Andrew Goldberg came to North Star Fund after 25 years in public interest law, including significant accomplishments working to eliminate childhood lead poisoning in New York City. “Lead poisoning almost exclusively affects low-income children of color,” says Andy, “and it is entirely preventable.” In addition to his efforts on lawsuits to compel city agencies to take aggressive actions against private and public landlords to reduce lead poisoning, Andy was a primary drafter of the New York City Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention Act–the most stringent of its kind in the U.S.
From 2002 to 2011, Andy was a supervising attorney at MFY Legal Services, Inc., where he supervised a Workplace Justice Project representing low-wage and foreign-born workers who had wage, discrimination, and unemployment insurance claims; a Consumer Rights Project representing vulnerable New Yorkers who were subject to abusive debt collection practices; and the Mental Health Law Project, the nation’s largest civil legal practice for low-income people with psychiatric disabilities.
Earlier in his career, he supervised an environmental litigation project with the New York Public Interest Research Group (NYPIRG) and served as a staff attorney with Bronx Legal Services in the South Bronx and with MFY Legal Services Chinatown.By that time Andy had already received a certificate in Mandarin Chinese from the Beijing Languages Institute, Beijing, China; his J.D. from Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law at Yeshiva University; and his B.A. from Columbia University School of General Studies.
“I have seen many dedicated grassroots organizations in my work as a legal services lawyer. In light of my experience, I see an opportunity as a member of the North Star Board to assist these groups to connect with the legal profession and sharpen the impact of their grassroots organizing campaigns.”