Alum—Then & Now
Photo (left): Lois at her home in Sausalito during an interview with her in April of 2021.
Lois Salisbury began her legal career with Public Advocates in 1974. For the next 19 years, at Public Advocates, she fought complex cases related to civil rights, education, health and consumer protections. The wins were frequent and often groundbreaking.
Lois Salisbury, pictured with members of Public Advocates staff and founders in the 1970s. Lois is in the bottom row, second from left.
As a legal intern at Public Advocates, and while still in law school, Lois worked alongside attorney Bill Hastie on a milestone case that eliminated the use of discriminatory exams, height and weight limitations and other discriminatory practices against people of color and women in the San Francisco Police Department. In this civil rights lawsuit, Officers for Justice v. SF Civil Service Commission (and related cases), PA represented 11 plaintiffs, all of them people of color and women. After 10 years fighting the case, the plaintiffs won through a broad consent agreement.
Among other work, Lois championed important cases that expanded access to quality of healthcare services for Californians. While at Public Advocates, she became the founding chair of Health Access, a statewide coalition of over 200 consumer groups that went on to lead the fight for universal health insurance in California as an independent organization. Lois also worked on the far-reaching win that secured access to emergency services for everyone, making it illegal for hospital emergency rooms to refuse care to people without health insurance.
She later went on to serve as the chief executive of Children Now, a research and action organization recognized nationally for its policy expertise, up-to-date information, and work with the media on behalf of children and families.
In these excerpts (video above) from an interview with Lois done in April of 2021, she talks about two memorable legal battles that she was deeply involved with. The Officers for Justice case, shortly after her arrival at Public Advocates, and the work she undertook to stop “patient dumping” by hospitals who did not want to treat people without health insurance in their emergency rooms. In the final excerpt, she shares her thoughts on what she considers Public Advocates’ most important legacy.
In March of 2002, Lois joined the David and Lucile Packard Foundation as their Director of the Children, Families, and Communities Program where she focused on state and national policy with strategies on universal health coverage for children, universal preschool, and expanded after-school and summer learning opportunities. Lois served in that position with the Foundation until 2011.
Photo: Lois at the Lisa and Douglas Goldman Tennis Center construction site.
In retirement, Lois continues to live an active and engaged life.
She’s the Co-Chair of the Tennis Coalition of San Francisco, which is responsible for leading the $27 million renovation of the Lisa and Douglas Goldman Tennis Center in Golden Gate Park. It encourages people of all levels and abilities to play tennis at an affordable, professionally managed public tennis center.
Lois adds that besides playing a lot of tennis, “I am also busy swing dancing, learning to waltz, and studying Spanish!”
