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Joseph H. Duff joined the staff of the NAACP Legal Defense & Educational Fund, Inc. in November 2008, as Senior Counsel, assisting the organization with special projects and assignments. Since January 2009, he has also served as LDF's interim General Counsel, advising LDF on internal legal matters and its institutional affairs agenda.
Prior to coming to New York, he served for ten years as a Senior Staff Counsel to California’s principal civil rights enforcement agency (DFEH), where he litigated a variety of matters ranging from employment and housing discrimination to public accommodations, family leave and other civil rights enforcement. In the 1980’s and 90’s, he served as Legal Advisor to the Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science and pro bono General Counsel to Crystal Stairs, Inc., a large California non-profit child care administration and policy project, co-founded by his wife. In the same years, he also undertook volunteer service to the Los Angeles NAACP, culminating in six years as its elected Branch President. In the mid-1970’s to the 1980’s, he was in general private practice, where he also became deeply involved as a local cooperating attorney for the NAACP in its state and federal school desegregation cases in Los Angeles. Mr. Duff is a graduate of UCLA School of Law and Occidental College.
Most notable, among other honors over three decades of legal practice, he was the recipient of the prestigious 1982 Loren Miller Legal Services Award from the California State Bar, the 1992 Occidental Alumni Seal Award, and the 2004 Alumnus of the Year, Community Service, from the UCLA School of Law.