Texas' legal aid system faces imminent collapse if Texas legislators don't infuse it with money soon.
According to an article in the Houston Chronicle:
Leaders of the Texas Access to Justice Foundation, which directs state and federal funds to legal aid for low-income Texans, said they plan to ask lawmakers for a $40 million "bridge loan" from the federal stimulus package. The foundation, funded in part by Interest on Lawyers' Trust Accounts, or IOLTA, projects that drops in interest rates will decrease 2009 IOLTA funding to $1.5 million from $28 million in 2007.
"That is a real crisis. That is not fabricated. That is not manufactured. That's reality," said James B. Sales, chairman of the foundation's policy making arm, the Texas Access to Justice Commission.
5.2 million people currently qualify for legal aid, which currently is being used more heavily since the Texas Gulf Coast was slammed by two massive and destructive hurricanes.
The National Law Journal warned of the risk to legal aid last October, singling out Texas as at high risk for the collapse of legal aid:
Texas has been particularly devastated, with thousands of people who lost jobs and homes due to Hurricane Ike seeking help applying or appealing for food stamps, Medicaid or Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) grants.
. . .
The situation is particularly severe in Texas, which was battered by Hurricane Ike. Since the hurricane, legal aid programs in Houston and Galveston have been flooded with requests for help from people who have been displaced by the hurricane, who were turned down by FEMA or for food stamps and need to file appeals.
. . .
If the funds can't be replaced — and when reserves run out — legal aid programs say they will have to lay off attorneys and staffers in the coming year and likely have to start turning away poor people, say IOLTA and legal aid officials.
Democratic Rep. Pete Gallego, of Alpine, and Texas Supreme Court Justice Harriet O'Neill are supporting and assisting the Texas Access to Justice Foundation in its efforts to get the necessary funds to continue working.
Read more about this here (and stay tuned for follow-ups):
Legal aid seeks $40 million from stimulus
Deep cuts slam legal aid:
State budget cuts, lower interest rates have dire impact.
Julie - Thank you so much for covering this important issue. Although Texas is facing an unprecedented decrease in legal aid funding, legal aid programs across the nation are in similar situations.
It's worth noting that even when IOLTA funding was better, legal aid programs were only able to help a small number of the people who needed their help. The Legal Services Corporation, the national entity responsible for distributing federal legal aid funding, estimates that low-income families have at least one legal issue each year. See LSC Justice Gap Report - http://www.lsc.gov/justicegap.pdf . (State studies suggest that the number is even higher. The Montana access-to-justice community's study suggests that low-income households have between 2 and 4 legal problems each year. See Montana Legal Needs Study Executive Summary - http://www.lawhelp.org/documents/326061Summary%5B1%5D.pdf?stateabbrev=/MT/ . However, the LSC Justice Gap study reported that only 1 out of 5 people who had a legal problem got help from an attorney, whether a legal aid attorney, a private attorney, or a pro bono (free) attorney. The Montana study reports that most people didn't even bother to seek out help from attorneys. And, according to the Justice Gap Report, for the limited number who managed to find their way to legal aid programs, because of the programs' limited resources, at least half who asked were turned away. And this was before IOLTA funding had been decimated, and the recession reduced family income. Even though an official study hasn't been done to document the current numbers, it is very likely that because legal aid programs are cutting staff that even more people who need legal help are being turned away.
This is unfortunate because providing legal aid has been shown to have a huge economic impact on households and communities. See NLADA Resources on Economic Impact - http://www.nlada.org/DMS/Index/000000/000050/document_browse . The most recent study from Texas is that "every dollar spent on legal aid generates $7.42 in total spending and $2.20 in personal income." See Legal aid dollars have multiplier effect - http://www.statesman.com/news/content/news/stories/local/02/18/0218legalside.html?cxtype=rss&cxsvc=7&cxcat=52 .
For those who want to keep an eye on legal aid, pro bono, and other access-to-justice issues, I'd encourage you to follow @accesstojustice on Twitter - http://www.twitter.com/accesstojustice . Matthew Burnett and I, who blog at Techno.la - http://www.techno.la , have created this account to distribute news on these topics from a wide variety of sources. (We aggregate the content by hand to make certain that it is relevant.)
Posted by: Kate Bladow | February 20, 2009 at 09:10 AM