Brenda Castañeda is the Deputy Director of Advocacy at HOME of VA. Brenda is a true believer in housing justice for all and has represented hundreds of tenants, defending them from eviction and seeking redress for unfair housing practices or conditions. She started her career at Blue Ridge Legal Services as a staff attorney after graduating from UVA School of Law in 2006. Later that year she transitioned to Legal Aid Justice Center (LAJC), where in 2015 she became the first legal director of the Economic Justice Program. Brenda has represented groups of low-income individuals, such as consumers, prisoners, or tenant organizations, in class actions and other impact litigation efforts to secure their rights. As head of the Economic Justice Program, she led her team in developing numerous efforts to create systemic change. Some of those efforts included class action litigation against a large state debt collector for landlords that was filing tens of thousands of eviction suits every year; an effort to reform zoning laws to redress past discrimination; negotiating with the state to roll back cuts to in-home aide services for severely disabled clients; and several class actions seeking refunds for public housing tenants subject to unlawful utility billing practices. As a part of her work, she and her team co-counseled with HOME over the years, including a multi-plaintiff administrative complaint in Hopewell to stop a low-income housing provider from imposed extra rules and burdens on families with minor children.