Two Graduates, One Mission

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Maria Foscarinis ’77 and Antonia Fasanelli ’96 attended Barnard more than two decades apart, but their mutual commitment to fight for the rights of the unhoused has brought the two women together and forged a powerful link between them.

In 2021, Fasanelli became the executive director of the National Homelessness Law Center (NHLC), the organization that Foscarinis founded in 1989. The nonprofit leverages the power of the law to advocate in legislatures and courts across the country for millions of displaced men, women, children, and families. When Foscarinis stepped down from leading the NHLC, Fasanelli accepted the position of executive director. “I was so happy when she agreed to take on this role. The law center is doing great, and I’m very proud of that.”

Fasanelli credits Foscarinis for inspiring her to pursue social justice law in her mission to address homelessness. Together and apart, the two Barnard graduates have carved out professional lives that have helped many thousands of families find affordable and safe housing.

After graduating from Barnard, Foscarinis attended Columbia Law School and decided to pursue a career as a public interest attorney. But her passion for fighting for the unhoused had taken root in childhood.

“My parents were immigrants from Greece. They had lived through the Nazi occupation during World War II, and I grew up hearing their stories about incredible suffering that they and the country experienced, with people starving and dying in the streets even though there was food available,” says Foscarinis. “The idea that you could be in a situation where there are resources but you’re denied them and dying struck a chord with me.”

Seeing the struggles of the unhoused in the U.S. through a similar lens, Foscarinis has dedicated much of her career to tackling this crisis. She initially worked as a lawyer representing homeless families on a pro bono basis and then joined the National Coalition for the Homeless, where she served as a principal architect of the 1987 McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act, the first major federal legislation to address homelessness by providing federal money for homeless shelter programs. Foscarinis founded the NHLC to ensure that the legislation would be properly implemented.

Although Foscarinis has stepped down from NHLC, the work is far from over for her. She wrote a book, slated to be published this year, that chronicles the evolution of homelessness over the past 40 years. She argues that to solve the problem, we need to recognize housing as a human right.

“People are suffering and dying, and that is just shocking to me and makes me want to do something about it. In this country, there’s a real need for national-level advocacy, and that’s what I took on,” says Foscarinis. “[My work] hasn’t solved the problem, but at least I’ve done something.”

For Fasanelli, a determination to do something to solve the homelessness crisis also coalesced in childhood. She grew up in Washington, D.C., and says she observed protest movements unfold regularly; even as a child, she wanted to get involved. But her singular focus on the unhoused came about through a personal connection. When the mentally ill son of a close family friend experienced homelessness in D.C., Fasanelli learned a powerful lesson about the deficiencies of the mental health and housing systems.

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“My parents really educated me about these failures through the lens of it being an injustice,” she says. “Because my friend couldn’t get support because of his disease, the only place he could be was on the street or in shelters. That influenced me deeply, and I began working in shelters as a high school student.”

That was in the 1980s, a time when the issue of unhoused Americans became impossible to ignore. “From an early age, I remember thinking, ‘How can we live in this very wealthy country and not have housing for everyone and not have healthcare for everyone?’”

And while Fasanelli knew she wanted to help solve these crises out of college, she hadn’t yet decided to become a social justice lawyer until she had the “great fortune” to work with Foscarinis at the center.

“I had the opportunity to see what she was building as a social justice organization of lawyers fiercely defending the rights of unhoused people while advocating for laws and policies to end homelessness,” recalls Fasanelli. “I was so inspired by seeing [Foscarinis] in action that I decided right then and there to go to law school.”

Even as Fasanelli, Foscarinis, and countless other homeless advocates face new challenges with the Johnson v. Grants Pass decision by the U.S. Supreme Court in June 2024 — which ruled that cities can punish people for sleeping in public, regardless of whether there is shelter space available — they remain steadfast in their pursuit to prevent and solve homelessness.

At the helm of the NHLC, Fasanelli and her staff are looking to leverage protections for the unhoused through state laws. As for Foscarinis, she hopes her book will open eyes and minds to creative solutions. An adjunct professor at Columbia Law for the past six years, she draws hope from her students and their budding careers.

“It’s encouraging to see them, because they are the future,” says Foscarinis. “The fight continues.”