Schulte Announces 2016 Brooks Burdette Pro Bono Awardees

Schulte is pleased to announce the recipients of its 2016 Brooks Burdette Pro Bono Awards, which recognize public interest organizations that work on behalf of the poor or otherwise engage a public policy issue to which the firm devotes substantial pro bono time. The firm selected the Community Resource Exchange to receive the 2016 Brooks Burdette Strategic Partner Award. CRE’s vision is based on building a more just, equitable and livable city for all New Yorkers, and the organization achieves these goals by working with nonprofits through one-on-one consulting, executive coaching, peer-based leadership and management development programs. In addition, Schulte selected Talisha Riggs, an investment management associate, as the 2016 Brooks Burdette Fellow. Each year, the firm chooses an associate to serve as a full-time fellow for six months at a public interest organization. Talisha will serve her fellowship at Henry Street Settlement, one of the oldest social services organizations in the country that delivers a wide range of social service, arts and health care programs to more than 60,000 New Yorkers each year.

The Brooks Burdette Pro Bono Awards recognize that while public service organizations often honor individuals and groups at their annual dinners, the organizations themselves should be honored too for their enormous contributions to the betterment of society. In 2009 the firm created the Brooks Burdette Strategic Partner Award and the Brooks Burdette Fellowship in honor of the late litigation partner who was a long-time chair of the Pro Bono Committee and whose commitment to public interest work while at the firm was exemplary. Brooks was a board member of the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law and was the first chair of the Board of Democracy Prep, a Harlem charter school. He played a key role in the landmark case of McWaters v. Federal Emergency Management Agency, a 2005 New Orleans federal court action that successfully challenged the eviction from temporary housing of tens of thousands of families left homeless after Hurricane Katrina. A native of Hogansville, Ga., Brooks earned his bachelor’s degree from Wofford College and his law degree from Harvard Law School in 1986. He was admitted to practice in New York that year and made partner 10 years later. He passed away suddenly on May 13, 2009 at age 47.