Giving back to the community is important, and the Turkewitz Law Firm has done this over the years in a number of ways.
As an attorney, Turkewitz used his skills in the wake of the September 11 attack to represent (for free) claimants before the September 11 Victims Compensation Fund. His representation of these clients was through Trial Lawyers Care, the largest free legal services project in American history.
He has also raised tens of thousands of dollars for local parks and recreation by creating a half marathon trail race. (Turkewitz is also a veteran marathon runner.) He approached elected officials back in 2002 with the idea of linking together a series of five Westchester County parks into a giant a 13-mile trail loop.
Currently, over 700 runners from 15-20 states annually converge on the system to race the trails with the funds being used for additional improvements for the benefit of the numerous communities that abut the parks.
In a ceremony on January 9, 2018, the City of New Rochelle awarded a Commendation to Turkewitz for his community efforts. This was followed on March 20, 2019, when he was honorably mentioned by Mayor Noam Bramson in his annual State of the City address.
On October 24, 2019, he was honored at an annual gala by Meals on Wheels of New Rochelle for Community Service, and both the City of New Rochelle and the County of Westchester proclaimed days as “Eric Turkewitz Day.”
You can read about the race creation here. As of 2019, Turkewitz continues to volunteer his time as the event’s founder and race director and the firm continues to be a sponsor.
The firm has also repeatedly sponsored local youth sports teams, to help keep down costs and encourage broad, community-wide participation.
In October 2020 he was honored with a community service award from NewRo Runners, for creating thousands of masks as free giveaways for the community at the start of the pandemic and fundraising to feed front line workers and assist local charities.