In partnership with Equality Florida, the state’s largest statewide LGBTQ advocacy organization, Southern Legal Counsel has engaged with all 67 Florida school districts to educate their leadership, personnel, students and parents on how to affirm, support, and protect LGBTQ students and their rights.

(October 15, 2020, Jacksonville, FL) – In a major First Amendment victory, the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida has declared Florida Statutes 316.2045 and 337.406—which prohibit the solicitation of charitable contributions on Florida roadways except by charitable organizations or when a local government permit has been issued— unconstitutional.

Southern Legal Counsel (SLC) led a coalition of Florida-based organizations submitting a formal comment to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development today on a proposed Equal Access rule change that seeks to rollback protections requiring that LGBTQ individuals have equal access to housing and homeless services.

After achieving a victory in Marion County Court for Anthony Cummings, a homeless man who had been illegally assessed $824 in court costs and had his driver’s license suspended in three cases of “open lodging” under an Ocala ordinance, Southern Legal Counsel and the ACLU of Florida also brought about systemic change affecting more than 10,000 people in 29 counties.

Obtaining a legal name change is an essential and monumental step in many transgender individuals’ lives, and the process requires access to the courts. When pro se litigants in Miami-Dade County filed petitions for name change through Florida’s E-Filing portal, their petitions were wrongfully “abandoned” by the Clerk of Court, who refused to docket them. SLC and Legal Service of Greater Miami (LSGMI) intervened and fought to ensure that all pro se litigants would have access to the courts without facing unnecessary administrative obstacles.

BOSTON (July 8, 2020) – The United States Conference of Mayors, along with organizations in South Carolina, Georgia and Louisiana devoted to their states’ ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment, Wednesday filed an amicus brief in support of the lawsuit filed by Equal Means Equal and other plaintiffs, demanding the federal government publish the Equal Rights Amendment as the 28th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

Washington, D.C. (June 29, 2020) – The United States Conference of Mayors, along with organizations in South Carolina, Georgia and Louisiana devoted to their states’ ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment, today filed an amicus brief in support of Virginia, Illinois and Nevada in their lawsuit demanding the federal government add the ERA as the 28th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

GAINESVILLE, Fla. (May 14, 2020) ‒ With complete disregard to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention COVID-19 guidance, this morning at 10 a.m. Gainesville Police Department and Florida Department of Corrections officers ordered those living in a homeless encampment near Grace Marketplace to vacate the area.

Southern Legal Counsel submitted a letter to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) April 13 opposing a recently proposed HUD rule allowing faith-based organizations to participate in any HUD program or activity with “permissible accommodations” under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.

The City of Fort Lauderdale will consider amendments to its camping ordinance tonight at 6pm. The proposed amendments will expand the geographic scope of the City’s current camping ordinance to much of the City during an unprecedented public health emergency.

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – Southern Legal Counsel, the ACLU of Florida, and pro bono attorney Eric Lindstrom today filed a federal lawsuit against the Florida Department of Management Services, the University of Florida, and the Public Defender of the Second Judicial Circuit of Florida on behalf of named plaintiffs Jami Claire and Kathryn Lane, who as state employees were denied medically necessary treatment for gender dysphoria because of the state’s categorical exclusion of coverage for “gender reassignment or modification services or supplies.”

As 2019 comes to a close, we at Southern Legal Counsel remain hard at work writing briefs, preparing for upcoming litigation and doing what we do day in and day out to defend your constitutional rights – our constitutional rights – against assault and erosion.

This year we have made progress in several important cases, including the continued defense of the right to share food in public places as a form of protected First Amendment expression, as supported by the federal Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals in a landmark opinion.

In February of this year, Southern Legal Counsel and the National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty sued St. Johns County Sheriff David B. Shoar and Florida Highway Patrol Director Gene Spaulding on behalf of Peter Vigue, a St. Augustine resident who has been repeatedly arrested for standing on the public right of way and asking for help in the form of money or other charitable assistance.

Ocala resident Anthony Cummings, who is homeless, was arrested three times in 2012 and 2016 for violating Ocala’s open lodging ordinance, the legality of which Southern Legal Counsel and the ACLU of Florida are now challenging in a federal class action lawsuit in which Cummings is one of three named plaintiffs.

Less than two months after filing suit against the City of Ocala for enforcing an open lodging ordinance specifically targeting people who are homeless, Southern Legal Counsel, the ACLU of Florida and pro bono attorney Andy Pozzuto passed their first legal hurdle when the city failed in its attempt to have the suit dismissed.

GAINESVILLE, Fla. – After an order from the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida compared the negative effects of adult entertainment to those of food sharing in a public park by Fort Lauderdale Food Not Bombs, Southern Legal Counsel (SLC) is appealing the case once again to the US. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit.

Southern Legal Counsel attorney Simone Chriss presented about SLC’s innovative transgender services delivery model, FloridaNameChange.org, at the July 24-27 Mazzoni Trans Wellness Conference in Philadelphia, the largest trans-specific conference in the world. Developed by SLC and the Florida Justice Technology Center, FloridaNameChange.org provides online access to the legal name change process in each of Florida’s 67 counties, as well as the process for updating the name and gender marker on all government-issued identification documents.

Southern Legal Counsel, the ACLU of Florida, and pro bono attorney Andy Pozzuto today filed a federal class action lawsuit against the city of Ocala on behalf of named plaintiffs Patrick McCardle, Courtney Ramsey, Anthony Cummings and more than 200 other similarly situated homeless persons who have been arrested for sleeping or resting on sidewalks and other outdoor areas.

Abigail Adkins, an Equal Justice Works Fellow sponsored by McDermott Will & Emery and Darden Restaurants Inc., in September began a two-year fellowship at Southern Legal Counsel to expand student mental health services.

On August 16, 2019, U.S. District Court Judge William Zloch upheld the City of Fort Lauderdale’s zoning ordinance and park rule restricting food sharing as a “social service” in public parks. Fort Lauderdale Food Not Bombs and its members, represented by Southern Legal Counsel and lawyers Mara Shlackman and Andrea Costello, challenged the City’s food sharing restrictions for violating their freedom of expression, association, and right to due process. The case was on remand from the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals, which had issued an opinion in favor of Fort Lauderdale Food Not Bombs that the First Amendment protects outdoor food sharing as “expressive conduct” under the First Amendment.