WHO
WE ARE
TEAM MEMBERS.
Elizabeth Elia
Associate Professor of Law,
University of New Mexico School of Law
Elizabeth Elia is a lawyer admitted to practice in New Mexico, New York, Massachusetts, and Washington, DC. As an Associate Professor at UNM School of Law, Elizabeth teaches courses related to property law, land use, real estate development, renewable energy development, environmental law, poverty law and clinic. Her scholarship focuses on the role of private property in affordable housing policy, including how servitudes are used to secure privately-owned affordable housing stock, state and local government actions to support federal housing voucher programs, and the places for tenant-purchase in affordable housing policy.
Elizabeth is an active participant in shaping housing policy in New Mexico. She has contributed to initiatives to prohibit source of income discrimination at the state and local level, to track and monitor eviction rates state-wide, to secure local control over rent regulation in Home Rule municipalities, and to revise the Uniform Owner Resident Relations Act, the Albuquerque Integrated Development Ordinance, and the New Mexico Affordable Housing Act, among others.
Before moving to New Mexico in 2017, Elizabeth worked for twelve years as a transactional lawyer specializing in the development and preservation of affordable housing across the US and its territories. She has structured and closed transactions totaling more than $200 million in public and private financing for affordable housing developments. She also has expertise in representing limited equity housing cooperatives, small businesses, nonprofit corporations, and Community Development Financial Institutions. In 2016, she was honored to be appointed to District of Columbia Mayor Muriel Bowser’s Affordable Housing Strikeforce. On the Strikeforce she served with agency heads and other leaders in the affordable housing professional community to develop a plan to preserve tens of thousands of units of affordable housing in the District of Columbia over a five-year period.
Elizabeth holds an LLM degree from Georgetown Law, a JD from American University Washington College of Law, and a BA from New College of Florida. She enjoys DIY projects, reading fiction, biking, and playing the trombone.
Allison Freedman
Assistant Professor of Law,
University of New Mexico School of Law
Allison Freedman grew up in Albuquerque and teaches primarily in the UNM School of Law's Economic Justice Clinic (EJC). Her work in the EJC focuses on improving housing stability and conditions for low-income tenants through litigation, legislation, and policy work.
Her scholarship focuses on housing and civil rights law and the ways statutory and regulatory regimes affect, stigmatize, and subordinate underserved and indigent communities. She is currently working on research related to eviction expungement and how legislation in this space could help minimize the downstream consequences of eviction.
Allison is passionate about improving housing policy in New Mexico. She has participated in legislative initiatives aimed at updating the Uniform Owner Resident Relations Act, the Albuquerque Integrated Development Ordinance, and the New Mexico Affordable Housing Act, among others. She also frequently partners with Albuquerque officials to help improve local housing policy.
Allison is the co-host of Personal Jurisdiction, a podcast featuring lawyers in a variety of career paths, their journeys to fulfilling careers, and the advice they have for getting there. Personal Jurisdiction often features lawyers from New Mexico and those in the housing space.
Prior to her work at UNM, Allison focused on housing litigation as a Clinical Fellow in the University of Michigan Law School’s Civil-Criminal Litigation Clinic and was an Adjunct Professor of Advanced Trial Practice at Northwestern Law. She also served as a law clerk to the Hon. Joan H. Lefkow of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois and an extern for the late Charles C.W. Daniels of the New Mexico Supreme Court.
Serge Martinez
Professor of Law,
University of New Mexico School of Law
Serge Martinez is on the faculty at UNM School of Law, where he teaches, writes and practices in the area of housing law, with a focus on the rights of renters and improving housing stability. He has served as Associate Dean for Experiential Learning since 2019.
In 2020, Serge helped launch Amparo, a nonprofit that assists renters facing eviction and supports tenant organizing in Albuquerque. He appears frequently in the media, both in print and on television as a regular panelist on New Mexico in Focus.
Before joining the faculty at UNM, Serge taught at Hofstra University School of Law and National Taiwan University College of Law, and worked as a senior staff attorney at the Urban Justice Center's Community Development Project, where he represented tenants and tenant associations in New York City.