Ashley Campbell Embraces Challenge, Honor of Leading LANC
It seems as though everything about Ashley Campbell’s career up to this point has prepared her for the challenge she has undertaken as the new chief executive officer of Legal Aid of North Carolina (LANC). She succeeded the organization’s founding director, George Hausen, in July.
In addition to two decades of service with LANC as a staff attorney, pro bono volunteer and board member, Campbell has gained a wealth of experience from her work in the private sector, non-profit community and legal education field.
LANC offices across the state have rolled out the welcome mat for Ashley Campbell, including the attorneys and staff of the Ahoskie office.
Her commitment to public service, in fact, dates back to her formative years in Gastonia, where she volunteered as a “candy-striper” at the hospital and tagged along with her mom doing volunteer work with a local women’s organization.
“My mother grew up very poor, in extreme poverty, and she really tried to raise us with a sense of empathy,” Campbell said. “And then when I got to be older I started working at a home for people living with AIDS in Belmont. That was the first time I really worked intimately with marginalized populations. This was around 1992, so the AIDS crisis was really different then.
“I worked at a place called House of Mercy. I was there every week, and I would volunteer to cook dinner and spend time with the people who were living there. These were all people whose families had cast them out and would not take care of them. We called this a home for people living with AIDS, but it was really where people went to die, unlike today where there are so many more treatments.”
After graduating from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (1999) and UNC School of Law (2003), Campbell came home to work for LANC as a staff attorney in Gaston, Cleveland and Lincoln counties.
Campbell represented clients in the areas of landlord tenant and domestic violence. Albeit a far cry from her dream of managing major political campaigns, which had been fueled in part by Bill Clinton’s 1992 presidential campaign and the accompanying documentary, “The War Room,” Campbell took to the courtroom immediately and tried approximately 100 bench trials over the next two years.
On the morning of this interview, Ashley Campbell worked in a video welcome message for new Legal Aid of North Carolina employees.
“I tried a domestic violence case within the first week I had gotten over there,” Campbell recalls. “But that’s how Legal Aid is, and I actually love that. The first time I stepped in a courtroom and started trying a case, I just loved it.”
Over the next two decades, Campbell served as a non-partisan staff attorney in the General Assembly, as a partner and later of counsel with Ragsdale Liggett PLLC, and as founding director of the Blanchard Community Law Clinic at Campbell Law School. She also served as president of the Wake County Bar Association and 10th Judicial District Bar, and as a board member and board chair with StepUp Ministry, a Raleigh-based non-profit established in 1988 by White Memorial Presbyterian Church “that prepares people who are ready and willing to make positive changes in their lives in order to gain stability.”
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Her work with StepUp Ministry further exposed Campbell to the needs of marginalized individuals.
“I had worked with low-income clients, so I understood the population we were serving,” Campbell said. “I loved working at StepUp. It is one of the greatest joys of my life. You would just leave a meeting feeling full of joy and love. I have never met a culture like StepUp – it is just so loving to everyone. It’s just awesome.”
Serving on the board of StepUp Ministry also brought Campbell in contact with Judy Bright, the longtime director of Camp Seafarer who later served as executive vice president of the YMCA of the Triangle. Bright, who died in 2018, helped indoctrinate Campbell on the ins and outs of fundraising.
“I don’t think I would be in this job without Judy,” Campbell said. “She was a huge part of it. She ran Camp Seafarer for years and she is like a legend. She was second in command at the YMCA under Doug McMillan. They ran an extraordinary program, and also had a very strong culture. Judy was on the StepUp board and taught me everything there was to know about fundraising.
Managing Attorney Pamela Thombs welcomes Ashley Campbell to the Raleigh office.
“She started the ‘We Build People’ campaign at the YMCA, which began as a $30,000 program and has grown into a multimillion-dollar program. A lot of people think of the Y as a place to work out, and it is that, but they have all kinds of values-based programing and ‘We Build People’ was so perfect for the many different things that they did. They would get their supporters to run peer-to-peer fundraising, where each supporter would be responsible for either bringing in an amount of money or engaging a number of people in making the asks.
“And Judy taught me how to do peer-to-peer fundraising.”
Bright also demonstrated the importance relationships play in raising money.
“Fundraising is not about just walking up to someone and saying, ‘Will you give me money?’ Fundraising is about finding out what someone cares about and how that aligns with what you’re doing: ‘How can we work together on something that you’re going to feel really good about?’
“It’s a very authentic form of fundraising. I would never ask somebody who doesn’t really care about our programs because it’s not going to be satisfactory to them.”
The experience will serve Campbell well in her new role, where an emphasis on fundraising figures prominently into the organization’s goals and objectives. Of course, Campbell knows this all too well after serving as vice chair of the LANC Board of Directors and as chair of the Fundraising and Resource Development Committee.
Ashley Campbell has enjoyed meeting LANC attorneys and staff throughout the state, including members of the Asheville office.
Another area of focus for Campbell will be pro bono service, which was also a key component of her most recent duties at Campbell Law School.
“I took the Campbell job because I wanted to get back into providing legal services for low-income people,” said Campbell, who oversaw all of the pro bono engagement at the community law clinic. “And we are making huge investments in pro bono here. We have an 11-person pro bono team. We believe that providing valuable opportunities for lawyers to provide legal services is so important. I have no doubt that lawyers want to do that.
“Lawyers have been saying for years that they want to do more pro bono work, so I know lawyers are willing to do it. But lawyers have time constraints and resource limitations, and sometimes they don’t know how to do a particular subject matter. What we want to do is have a variety of different programs that lawyers can pick from to determine what’s most suitable for them.”
Being innovative and creative in their approach to legal services, Campbell added, and growing partnerships and collaborations in the community, will be vital to the success of LANC moving forward. Only 12 weeks into the job, she has already visited 10 offices across the state and met dozens of her new colleagues.
“I consider this the honor of a lifetime,” Campbell said. “I really mean that. I just believe the work that this organization does is so incredibly important, and to be entrusted to lead this organization is an enormous honor. The most rewarding part has been meeting our lawyers and our staff, and it’s very important to emphasize our staff because they are so committed to the work and are just such strong advocates.
“It is extraordinary that we can retain such high-quality staff and lawyers on our salaries. And it’s because they are so committed to the mission of the work. They are so strong, and I knew that. I have always known that Legal Aid of North Carolina had excellent advocates and excellent programs. I have always been a raving fan.
“But I have been bowled over!”
Russell Rawlings is director of external affairs and communications for the North Carolina Bar Association.