Community Service Society

About This Office

The Community Service Society of New York (CSS) is a 160 year-old institution that has been on the cutting edge of public policy innovations to support poor New Yorkers in their quest to be full participants in the civic life of the nation?s largest city. CSS employs a variety of tools ? advocacy, direct service, research and policy analysis, and strategic partnerships ? to forge consensus on appropriate policy interventions to facilitate the economic mobility of low-income New Yorkers. Our legacy includes significant milestones, such as: establishing the prototype for the free school lunch program; serving as the catalyst behind the city?s first tenement housing laws; aiding victims of the Titanic maritime disaster and World Trade Center employees impacted by the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001; creating the nation?s largest senior volunteer program; and developing the curriculum that spawned the Columbia University School of Social Work.