STAFF

ALANA GREER

Alana Greer is the Director and co-founder of Community Justice Project. As a movement lawyer, she supports community led campaigns for racial justice and human rights. Alana is passionate about lifting up the voices of the community members she works with and using her legal and analytic skills to support grassroots movements seeking to dismantle structural racism and inequality. She is an Echoing Green BMA Fellow and an advisory board member for the Dream Defenders, Law for Black Lives, and New Florida Majority. She was previously a staff attorney at Florida Legal Services and Advancement Project’s National Office, where she worked with youth and parent leaders across the nation fighting to end the School-to-Prison Pipeline. Originally from Miami, Alana left Florida to attend Boston College and Harvard Law School, where she was a student attorney at the Harvard Legal Aid Bureau, and returned home to support youth organizing that arose after the killing of Trayvon Martin. Prior to law school, she was a member of the Jesuit Volunteer Corps and worked with the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area to defend individuals from the criminalization of homelessness.


NADEGE GREEN

Nadege Green is Director of Community Research and Storytelling at the Community Justice Project. She worked as a journalist in Miami for just over 10 years investigating how local government policies and actions— both historical and contemporary—  impact everyday people.  Her work centers around using analysis, data and narratives from the directly impacted to address housing inequities, climate justice, and other pressing issues in Miami-Dade County that disproportionately impact black and brown communities. Green believes in the power of teaching community storytelling as a means to educate, problem-solve and heal.  She is a frequent lecturer and speaker in academic and community settings around disparities in Miami-Dade, local history and race. Green is a recipient of the Ruth Shack Leadership Award and the Florida ACLU Gene Miller Voice of Freedom Award.


CARRIE FEIT

Carrie Feit is a Senior Attorney at Community Justice Project. Following historic wins by local organizers, Carrie is working on implementing a Right to Counsel in evictions program in Miami-Dade County with a lens towards the systemic impact of evictions on racial, economic and gender justice.

Carrie grew up Brooklyn, New York and landed at George Washington University for law school, earning a J.D. and Masters of Public Health. She practiced for over 20 years in Miami as a federal court litigator representing individuals in their disability insurance claims, first with a small firm, Wagar, Murray and Feit, and beginning in 2008, in her own practice.

A defining moment for Carrie was the election of the 45th President of the United States, when she woke up to unapologetic racism, ableism, xenophobia and unspeakable misogyny. With her children and nieces in mind, she joined the organizing of the Women’s March on Washington and helped found Women’s March Florida, which most importantly to her, brought her into the struggle for collective liberation guided by Black and Brown and Queer community organizers and organizations rooted in systems change in Miami. Carrie’s commitment to allyship, equity and the ability for all to thrive through organizing informed by marginalized populations led to her impassioned transition to movement lawyering.

Carrie has served on the Board of Directors for the Miami Dade Trial Lawyers Association (MDTLA), the Miami-Dade Chapter of the Florida Association for Women Lawyers (FAWL), and the Florida Justice Association (FJA) where she also served as Chair of the Women’s Caucus. She also served as Chair to the ERISA Health Care and Disability Litigation Group of the American Association for Justice (AAJ). She currently serves as Resolution Chair on the Miami-Dade County Council of PTA/PTSAs. Carrie is admitted to practice in the Southern, Middle and Northern U.S. Districts of Florida.


BERBETH FOSTER

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Berbeth Foster is a Senior Attorney and Director of Movement Partnerships at Community Justice Project. She was formally the Lead Consumer Rights Attorney in the Senior Citizen Law Project of Coast to Coast Legal Aid of South Florida. Berbeth has a decade of experience litigating and defending low income populations in consumer rights matters including mortgage foreclosure, debt collection, fraud and Chapter 13 bankruptcy. Berbeth’s expertise in the area of reverse mortgage foreclosure defense has led to a number of speaking engagements at the National Consumer Law Conference. In her time at Legal Aid, Berbeth assisted her clients in obtaining over half a million dollars in debt relief. She now focuses her time at Community Justice Project on representing a vast array of grassroots organizations fighting for racial and economic justice. She works with various statewide and national coalitions advocating for housing as a human right, reimagining public safety and climate justice; to name a few.

Berbeth graduated from the University of Miami School of Law. While at the University of Miami, Berbeth was a Dean’s Honor Scholar and Bill Colson Scholarship recipient. Shortly after graduation, she was awarded a University of Miami Foreclosure Defense fellowship to work at Legal Aid Services of Broward County. That fellowship opportunity at Legal Aid Service of Broward County led to her longstanding position at Coast to Coast Legal Aid. Berbeth is a member of the Florida Bar, American Bar Association, Broward County Bar Association, and the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida.


MIRIAM HASKELL

Miriam Haskell is a Senior Attorney and Director of Litigation for the Community Justice Project. Miriam attended Barnard College and the University of North Carolina School of Law. Miriam moved to Miami to begin her legal career as an Assistant Public Defender. In Miami, Miriam has also worked at the Southern Poverty Law Center, where she focused on class-action litigation against juvenile and adult prisons, and Legal Services of Greater Miami, where she represented people trying to access public benefits and school services for students with disabilities. Before becoming a lawyer, Miriam worked as a journalist for daily newspapers, with a focus on education. In both journalism and the law, Miriam has focused on centering individuals and communities in their fights for justice.


FAELAN BLAIR

Faelan Blair is Program Assistant at Community Justice Project. Faelan attended Florida Atlantic University and studied History and Classics. In his work with Community Justice Project, he provides technical assistance with data collection and research, primarily with housing since the pandemic but also with other projects as needed. He also works closely with Nadege Green on Artist in Residency projects as well as other active communications. Other roles include technology coordination and generally helping as needed around the office.


AXELLE CELESTIN

Axelle Celestin is Intake Paralegal at Community Justice Project.


ELIZABETH RUIZ

Elizabeth “Liz” Ruiz is Assistant to the Director at Community Justice Project.


CO-FOUNDERS

MEENA JAGANNATH

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Meena Jagannath co-founded the Community Justice Project, Inc. in 2015, and now works as the Director of Global Programs at Movement Law Lab. She continues to advise on the Artist-in-Residence series and strategic initiatives. She is a movement lawyer with an extensive background in activism and international human rights.  Prior to coming to Miami, she worked for the Bureau des Avocats Internationaux in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, where she coordinated the Rape Accountability and Prevention Project, which combined direct legal representation with advocacy and capacity building of grassroots women’s groups.  While using her legal skills to build the power of movements locally in South Florida, she has also brought to bear her international human rights expertise in delegations to the United Nations to elevate U.S.-based human rights issues like police accountability and Stand Your Ground laws to the international level. Meena has published several articles in law journals and other media outlets, and has spoken in numerous academic and conference settings.  She received her J.D from University of Washington Law School where she was a William H. Gates Public Service Law Scholar. She also holds a Master's degree in International Affairs (human rights concentration) from the School of International and Public Affairs at Columbia University, and a B.A. in International Relations and Peace and Justice Studies from Tufts University.


CHUCK ELSESSER

Charles Elsesser is co-founder of Community Justice Project, Inc. and recently retired. He continues to serve on our Board of Directors. He has been a member of the State Bar of California since 1972 and a member of the Florida Bar since 1992.  He graduated from University of Southern California Law School in 1971.  From 1972 to 1984, he worked as an attorney representing poor people, first in Delano, California for California Rural Legal Assistance and later in Los Angeles for Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles.  During that same period, from 1974 through 1976, he was a Clinical Instructor of Law at University of Southern California Law Center in Los Angeles.  In 1986 he became the Director of Litigation at Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles, responsible for the oversight of the litigation of the more than 50 lawyers employed by the firm.   In 1988 he was awarded the Award of Merit by the Legal Assistance Association of California, an annual recognition by the legal services community of California for excellence in advocacy.  From 1989 to 1991, he served as a Senior Consultant to the California State Senate Rules Committee and housing consultant to the Senate President Pro Tempore, State Senator David Roberti.    In 1991 he served as the Director of the Housing Department of the City of Santa Monica, California. In 1992 he relocated to Miami, Florida.   Initially he was employed as an attorney at Legal Services of Greater Miami, Inc. and, since 1997, he has worked at Florida Legal Services, Inc. where he has been involved in civil rights and housing litigation and advocacy.   In 2001, he was awarded the Steven M. Goldstein Award For Excellence (2001) by the Florida Bar Foundation for a series of class actions assisting immigrants to obtain citizenship.   In 2008 he was awarded the Kutak Dodds Award 2008 by the National Legal Aid and Defender Association for his long record of significant advocacy. Charles co-founded Community Justice Project and joined its Board of Directors in 2017.