Disability Rights Louisiana

DRLA’s journey started in the 1970s with a simple, yet urgent question: What if all people with disabilities had access to legal advocacy?

One in three people in Louisiana—about 1.2 million—has a disability. Our community is over twice as likely to be unemployed, arrested, abused, and without a high-school education. Sixty percent of Louisiana residents with disabilities cannot afford basics like rent and a cell phone—let alone a lawyer when their rights are violated.

Our team of 53 staff includes attorneys, advocates, and policy specialists. Half of our team is made up of people who have disabilities or have family members with disabilities. Many of us have done this work for decades. We bring both expertise and lived experience to our work.

Our mission is to protect and advocate for the human and legal rights of people with disabilities. We work to empower the disability community to live an integrated life, free from abuse, neglect and exploitation. In 2024, we:

• Provided legal representation and other forms of individual advocacy to people with disabilities in 2,300 cases. We empowered our clients to access safety, critical healthcare services, autonomy, jobs, education, housing, and voting opportunities.
• Handled 8 systemic litigation cases, improving healthcare access and stopping the abuse and neglect of nearly 30,000 people with disabilities.
• Monitored and investigated institutions and agencies to prevent the abuse, neglect, and exploitation of approximately 10,000 people with disabilities.
• Helped secure an additional $42 million in state funding for home and community-based healthcare services that will empower hundreds of adults to remain in their communities instead of being institutionalized.
• Launched the Justice Behind Walls project, bringing our legal advocacy into juvenile detention centers, mental health facilities, and group homes across the state—places where children with disabilities are often denied education, and are vulnerable to abuse and neglect.

We are responsible for holding the line for the human and civil rights of Louisiana's disability community. We are the only organization in the state that provides free legal advocacy to people with disabilities—and the only one with federally mandated access to protect people with disabilities inside institutions.

History shows us that, without access to legal advocacy, people with disabilities are denied healthcare, decision-making power, education, employment, housing, and voting rights. Without oversight, institutionalized people with disabilities can be left to experience extreme abuse and neglect. We cannot allow this.

Your support helps people with disabilities access legal services and other forms of advocacy. Together, we can transform Louisiana into place where people with disabilities are empowered to live independently and safely, with improved autonomy, health, financial security, and civic engagement.