Foreword Symposium: Fourth Annual Mid-Atlantic People ofColor Legal Scholarship Conference: Law and Literature: Examining the Limited Legal Imagination in the Traditional Legal Canon

The Fourth Annual Mid-Atlantic People of Color Legal Scholarship Conference, which took place at Rutgers Law School in Camden on February 12-14, 1998, poignantly captured the theme around which the conference was organized. The theme of the conference was Law and Literature: Examining the Limited Legal Imagination in the Traditional Legal Canon. True to the theme of the conference, many presenters sought to expand our collective imagination through poetry, fiction, and narrative. The presentations were intellectually stimulating and provocative. Indeed, there was a literary quality to some of the presentations. Perhaps most importantly, the conference itself, in the tradition of the Regional People of Color conferences, provided us with the necessary sustenance that can only be found in a community of scholars united by a particular undertaking. The dual focus of our undertaking is reflected in both the title of the conference and the papers included in this issue of the Journal. First, conference participants were concerned about the limited legal imagination reflected in the traditional legal canon. Of particular focus was the question of which voices, perspectives, and experiences have become central to the canon, and which are marginalized. Second, participants focused on law and literature, invoking literary fiction and poetry to explore the justice of legal rules and legal decisionmaking. Many scholars at the conference persuasively made the case that literature, and literary techniques (like narrative), can broaden the scope of legal discourse by bringing voices and perspectives which might otherwise go unrecognized, unheard, or unappreciated

Welfare Reform: What Have We Learned in Fifteen Years?

Synthesizes findings about the impact of the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program on caseloads and family self-sufficiency, effective training and education strategies, and outcomes for families in moving from welfare to work

Building a Better Safety Net for the New New Orleans

The most vulnerable populations in New Orleans -- the elderly, people with physical and mental disabilities, and single mothers out of the labor market -- arguably were hit hardest by Katrina. These groups had the highest poverty rates and the fewest assets.Most were African American. Many depended on the social safety net for survival and on others to avoid the storm's catastrophic effects. Most of these vulnerable residents eventually evacuated the city, and it is unclear how many will return home. Research suggests that they will need the strong kinship networks established pre-Katrina (Hill 1993). But vulnerable populations also require a functioning safety net along with other necessities such as housing and health care discussed in earlier essays. Rebuilding presents New Orleans with a unique opportunity to strengthen its safety net for vulnerable populations that return and for others who will require help in the future

Will Retiring Boomers Form a New Army of Volunteers?

This study looks at older adults retiring between 1996 and 2004 to see who engages in formal volunteering after retirement. The results, based on data from the Health and Retirement Survey, show that while most volunteers acquire the volunteer habit while still working, a significant share begins volunteer work after retirement. Among adults who retire, 45 percent engage in formal volunteer activities even though only 34 percent of these same adults volunteered while working. Since boomer cohorts following this group will be much larger, nonprofit organizations seem destined to benefit from a significant growth in the services of retirees

Is the Safety Net Catching Unemployed Families?

Examines changes in benefits and characteristics of unemployed families and those who received unemployment, SNAP, child tax credit, and other public assistance in 2009. Considers factors behind increases in unemployment and SNAP recipients

Next Steps for Temporary Assistance for Needy Families

Examines trends in the state programs' caseloads, eligibility rules, and characteristics of families receiving assistance. Presents experts' views on lessons from the recession and insights into funding, TANF's role in the safety net, and reauthorization

The Mobility Case for Regionalism

In the discourse of local government law, the idea that a mobile populace can “vote with its feet” has long served as a justification for devolution and decentralization. Tracing to Charles Tiebout’s seminal work in public finance, the legal-structural prescription that follows is that a diversity of independent and empowered local governments can best satisfy the varied preferences of residents metaphorically shopping for bundles of public services, regulatory environment, and tax burden. This localist paradigm generally presumes that fragmented governments are competing for residents within a given metropolitan area. Contemporary patterns of mobility, however, call into question this foundational assumption. People today move between — and not just within — metropolitan regions, domestically and even internationally. This is particularly so for a subset of residents — high human-capital knowledge workers and the so-called “creative class” — that is prominently coveted in this interregional competition. These modern mobile residents tend to evaluate the policy bundles that drive their locational decisions on a regional scale, weighing the comparative merits of metropolitan areas against each other. And local governments are increasingly recognizing that they need to work together at a regional scale to compete for these residents.This Article argues that this intermetropolitan mobility provides a novel justification for regionalism that counterbalances the strong localist tendency of the traditional Tieboutian view of local governance. Contrary to the predominant assumption in the legal literature, competition for mobile residents is as much an argument for regionalism as it has been for devolution and decentralization. In an era of global cities vying for talent, the mobility case for regionalism has significant doctrinal consequences for debates in local government law and public finance, including the scope of local authority, the nature of regional equity, and the structure of metropolitan collaboration