GGU Law Alums Fight for Housing Justice

Allyson Murphy, JD 2005, worked in several terrible jobs at the start of her career—in the areas of insurance defense and asbestos law. But all that changed the day she glimpsed a job announcement for a senior associate at Tobener Ravenscroft LLP, a full-service tenant rights law firm in San Francisco.

“I jumped at it immediately,” recalled Allyson. “I was a pivoter, trying to get to the other side and wear the good guy’s hat. That’s how I ended up at Tobener Ravenscroft and I’ve been here now for 7 years.”

Two years after Allyson joined the firm, Tobener Ravenscroft hired Allyson’s Golden Gate University classmate Christina Collins, JD 2005, as a consultation attorney. Christina had also dabbled in various areas of law—from entertainment to personal injury—but her passion was housing.

“I had volunteered with nonprofit organizations and experienced housing insecurity myself as a young person,” said Christina. “My son and I had gone through a no-fault just cause owner move-in eviction that led me to Tobener and I’ve been here ever since.”

When Rebekah Didlake, JD ’22, was seeking an internship for her last year at GGU Law, her professor contacted Allyson who got Rebekah’s resume in front of the bosses at Tobener.

“I interned here for my whole last year of law school,” recalled Rebekah. “I loved the work, loved being able to do affirmative housing law and give our clients a check at the end that hopefully they can use to get permanent housing.”

Today, Rebekah is a litigation associate at Tobener who works directly with Allyson and the partners and litigates cases as well.

“Our partners are Hastings graduates, so we often get clerks through Hastings,” commented Allyson. “We said you need to give Rebekah a chance! You hired me, you hired Tina. We joke about it. We’re Team GGU!”

Their experiences speak to the tremendous value of networking within the GGU alumni community, which today is 70,000 strong.

Rebekah credits GGU for preparing her for the practical realities of working in a law firm.

“One of the reasons I was able to land here was the strength of the litigation program. A lot of the work that I was doing at the firm as an intern was not things I had seen for the first time. I think that impressed the partners and led them to offer me a job because not every intern that comes through our firm gets a job offer. I feel really lucky to be working in a field that I wanted to work in.”

What Allyson, Christina, and Rebekah share in common—aside from their alma mater—is a dedication to housing justice.

“For me it’s important to understand that people who come from inside San Francisco law schools are committed to keeping people housed and are in a good position when things are wrongly done to them by landlords,” said Allyson. This is a hot area of law in San Francisco and there are a lot of firms that do it, but I think our firm is the best.”

What makes Tobener Ravenscroft unique is its commitment to policy work and the hundreds of hours of free advice the firm provides clients, whether or not the firm takes their case.

As a consultation attorney, Christina issues advice to all those tenants who contact the firm.

“We get 300-400 calls per week from tenants seeking help and not every call is a full-blown case we can litigate,” said Christina. “Oftentimes people are seeking empowerment about what their rights are and what steps they can take to resolve issues on their own. In five years, I’ve counseled 4-5,000 tenants. The reason I got into law is to empower others who don’t feel they have a voice and I get to arm them with knowledge.”

Tobener Ravenscroft is also unique for taking cases throughout California.

“That expansion has allowed us to help more tenants and set good standards in areas that do not have strong tenant protection laws. Most recently, we have been harnessing the new strength of the recently revised Tenant Protection Act to serve these communities,” said Allyson.

Allyson, Christina, and Rebekah hope their work continues to spread the word to prospective clients in need of housing advice and support.

“I think it’s important for tenants to know that you shouldn’t be afraid to reach out to an attorney because you can’t afford one because money isn’t necessarily determinative of whether we can help you or not,” said Allyson. “We give free consultations to veterans. We have multiple Section 8 cases.“

Added Christina, “Generally, if there’s not a case we can help with we always offer advice or if it’s not in our wheelhouse we provide a referral. We get feedback from clients who say you are the first firm who answered the phone much less called back and followed up with me. That’s a unique aspect of what we do. We talk to every person who calls us. We answer every single phone call.”