Laurie Hauber

Meet Laurie

Laurie is in our Eugene, Oregon office and works on nonprofit and community economic development issues across the country. She began her legal career at Cooley LLP and then founded the Economic Justice Project at the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law of the Boston Bar Association. From 2004 to 2009, Laurie taught at Vanderbilt Law School, where she started Vanderbilt’s Community & Economic Development Clinic. In 2009, Laurie moved to St. Louis and directed the Community Economic Development Program at Legal Services of Eastern Missouri. After moving to Eugene in 2016, Laurie worked with Lane County Legal Aid/Oregon Law Center where she focused on affordable housing, homelessness and land use. Most recently, Laurie served as Director of Experiential Education and Associate Professor of Law at the University of Oregon School of Law.

Laurie grew up in the Midwest and graduated from Harvard College where she played on the varsity soccer team. She received her law degree, magna cum laude, from Boston College Law School. After law school, she worked in Phnom Penh, Cambodia as an attorney at Legal Aid of Cambodia. She lives in Eugene, Oregon and enjoys hiking, biking, and spending time with her husband and dog (and visiting her adult children whenever she can).

Legal Experience includes:

Providing legal representation to hundreds of nonprofits, community-based businesses and other social enterprises on a wide range of matters, like:
- structuring nonprofit corporations, limited liability companies and other start-up businesses and social enterprises;
- guiding nonprofits through the tax-exemption application process;
- drafting and reviewing contracts;
- handling corporate governance matters;
- navigating zoning and other land use issues;
- advising on and local, state, and federal regulatory requirements for nonprofits.
Engaging in legislative and administrative advocacy, education and outreach strategies on behalf of nonprofits, particularly involving housing and homelessness.
Leading fundraising efforts to launch and sustain CED programs.
Represented U.S. and foreign emerging growth companies and venture capital funds in all aspects of transactional work and general corporate counseling, including mergers and acquisitions, venture capital financings and other private placements, corporate formations, and corporate governance.

Community Engagement:

Designed curriculum and taught hundreds of seminars to founders and executive staff of nonprofits and small businesses on tax exemption, corporate governance, contracts, employment, commercial leases, intellectual property and general business issues.
Executive Committee Chair, Nonprofit Organizations Law Section of the Oregon State Bar.
Co-Chair, Community Development Practitioners & Legal Educators Committee of the American Bar Association Forum on Affordable Housing and Community Development Law.
Prior Editor-In-Chief of the ABA Forum’s Journal on Affordable Housing & Community Development Law.
Board Member, Food for Lane County; Chair, Policy Committee

Presentation and Awards include:

Spoken at numerous conferences on topics involving nonprofit formation, nonprofit governance, community development, social entrepreneurship, community engagement strategies, transactional pro bono programs, legal issues for the unhoused, and name image & likeness.
Focus Louis city wide award for “Responding to Community Needs and Entrepreneurs”
Missouri Women’s Justice Public Service Practitioner Award
James Caleshu Award from the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area

Select Publications

A Tribute to Susan Jones: A Leader . . . An Influencer . . . A Mentor,” 33 Journal of Affordable Housing & Community Development Law 1 (2024)
Criminalization of the Unhoused: Alternatives to a Punitive System, 31 Georgetown Journal on Poverty Law and Policy 2 (2024)
Complex Projects in a Transactional Law Clinic, 18 Journal of Affordable Housing & Community Development Law 3 (2009)
Promoting Economic Justice Through Transactional Community Centered Lawyering, 27 Saint Louis University Public Law Review 1 (2007)