Posts in Memorandum
The Liability of Federal Agents for Civil Rights Violations
The Liability of Federal Agents for Civil Rights Violations

Can people sue federal agents for police brutality? In this memorandum, CLiME explores the very limited bases for finding ICE agents civilly liable for excessive force or deprivation of civil rights. The main issues involve: 

  • restrictive federal legal standards and barriers to bringing a claim 

  • unbridled and undue deference afforded to federal law enforcement agents on the job, and 

  • underdeveloped state laws that have yet to provide legitimate alternatives to weak federal causes of action. 

Courts appear to be generally hostile to government liability and the costs of accountability against federal agents. As a result, unlike police brutality by state and local law enforcement, legal remedies against ICE and other federal law enforcement are largely unavailable. Some scholars have proposed ways to close this legal gap, so far without success.

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MemorandumRutgers CLiMECivil Rights Initiative
Legal Strategies to Lower Building Emissions in Metropolitan New Jersey
Legal Strategies to Lower Building Emissions in Metropolitan New Jersey

Metropolitan areas in New Jersey need to dramatically lower their building emissions to combat climate change and protect local health. However, metropolitan New Jersey faces several major challenges. First, federal and state law preempt New Jersey municipalities from adopting some stricter laws that could lower building emissions. Second, competition between municipalities creates a collective action problem that disincentivizes legal reform. Third, building emission reduction strategies can create unintended harm such as worsened indoor air quality and gentrification. To avoid these challenges, individual New Jersey municipalities can utilize metropolitan equity strategies to cooperate efficiently. However, the most impactful way New Jersey can decarbonize buildings may be for the state legislature to amend its building emissions benchmarking law to enable the state government to decarbonize buildings more effectively.

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MemorandumRutgers CLiMEStudent Research, Economic Development
Reevaluating New Jersey’s Rent Control Exemption for New Construction
Reevaluating New Jersey’s Rent Control Exemption for New Construction

In New Jersey, new construction is exempt from price controls for 30 years, even in municipalities with rent control ordinances. Given the other exemptions available to developers, it is questionable whether this exemption is necessary to spur new construction. This memo examines that question by laying out the history of rent control in New Jersey as well as the history of the new construction exemption, looking at case law involving the exemption as well as arguments for the exemption and critique of those arguments, and proposes alternatives to the exemption as either an abolishment or revision of the exemption. The history shows how the moderate nature of rent control in New Jersey suggests that its effect on new construction is overblown, the legislative intent was more about removing barriers to new construction without considering any balance with the prevention of rent gouging, rent control is relevant towards new construction, and significant revision, if not abolishment, of the exemption would have a beneficial effect for existing affordable housing.

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MemorandumRutgers CLiMEHousing, Gentrification, Student Research, Economic Development
Memorandum: Campaign Against Federal Affirmative Action Programs
Memorandum: Campaign Against Federal Affirmative Action Programs

New Jersey's Assembly Bill A4 represents a landmark effort to comply with the Mount Laurel Doctrine and the state's growing affordable housing crisis by reforming how municipalities meet their fair share housing obligations. At the heart of this legislation is a standardized formula that requires each municipality to calculate its present and prospective affordable housing needs, along with other factors like population growth, land, and income capacity. By decentralizing housing planning, A4 shifts responsibility to local governments from the state and gives them a ten-year window to meet their fair share housing obligations.

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MemorandumRutgers CLiMEInequality, Civil Rights Initiative
Memorandum: Anti-DEI Retrenchment and Litigation after Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard
Memorandum: Anti-DEI Retrenchment and Litigation after Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard

In June 2023, the Supreme Court in Students For Fair Admissions, Inc. v. President and Fellows Of Harvard College (“SFFA”) found that Harvard University’s and the University of North Carolina’s affirmative action admission policies unconstitutionally employed race-based discrimination, violating the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.[1]

Beginning with its first constitutional review of affirmative action, the Court has consistently found that the only governmental interest compelling enough to warrant the use of race in admissions policies and decisions, and thus satisfy strict scrutiny judicial review, is the institution’s interest in “obtaining the educational benefits that flow from an ethnically diverse student body.”[2] Before this first opinion in Regents of Univ. of Cal. v. Bakke, affirmative action initiatives were a “response to the legacy of Jim Crow segregation and, by extension, slavery. It was an outgrowth of the civil-rights initiatives… Diversity was part of the conversation, but it was only one of many reasons selective colleges employed affirmative action.”[3]

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MemorandumRutgers CLiMECivil Rights Initiative
Legal Memorandum: Equitable Redevelopment of Newark’s City-Owned Property

As the New Jersey Supreme Court recently noted in Malanga v. Township of West Orange, municipalities can sell or improve upon public property in a number of ways.¹ However, a redevelopment designation appears to be the best way for a municipality to maintain the greatest degree of control over the future of a given parcel, in terms of retaining ownership, choosing a developer and deciding the use to which the parcel will be put. Without such a designation, in order to facilitate non-publicly funded development of city-owned property, a city would have to auction property off to the highest bidder at an open public auction, a risky process over which the city could easily lose control.² Furthermore, though a municipality can impose conditions on the sale and restrictions on the use of property sold at auction,³ it cannot convey property for nominal consideration without a redevelopment designation, unless the property is conveyed to a very narrow set of noncommercial entities.⁴

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MemorandumRutgers CLiMEStudent Research
What to Do: When a Loved One Has Passed
What to Do: When a Loved One Has Passed

This memorandum provides useful information regarding the management of a loved one’s affairs (estate) when they have passed. Estate matters can be laborious and emotionally charged. This memorandum will explain probate and administration in New Jersey and provides information for you to begin navigating the process of managing your loved one’s estate. However, this memorandum provides general information, and is not intended to serve as legal advice. No two estates are the same and the law on the administration of estates is extensive. It is recommended that you consult with an experienced estate attorney to answer any questions related to your particular circumstances.

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MemorandumRutgers CLiMEWhat to Do
DRIM Analysis of Newark's Central Ward

Based on the previous DRIM analysis and updated 2017 DRIM analysis, three Wards have been analyzed and found to be Displacement-Risk Neighborhoods: The Central Ward, the South Ward, & the East Ward.  

To better understand the trend of displacement that has occurred between years 2000, 2015, & 2017, we conduct a baseline study to analyze the specific displacement risk indicators for one Ward: The Central Ward.

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MemorandumRutgers CLiMEPoverty, Gentrification
DRIM Update Memo

With the increased use of public land for the sake of economic development, cities across the U.S. are facing an urban construction boom. Through the 1980s and 1990s, Newark’s construction boom focused on land-use policies, especially the tax abatement strategies for bringing about capital-intensive projects. Simultaneously, Newark’s shift to a more neo-liberal solution led to a decline in public housing and section 8 vouchers.

As Newark experiences unprecedented growth potential, Newarkers express more and more anxiety about the prospects of housing displacement brought on by the processes of gentrification that have transformed urban neighborhoods across the United States.

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MemorandumRutgers CLiMEGentrification, Poverty
Newark’s Right to Counsel: A Proposed System Design for Indigent Tenants Facing Eviction
Newark’s Right to Counsel: A Proposed System Design for Indigent Tenants Facing Eviction

As a member of a local affordable housing coalition and partner to Mayor Baraka's effort to implement the second right-to-counsel (RTC) ordinance in the country, CLiME led the research design of such a system and the supporting basis for its legality under New Jersey law.  

This memorandum was submitted to the City of Newark in early February, with recommendations for implementing a system of free legal services for indigent Newarkers (incomes below 200 percent of the median) facing imminent eviction proceedings in Essex County court.  

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MemorandumRutgers CLiMEInequality, Housing
Legal Memorandum on Trauma, Schools and Poverty: Inquiry into Emotional Disturbance Classification for Children

What is the practical reality of “emotional disturbance” classifications under the IDEA? The vagueness and ambiguous nature of the “emotional disturbance” classification under the IDEA fails to accurately identify children affected by trauma as well as provide beneficial and effective services for those who do qualify. Emotional Disturbance (“E.D.”) is defined as a “condition exhibiting [at least one of five] characteristics over a long period of time and to a marked degree that adversely affects a child’s educational performance.” A child needs to exhibit one …

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MemorandumGuest UserTrauma
Preliminary Research On Evidence Of Psychological Trauma In The International Realm

The most common consequence of trauma, such as war and natural disasters, on children is the development of post-traumatic stress disorder (“PTSD”). There are two types of trauma that a child experiences that can result in PTSD. Type I of trauma “refers to a one time, horrific, and clear cut life-endangering experience.” When “chronic stress and adversities . . . are a part of [a child’s] daily life,” it is considered Type II trauma. Based on the following research, it appears Type I can develop into Type II.

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MemorandumGuest UserTrauma
Understanding Institutional Obligations To Children Experiencing Trauma II: New Jersey State Law On School-Based Responsibilities

This memo is the second in a series of documents prepared as part of the Center on Law, Inequality & Metropolitan Equity's (CLiME) Trauma, Schools, and Poverty project. The classroom, as the centerpiece of a child’s daily life, is one place where theneeds of childhood trauma victims can be both collectively and individually addressed. CLiME does not assume that existing special education or antidiscrimination law in schools is the optimal means for protecting or supporting victims of childhood trauma; however, we commence this research by investigating whether schools …

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MemorandumGuest UserTrauma