys from the Corporate and Securities Group will also be representing VVSD in its annual negotiations with the City of San Diego for the Winter Shelter program, in which public buildings are opened to provide safe, warm shelter to the homeless population during the cold season each year (November to February).

Class Action Advocacy

San Diego lawyers have lent their appellate expertise to NVLSP’s advocacy and efforts in ongoing class action litigation which seeks to obtain improved claims processing and increased benefits for veterans suffering from service-related illnesses. To date, as part of the Signature Project DLA Piper has prepared amicus briefing on behalf of NVLSP as it relates to the benefits eligibility of veterans who allege that they were harmed by exposure to Agent Orange. DLA Piper is also providing general strategic support to NVLSP in other class-action litigation which seeks to achieve systemic policy changes, with the goal of making it easier for veterans to obtain the benefits to which they are entitled.

Representation of Veteran-Owned Businesses

Transactional attorneys from DLA Piper’s Golden Triangle office have, since the launch of the Signature Project, provided representation on transactional business matters referred by the San Diego Military Advisory Council and Elite SDVOP – a government-sponsored non-profit which seeks to support the entrepreneurial efforts of veterans whose disabilities prevent them from succeeding in traditional employment opportunities. Examples of the types of matters in which, corporate and securities lawyers have helped include assisting in the formation and tax-exempt qualification of a non-profit corporation dedicated to providing affordable housing for disabled veterans, assisting with restructuring of debt and addressing credit issues for disabled veteran-owned businesses and acting as outside counsel for disabled and low-income veteran entrepreneurs.

Stand Down

Since 1988, Signature Project partner VVSD has hosted a three-day veterans’ outreach event, Operation Stand Down, with the goal of providing “one stop shopping” to homeless veterans and their families in San Diego. At Stand Down, clients can access food, clothing and shelter; assistance with medical, legal and mental health issues; job counseling and referrals; and, most importantly, companionship and camraderie. In previous years, DLA Piper San Diego attorneys volunteered their time to counsel veterans on legal issues. This year, as part of its Signature Project, DLA Piper’s San Diego employees expanded their role to include preparing and serving meals, helping veterans use web-based resources to locate loved ones, and helping sort donated clothing and assist veterans in selecting appropriate clothing. Our expanded efforts were considered a significant component of VVSD’s effort to serve the nearly 1,000 homeless veterans and family members who attended Stand Down in 2008.

VVSD Clothing Drive

Each year VVSD sponsors a clothing drive to collect clothing to be provided to homeless veterans at Stand Down. A group of 25 attorney and staff volunteers coordinated collection efforts and ultimately sorted, folded and boxed 106 boxes of “gently used” clothing filled for men, women and children of all sizes to be donated to veterans and their families.

Backpack Brigade

The DLA Piper San Diego offices joined forces with Operation Homefront to coordinate the firm’s efforts to make Operation Homefront’s 2008 back to school campaign – and, in particular, the Backpack Brigade, which seeks to ensure that the children of military families have the school supplies which they need despite the challenges of their family circumstances – a huge success. The San Diego offices raised more than $10,000 in cash and in kind contributions to support the Backpack Brigade, an event which assisted more than 700 San Diego military families.

Disability Claims Clinic (4Q 2008 Launch)

Although nearly 70% of all veteran claims for disability benefits are initially denied by the Veterans Administration, many of these claims are ultimately granted after additional medical data or information about the connection between a veterans’ disability and his time of service is provided to the government – but only after years of delay. To address this problem, DLA Piper and SDVLP are creating a veterans’ clinic, at which clients who wish to file an initial disability claim may obtain legal assistance and guidance, to ensure that their applications for benefits are sufficiently supported and in the proper form. Attorneys and paralegals trained in the veterans claims process will help San Diego veterans compile and review their service documents and medical records, complete the necessary forms and submit them to the Veterans Administration. It is anticipated that this assistance will greatly reduce the likelihood that a veterans’ claim will be rejected for technical reasons, and eliminate the extraordinary delay currently associated with the claims appeals process. VVSD has graciously agreed to be the initial host site for the veterans’ benefits clinics to be operated jointly by DLA Piper and SDVLP at least monthly.

Lawyers Serving Warriors (1Q 2009 Launch)

DLA Piper has agreed to closely partner with NVLSP as it launches its latest veterans’ initiative – Lawyers Serving Warriors – in San Diego. This new program is focused on the complex disability issues, many PTSD related, faced by veterans who have served in the Afghan (Operation Enduring Freedom) and Iraq (Operation Iraqi Freedom) conflicts. Service members often need, but are unable to access, representation in the medical evaluation process, which takes place prior to their separation from the military and which determines whether or not an individual service member and his or her family qualifies for many types of federal disability benefits. DLA Piper and NVLSP anticipate launch of this new arm of the Signature Project, and case placement, in early 2009.

For more information about our activities, please contact one of the San Diego signature project leadership: