About Us

The Safety Net Project advocates for safe and secure housing and fundamental resources like food and cash assistance for underserved and marginalized communities in New York City.

We combine legal services, policy advocacy, new media campaigns, and community organizing to advance the movement for economic justice.

Who are we?

The Safety Net Project provides free legal services to low and no-income households at legal clinics located at food pantries, soup kitchens, and community health centers throughout New York City. We advise, assist, and represent New York City’s most vulnerable members to minimize evictions, ensure tenants obtain necessary repairs to their apartments, and those eligible for crucial public benefits receive them.

The Safety Net Project’s policy work is done in coordination and partnership with the Safety Net Activists, a volunteer group of community members with personal experience with poverty, homelessness, and the public benefits system.

Why do we exist?

In a city of unparalleled luxury, millions still slip through holes in the safety net. They land in a wasteland of homelessness, starvation, and anguish. One in five residents lives in poverty, including 25,000 children who wake up on the street or in a shelter.

We believe these injustices pose moral and practical problems for our society. In response, the Safety Net Project utilizes a multi-pronged strategy to fight for a more just New York City. We have been fighting for economic justice for New Yorkers for over 30 years. Click here to learn more about our history.

What’s Our Vision?

The Safety Net Project believes that safe, affordable housing is a human right and that no human being should lack for food, a quality education, health care, safe drinking water, heat, and cash assistance to purchase necessities for living a dignified life. SNP develops, supports, and organizes community leaders by providing individuals with the resources and platform necessary to share their stories of poverty, struggle, and resilience.

SNP believes that by fighting to prevent evictions, illegal rent increases, uninhabitable living conditions, and other attacks on the social safety net, SNP is helping to preserve and strengthen families and communities