Tanya Douglas

Tanya Douglas is the Director of the Disability Advocacy Project (DAP) at Manhattan Legal Services (MLS) and coordinates the Veterans Justice Project at MLS which is a program of Legal Services NYC.  Tanya is a graduate of Cornell University and Cornell Law School. Tanya has spent her entire legal career as a public interest attorney with Legal Services NYC and has represented clients in SSI/SSD, education, public benefits and housing cases.

Tanya has spent a significant amount of her legal career focused on diversity and cultural competency matters for legal services/legal aid programs. She is the chair of the first ever Legal Services NYC’s Diversity Committee. Tanya is the co-facilitator of the New York State Legal Services/Legal Aid Diversity Coalition whose mission is to increase diversity in legal services/legal aid and increase cultural competency of legal services/legal aid staff.  Tanya has offered trainings on cultural competency, diversity, and language access issues at local and national conferences. She has been a member of the MIE Training Committee and a trainer in MIE events, especially Supervising Legal Work, for a dozen years.