This year's Axelrod Lecture will feature a talk by Paula Franzese, a professor at Seton Hall University Law School, and an expert in property law and government ethics.

Franzese will speak about tenant's rights, eviction issues and the implied warranty of habitability in her talk titled "A Place to Call Home: Giving Voice to Tenants Left Behind" starting at 12 p.m. in the Baker Court Room at the Center for Law and Justice at 123 Washington St. in Newark.

After her remarks, there will be a lunch in the Berson Board Room from 1 to 2 p.m.

The author of numerous publications, Franzese’s scholarship in the area of housing law includes critical examination of landlord tenant law, common interest communities, homeowners associations and the dilemma of privatization, the law of servitudes, exclusionary zoning, affordable housing, adverse possession doctrine and takings law. Her most recent empirical and scholarly study of the plight of poor tenants living in substandard housing has become the basis for significant reform efforts.  She has spearheaded ethics reform initiatives on behalf of three governors, including serving as Special Ethics Counsel to Governor Richard J. Codey,

The annual lecture is named after former Rutgers Law Professor Allan Axelrod.  Axelrod was the William J. Brennan, Jr. Professor of Law Emeritus  in Newark and a legendary figure in the history of the law school. Professor Axelrod formally retired in 1988, but could regularly be found in his office. He died at his home in Hoboken on August 9, 2008 at the age of 85.