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| Affiliation | Democratic |
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| Name | Sandra Roper |
| Address |
Brooklyn, New York , United States |
| Email | None |
| Website | http://www.roper2005.com |
| Born |
December 00, 1956
(67 years)
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| Contributor | nystate63 |
| Last Modifed | nystate63
Feb 01, 2005 09:19pm |
| Tags |
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| Info | Sandra Elena Roper, the eldest of six children, was born in Panama, Central America in December, 1956. Wanting to give their children a better life, her parents, Ralph and Norma, saw opportunity in the United States. The family immigrated here in the mid-sixties, settling in Brooklyn with Sandra’s grandparents, Lionel and Cecilia. The extended family provided a loving, supportive, spiritual home environment that instilled a strong work ethic, family values, moral integrity and a sense of societal duty. These character strengths shaped Sandra into who she is.
Sandra Roper’s grandfather was an active UAW member. Her grandmother was also an active member of 1199 Hospital Workers Union. Accompanying her to meetings and participating in the union’s children’s activities and summer camp, young Sandra saw herself as a 1199 Union kid.
Holding jobs while attending both high school and college, Sandra consistently achieved high grades and garnered a number of scholarships. An avid reader and writer, she also excelled in math and science. During the sixties, Ms. Roper went to a socially-conscious Catholic school in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Our Lady of Victory. It was there that Sandra first heard a call to public service that her father encouraged her to pursue.
Through a four-year, United Federation of Teachers Scholarship, Sandra Roper attended Long Island University College of Pharmacy. While a student at LIU, she married and had two children, Donald and Norma. Ms. Roper graduated in 1979 and began employment as a hospital pharmacist. With the same institution for twenty-five years, Sandra Roper still maintains her practice.
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Sandra made the decision to go to Brooklyn Law School, receiving a Thurgood Marshall Scholarship and the Evelyn B. Ward Graduation Award, 1987. For her thesis, Direct Prescription Drug Advertising to the Consumer, Sandra Roper was awarded the very prestigious, Washington-based Food and Drug Law Institute’s Fellowship, 1987. This provided an LLM from New York University School of Law, which was granted in 1989.
Sandra Roper passed the Bar in 1987 and was admitted to the New York, New Jersey and Washington, DC Bars.
The same year that Sandra completed NYU Law, her father was diagnosed with inoperable terminal cancer, passing on September 19, 1988 One day before, a fire destroyed the family home, leaving Sandra’s grandfather permanently disabled and her aunt in a comma from which she never would recover.
At that time Sandra Roper was FDA regulatory counsel for a pharmaceutical corporation.
Ms. Roper then became a poverty law associates with Legal Services in 1989. In August, 1990, she began a general practice that continued until December, 2001.
Beginning in 1989, Sandra Roper has worked with many community organizations: NAACP-Brooklyn Branch, President of the Stuy Park Lion Clubs, Inc., President Carter’s Habitat for Humanity, Rev. Sharpton’s National Action Network, The Rotary Club of Bedford-Stuyvesant, National Association of Negro and Professional Business Women, Community Board #3, Decatur-Stuyvesant Senior Citizens Center, Inc., CMC-St. Louis Senior Citizens Center, Battered Women In Hiding, CMC Health Fairs, Carribean American Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Antioch Development Corp., Vannguard Community Development, Inc., United African American Business Association, and the Panamanian Drum Corp. of New York.
Sandra perfected her voice of advocacy working with the NAACP. It was through pro-bono work with NAACP that she started on the path to civil rights and consumer rights practice. To directly serve the community, Ms. Roper founded the NAACP-Brooklyn legal clinic. Meeting with people beset by a wide range of problems, Sandra counseled them on how to obtain legal representation or guided them to the appropriate agencies in order to obtain help. When Sandra’s sister, Cas, also became a lawyer, together they began a rotating paralegal/ law student/ law graduate internship program for the NAACP legal clinic.
Attorney Roper spoke out against predatory lending in 1996. Her pioneering work led to a State Attorney General and Banking Department $12Million Settlement, which established a precedent against Predatory Lending Practices in general. As a result of Attorney Roper’s vision, now there are regulations to stop Predatory Lending Practices in FHA loans in our communities. This is yet another example of Sandra Roper’s dedication. She takes tough cases that require many hours of hard work, but have significant beneficial impact on the community at large.
In 2001, Sandra Roper ran for Brooklyn District Attorney, the first African-American candidate for that office. With limited funds and running against an incumbent, she still received thirty-seven percent of the vote. With no support from the smoke-filled rooms of Brooklyn politics, Attorney Roper, ran a truly grass-roots campaign with the help of members of her Lions District 20K-1, Habitat for Humanity, NAACP-Brooklyn Branch, and Decatur Stuy Seniors. Through their efforts, the people won two county-wide judge positions.
In 2002, Ms. Roper worked on opening the doors to a new Brooklyn democratic process through the establishment of The Robin Hood Political Consortium. After the Amadou Diallo tragedy, Sandra created the JUSTICE CARD and the JUSTICE CARD HOTLINE for the NAACP-Brooklyn Branch to provide guidelines on how to respond when stopped or arrested. To protect our community from unnecessary incarceration, Sandra has founded the Justice Card Alliance.
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