The Urban Law Center is important for Fordham Law for several reasons.
First, it's an opportunity to showcase some of the incredible opportunities and talent we have here at Fordham.
We have faculty that write and teach in a variety of areas related to urban law.
We have three great clinics that work on urban legal issues.
We have the only student-run urban law journal in the country, and it's approaching its 40th anniversary this spring.
We have a great relationship with a wonderful urban studies program at Fordham University,
and of course we're grounded, as we always have been, at Fordham Law School in the life of the city.
So it's an opportunity to advance a dialogue about the nature of urban law.
It's an opportunity for our students to be engaged in questions that they'll encounter throughout their career,
and it's an opportunity to have an impact on some of the most important issues facing cities around the country and around the world.
The Urban Law Center has three primary goals.
The first is a scholarly goal.
The field of urban law was well recognized decades ago, but for a variety of interesting reasons,
we don't as legal scholars tend to talk about urban law as a unified field anymore.
In other areas of the academy, in economics, in sociology, in history, in political science,
there are very well recognized subspecialties that focus on urban economics, urban sociology, urban history, urban politics.
That kind of focus and subspecialty deserves to be a part of legal academia,
and I think that the Urban Law Center can help advance that specialty.
Second, I think we have an important role to play in advancing the engagement of students with the question of how law shapes the life of cities.
Our students are going to be involved in legal questions throughout their career
that involve the built environment and land use and sustainability and social justice and fairness and equity,
questions that are at the heart of how cities operate and how people live in cities,
and helping them see that, helping them engage with those questions is an important goal of the center.
Third, I think that the Urban Law Center can help advance a policy dialogue
in an area where the role of law is not given as much attention as it could be.
There are some very, very important legal questions at the heart of most urban governance issues.
Again, whether it's the built environment, the role of sustainability, questions of fairness and equity,
in all of these areas that are at the cutting edge of urban governance, law plays an important and under-recognized role.
And I think the Urban Law Center can play an important role in surfacing those questions and helping policymakers think more deeply about them.
One of the things I'm most excited about in terms of the potential of the Urban Law Center is how we can help students engage
with a variety of legal questions at the intersection of law and cities.
So we are already working with students to try and find placements in externships.
We're encouraging students to get involved in clinics.
We have three great clinics that involve urban legal questions.
We are starting a practitioner series where we're going to help students find mentors
and understand career paths that involve urban law.
And I think the potential for student engagement could not be better.
