Meet CLASI volunteer attorney in Sussex County, Zita Dresner!
I was motivated to become a legal aid advocate after serving as a nursing home volunteer for the DC Long-Term Care Ombudsman Program while working as an English Professor at the University of the District of Columbia. I took a leave of absence from UDC to attend what was then called the DC School of Law. During law school, I did an internship with the DC Ombudsman Program and, upon graduation from law school, worked for the National Training Project, a program of Legal Services for the Elderly in DC, writing training materials for legal aid providers and advocacy agencies and doing nursing home law trainings. I eventually became the attorney for the DC Ombudsman Program and remained in that position until my retirement. I worked a total of 12 years as a legal aid advocate for Legal Counsel for the Elderly. I moved to Lewes upon my retirement in 2007 and began volunteering two days a week with the Elder Law Program of CLASI in 2008. One of the first cases I worked on at CLASI involved an elderly woman who had lost her property through the deceit and manipulation of a neighbor whom she thought would be helping her with a problem involving the sale of a parcel of her land. Eventually, we were able to get her property back for her. My one wish is that CLASI can acquire funds to hire an additional attorney for the Elder Law Program so that we don’t have to turn away cases in Sussex County.
