Small Business & Community Economic Development Clinic

This Clinic will not be accepting applications in Spring 2024.

The Small Business and Community Economic Development Clinic provides legal assistance to small businesses, microbusinesses, social enterprises, nonprofit organizations, worker cooperatives, artists, and creatives. Under faculty supervision, students interview, advise, counsel and represent entrepreneurs and businesses and assist nonprofit organizations committed to improving the welfare of individuals and communities. Specific cases may involve drafting or reviewing articles of incorporation, bylaws, articles of organization, operating agreements, or partnership agreements; researching local licensing requirements and zoning laws; reviewing and drafting contracts and leases; preparing applications for federal tax exemption; advising and counseling business founders and corporate boards; and advising clients on basic tax matters, and related legal issues.

Through classwork and casework, students examine substantive business law, social entrepreneurship and community economic development, the role of small business in providing economic opportunity for under-capitalized and under-represented entrepreneurs, and develop transactional legal skills. Students may also participate in law and policy action research projects.

Contact Us

The George Washington University Law School
Jacob Burns Community Legal Clinics
Small Business and Community Economic Development Clinic
2000 G Street NW, Suite 200, Washington, DC 20052
202.994.7463
Fax: 202.994.4946
[email protected]

Clients are seen by appointment only. Please contact the SBCED Clinic to talk to someone about your business needs.

Faculty

Susan R. Jones


Small Business & Community Economic Development Clinic Client Testimonials

 

Dana Tai Soon Burgess
Founding Director, Dana Tai Soon Burgess Dance Company

 

Brandon Zimmerman, PhD
Optical Physicist

 

Serena Ferguson, Greyson Mann, and Patricia Stamper
Friends of the DC Streetcar

About the Faculty

Professor of Clinical Law and Faculty Supervisor, Susan R. Jones

Susan R. Jones is a Professor of Clinical Law, the Director and Supervising Attorney of the Small Business & Community Economic Development Clinic (SBCEDC) and a fulltime faculty member of The George Washington University Law School. She is an active member of the District of Columbia Bar and served as Vice-Chair of the DC Bar (CED) Pro Bono Project Advisory Committee. She was a Distinguished Visiting Professor at the University of Maryland School of Law, the Haywood Burns Visiting Chair in Civil Rights at the City University of New York (CUNY) School of Law at Queens College and was an assistant professor of law at CUNY.

Professor Jones chaired of the Association of American Law Schools (AALS) Section on Clinical Legal Education, served on the executive committee of that section and as chair of the Section on Africa and the Section on Poverty Law. She was a member of the AALS Standing Committee on Clinical Legal Education, Executive Committee member of the AALS Section on Transactional Law and Skills and she was co-chair of the Transactional Clinics Committee of the AALS Clinical Section.

In addition to her work with the AALS, Professor Jones has held numerous leadership positions in the American Bar Association (ABA) including service on the governing committee of ABA Forum on Affordable Housing and Community Development Law, editor-in-chief and senior editor of the ABA Journal of Affordable Housing and Community Development Law, and co-chair of the Forum’s Legal Educators’ Practice Division. She is a co-founder and past co-chair of the Community Economic Development (CED) Committee of the ABA Section on Business Law and she served on the ABA Business Law Education Committee as well as on the ABA Commission on Homelessness and Poverty.

Professor Jones was a Fannie Mae Foundation Fellow, Harvard University Kennedy School of Government, is a member of Leadership Washington class of 1996, and she is an elected member of the American Law Institute.

Her scholarly pursuits include several books and numerous published law review articles. She is the co-editor of Investing for Social Impact, Economic Justice, and Racial Equity (ABA Publishing 2023), co-editor of Building Healthy Communities: A Guide to Community Economic Development for Advocates, Lawyers and Policymakers and the author of A Legal Guide to Microenterprise Development (ABA Publishing).

An award winning lawyer, Professor Jones received a Washington Area Lawyers for the Arts Lifetime Achievement Award for distinctive service to the greater Washington, DC creative community and for 20 years of service on the WALA Board of Directors and WALA’s Outstanding Volunteer Award. She received an Advocate for Justice Award from the University of the District of Columbia, David A. Clarke School of Law.

In addition to her scholarly and practical work in transactional law, small business, community economic development, microenterprise development, and social entrepreneurship, Professor Jones has research interests in community economic development, international/comparative entrepreneurship and community economic development, nonprofit organizations and charitable giving, minority entrepreneurship, arts and entertainment, the creative economy, social entrepreneurship and social impact investing.

Information for Students

The SBCEDC gives students the opportunity to translate theory into practice. Students gain experience in client interviewing and counseling, developing legal judgment, and other lawyering skills such as corporate and contract drafting, and legal negotiation. Students learn about all phases of small business development from creating business plans and financing options as well as the many regulatory and tax requirements imposed on small businesses by the federal, state, and local governments. Students write legal memoranda, conduct legal research, draft articles of incorporation, bylaws, and contracts. Past Clinic students have benefitted from and enjoyed the experience, and some have even started their own businesses or reconsidered how to operate existing businesses.

Students are selected based on their potential to provide high quality, client-centered legal services to the SBCEDC’s clients. Faculty will consider a student's interest in and commitment to public interest transactional work and the importance of teamwork and collaboration in law practice. Faculty aim to select a class with different backgrounds, experiences, and interests, but also a common desire to serve clients and gain lawyering experience.

Every semester, the Clinics hold an Open House where faculty are available to answer questions about their respective clinics. Students may also contact Professor Jones to discuss the Clinic or ask specific questions.

Eligibility Requirements

  • 2L and 3L students are eligible to apply.
  • Prerequisites: Law 6250 (Corporations) and Law 6300 (Federal Income Tax); may not be taken concurrently.

For more information, and to apply, please log in to the Portal. Application materials are posted approximately one month prior to the registration period for the following semester.

Information for Prospective Clients

The Clinic is designed to meet two important needs:

  1. To provide current law students interested in business law with a clinical program that will expose them to the practical and substantive legal problems of counseling small businesses and nonprofit organizations.
  2. To offer much needed legal advice to segments of the small business community in the DC metropolitan area. Clients are seen by appointment only.

Since 1977, the Clinic has provided free start-up legal services to Washington, DC area entrepreneurs, nonprofit groups, and artists including short-term counseling in a broad range of business matters such as corporations, limited liability companies, partnerships, contracts, commercial leases.

The Clinic also provides direct legal assistance, counseling, representation, and informational materials to new and existing nonprofit organizations and groups whose mission is to help low- income individuals and communities pursue economic empowerment and self-help initiatives.

How the Clinic Accepts Cases:

The Clinic is a free service and one of only a few small business legal clinics in the DC area. Most of the Clinic’s clients are microbusinesses comprising of 1-5 persons with less than $50,000 in start-up capital. The Clinic’s services are in high demand and it handles a limited number of carefully selected cases each semester by appointment only.

We choose clients according to a range of factors which include the variety in our case load, the number of clients we already represent, and the complexity of the client’s case. Preference is given to clients who have developed a business model canvas or business plan. If we are unable to help a client in a given semester we may be able refer the client to another legal resource.

The services provided by the Clinic take place during the George Washington University Law School’s academic year (i.e., from September through April of each year). The Clinic does not accept new cases in the summer.

Legal Services Provided:

  • Drafting or reviewing Articles of Incorporation
  • Drafting or reviewing Bylaws for Corporations (for profit and non-profit)
  • Creating Limited Liability Companies
  • Reviewing Leases
  • Conducting Legal Research on Specific Problems
  • Business Licenses and Permits
  • Contract Drafting and Contract Review
  • Application for 501c3 Federal Tax-Exemption Status

The Clinic does not handle litigation. Additionally, the Clinic does not draft business plans, engage in financial negotiations, develop loan packages, or prepare tax returns. For these types of services, we recommend that clients seek the services of an accountant or tax advisor.

To Obtain Representation:

Please send an email to [email protected] with a brief description of your legal issue and to determine availability.

The client must complete an application before he or she is eligible for consideration:

Application for Legal Assistance [pdf]

The clinic requires all prospective clients to attend an initial consultation (virtually or in person) before we will accept a case. After the initial consultation, the director will make a decision on whether the clinic can accept the case. A prospective client will be notified by email of the decision. Whether or not the clinic can accept a case depends on a variety of factors such as the complexity of the case, the size and variety in our case load, and whether the client has a business model canvas or business plan.

The Client's Role:

Once a case has been accepted, the client is responsible for filing all legal papers with the appropriate government agency and paying any filing fees. The Clinic will prepare a Retainer Agreement with the client, specifying the scope of legal work to be completed. Clients agree to be represented by law students working under the supervision of a licensed attorney. Due to the educational nature of the Clinic, the client is expected to commit to actively engaging in the legal assistance process by maintaining communication with the Clinic students assigned to their case with corrections or feedback, and attending scheduled Clinic meetings or emailing the clinic or the student(s) assigned to their case if they should need to cancel a scheduled meeting. We reserve the right to end our relationship with the client if he or she is not complying with our requests for information or neglects to contact us when they cannot attend a scheduled meeting.

Legal services are provided on a short-term basis. We will keep the information clients discuss with us confidential. However, there may be instances where we will seek the client's permission to share information for the client's benefit with other organizations such as loan programs or the media. Cases will be discussed by students enrolled in the course and with the supervising attorney.

The clinic cannot serve as ongoing legal counsel for a business. Draft or final documents can usually be delivered within several weeks, depending on the complexity of the case and the client's diligence and attention to the case.

Resources

Action Research Projects