City Bar Justice Center

Transcription

1 City Bar Justice Center Overview of Achievements, The City Bar Justice Center provides direct legal representation, information, and advocacy to approximately 20,000 low-income New Yorkers annually through staff, pro bono attorneys and other volunteers. Clients include Superstorm Sandy victims, immigrants, battered women, homeless families, seniors, cancer patients and survivors, consumers filing for bankruptcy, homeowners facing foreclosure, struggling small businesses, veterans, and others. We recruit, train and mentor volunteers to provide advice and representation; offer a telephone legal hotline; and match volunteer attorneys with cases and projects in need of support. This year we helped clients obtain $776,576 in benefits and monetary awards; saved NY taxpayers over $2 million by assisting clients obtain or maintain housing, employment and appropriate government benefits; leveraged over $20 million in pro bono legal services for the poor and economically distressed; and helped clients divest themselves of over $5.8 million in debt through consumer, bankruptcy, and foreclosure prevention advocacy. In particular, we: Created a Sandy Disaster Assistance Project, training 475 pro bono attorneys, assisting over 600 clients, and coordinating and staffing weekly pro bono legal clinics at the NYC Restoration Centers; Developed the template for a pro se FEMA appeal form which is now a nationwide standard template for FEMA appeals to simplify the process of appealing FEMA denials; Started a trusts and estates pro bono project to assist callers to our Legal Hotline; Won back benefits totaling over $100,000 for homeless families residing in NYC shelters; and Held six Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) clinics, assisting over 120 undocumented youths seeking deferred status. Bronx New York Richmond Kings Queen s This Provider At a Glance Population Served: General Low Income Population Area Served: New York Metropolitan Area Total Funding: $3,235,485 Total IOLA Grant: $185,000 Staffing - Full Time Equivalents Total Staff: Lawyers: Paralegals: Other Staff: 3.13 Types of Services Provided Direct Civil Legal Representation Brief Services Extended Services Hotlines and Other Phone-Based Services Technology and Other Innovations Community Legal Education Pro Se Assistance Collaborations With Other Service Providers Major Cases or Other Advocacy Projects City Bar Justice Center - 1

2 Outcomes 22,161 Individuals Benefited from 11,658 Closed Direct Civil Legal Cases Extended Representation Outcomes 956 People obtained assistance with business start/development 560 People obtained, preserved, or increased public assistance, TANF, or other welfare benefit/right 247 People obtained federal bankruptcy protection 198 People obtained insurance benefits (other than health or disability) 1,722 People obtained benefits from other "extended representation" Brief Representation Benefits 13,617 People benefited from legal advice and counsel 3,513 People benefited from non-litigation advocacy services 1,348 People benefited by referral to other sources of help Dollar Benefits Achieved for Clients - Total $1,079,385 Other Federal Benefits: $112,555 Other Benefits: $966,830 Total includes back awards and total monthly benefits, estimated over 12 months for other federal benefits and other benefits. Examples... Outcomes for Clients s. F is a rent stabilized tenant who was M being harassed by her landlord. She lived with and was primary caretaker of her mother for 9 years prior to her mother's death in February. Within a few weeks of her mother's death, the landlord started holdover proceedings against her. Ms. F called the Legal Hotline where she was advised of her right to stay in the apartment, despite not being on the lease, and to send the landlord proof of her residency and her monthly rent checks through certified mail. The Hotline attorney further explained what could happen if the landlord tried to commence a housing court case and sent her informational materials on rent stabilization, a guide to tenants' rights, and a copy of the Department of Housing and Community Renewal Form RA-90. s. P is a single mother of a special needs M child whom she adopted out of the foster care system. She works part-time as a substitute teacher. Unable to afford private counsel, but hoping to get rid of her debt, Ms. P filed a prose Chapter 7 bankruptcy petition on her own. This put her at risk of losing her home which appeared to have equity in excess of the allowed "homestead exemption," thus prompting her to contact the Justice Center's Consumer Bankruptcy Project (CBP) for assistance. After researching the matter and obtaining documentation showing that, because of several Examples continued on last page Breakdown of Cases by Legal Problem Area People Cases Total 22,161 11,658 Housing 4,676 2,346 Family 4,975 2,199 Consumer 4,019 2,148 Income Maintenance 2,878 1,738 Other 5,613 3,227 City Bar Justice Center - 2 Family 19% Consumer 18% Housing 20% Income Maintenance 15% Other 28%

3 Other Services Hotlines and Other Telephone Based Legal Services The Justice Center's civil Legal Hotline, open weekdays from 9am to 5pm, offers legal advice, brief services, information and referrals to poor and low-income New Yorkers from all five boroughs of NYC through a telephone hotline. The primary areas in which it provides assistance are consumer, family and matrimonial, housing, employment law, and government benefits. The Hotline staff screen calls for income, demographics and the facts of the callers' issues to determine the appropriate course of action. Some callers are seeking basic legal information or a referral; others are seeking advice on how to proceed pro se. When necessary, the Legal Hotline staff provide brief services, such as reviewing papers for those who will be representing themselves, helping the caller fill out legal forms or providing self- help pamphlets. The Hotline also serves as a point-of-entry for the Justice Center's Consumer Bankruptcy Project (CBP) and newly established Personal Planning Estate and Law Project (PPELP). The Hotline staff screen callers with bankruptcy questions and send appropriate callers a CBP intake application. Callers with complicated personal planning and/or estate issues are referred directly to the PPELP's pro bono panel. Callers with immigration, benefits, elder law, veterans' benefits, homeless and foreclosure matters are referred to the Justice Center's specific full representation projects when appropriate. Technology and Other Innovations The Justice Center continues to use Kemp's Case Works' PRIME case management system to track information and maintain case files; probono.net to post training materials; and LawHelpNY.org to post fact sheets, client guides and other prose materials. The Justice Center hosts the Corporate Counsel Pro Bono practice area for in-house counsel and the Foreclosure practice area, and co-hosts the NYC Pro Bono practice area, all on probono.net. The Legal Hotline staff are equipped with head phones and dual monitors. The Hotline staff use "do-it-yourself' programs and A2J programs to assist prose litigants with court document preparation of consumer credit civil court answers, name change petitions, and Surrogate court small estate matters ; and the Consumer Bankruptcy Project continues to use Best Case software to facilitate the preparation of pro se Chapter 7 petitions, which are then filed electronically with the Bankruptcy Courts. With the goal of simplifying the process of appealing FEMA denials that thousands of victims of Superstorm Sandy were receiving, the Justice Center drafted a model pro se FEMA appeal form with instructions, based on research by Skadden and with input from some legal services providers, which pro.bono.net has turned it into an interactive A2J form. We are pleased to say that our form is being used nationwide as the template for a FEMA appeal. Legal Services Other Than Direct Legal Representation In addition to individualized casework, the Justice Center provides community legal education and outreach to thousands of New Yorkers of diverse populations including the elderly, microentrepreneurs, immigrants, cancer patients and survivors, veterans, and low-income women with children, through presentations, distribution of materials, and a growing on-line presence. At presentations, staff and volunteer attorneys provide low-income New Yorkers with legal information and materials on a range of topics, and often follow-up presentations with short one-on-one consultations. The Justice Center also develops materials for prose assistance, many of which are posted on the City Bar's website, LawHelpNY.org and probono.net. A short video on personal bankruptcy, developed by the Consumer Bankruptcy Project in 2010, continues to be accessible to the public on the Civil Court's website. Number of People Benefited by Legal Services Other Than Direct Legal Representation Total: 183,762 People Community Legal Education: 9,011 People Pro Se Assistance: 2,356 People Web Usage: 163,331 People Legal Hotline Services: 9,064 People City Bar Justice Center - 3

4 Other Services, continued Collaborations With Other Service Providers The most significant collaborations this year involve Superstorm Sandy. Using our affiliation with the City Bar and the expertise acquired from responses to past disasters, we quickly gathered together the legal services provider community, local bar associations and law firm pro bono groups to structure a coordinated response. We immediately organized a training for over 250 pro bona attorneys, and began sending teams of staff and pro bono attorneys out to the field to hold legal clinics. After the City set up its seven Restoration Centers in areas hit hardest by the storm, the Justice Center was "invited" to staff all seven sites. To do this, the Justice Center coordinated with the local bar associations, law firm pro bono coordinators and the larger legal services community to handle the service delivery - in partnerships - at each site on at least one day a week. Although the Restoration Centers have closed, these collaborations continue, on bi-weekly conference calls, at monthly roundtable discussions coordinated by the Justice Center on insurance and FEMA issues, and at on-site clinics still being held in the affected areas. The Foreclosure Project partnered with other legal service providers, bar associations and community organizations to advocate for systemic improvements to the foreclosure settlement conference process. A recent collaboration involving a state-wide initiative to collect data on violations of the National Mortgage Settlement by Wells Fargo and Bank of America resulted in an enforcement action against those banks by the NY Attorney General's Office. The Consumer Bankruptcy Project collaborates with the CLARO Project, training CLARO volunteers about bankruptcy as an option for consumer debtors and providing on-site counseling at the CLARO clinics held in the NY Civil Court, with Fordham Law School's Feerick Center to increase efforts on consumer education and counseling to low income New Yorkers; and with Start Small/Think Big, an NGO in the Bronx. Backup or Support Services Each Justice Center project conducts an in-depth training for its volunteers. In addition, the Justice Center often provides training or shares expertise with staff in allied professions, including service providers and staff in the shelters, social services agencies, community-based organizations, and hospitals and medical centers, as well as law enforcement and government representatives who work on issues involving our clients, and law firms seeking to set up their own pro bono projects. Major Cases or Other Advocacy Projects Advocacy with HRA' s Office of Legal Affairs on behalf of homeless clients HRA was transferring to a welfare center in Queens the cash assistance cases of those homeless domestic violence victims for whom it had determined should not be sent to Queens because their abusers and/or their families lived or worked in Queens. The Director alerted HRA's Office of Legal Affairs (OLA), causing an investigation to be Sources of Funding Total $3,235,485 IOLA Grant $185,000 Foundations $582,216 State Funding $538,646 Other Federal Programs $292,310 Private Bar $282,584 Other $1,354,729 Other 42% IOLA Grant 6% Foundations 18% State Funding 16% Private Bar 9% Other Federal Programs 9% City Bar Justice Center - 4

5 Other Services, continued conducted which discovered that HRA had no system in place to prevent these clients' cases from being transferred automatically to the Queens center. Under pressure from the Director of LCH, HRA's Management Information Systems Department now is overseeing a process to prevent this from happening and is planning on automating the process in the coming months. As a result, all homeless DV welfare recipients and applicants with Queens as their borough of exclusion are avoiding being sent to the Queens welfare center. Pro Bono Volunteer Involvement The mission of the Justice Center is to increase access to justice by leveraging the resources of the New York City legal community. Every project of the Justice Center uses pro bono attorneys to leverage resources and increase the number of clients assisted. Once recruited, volunteers receive training on a range of subject matters that relate to subject matter of the project for which they have volunteered. The Justice Center regularly publicizes volunteer opportunities, program activities and training sessions, is an accredited CLE pro bono provider, and provides CLE credit to volunteer attorneys who attend trainings. In addition to direct representation, volunteers are trained to make presentations and conduct outreach, staff advice clinics, answer calls to the Legal Hotline, or provide mentoring/training to other volunteers, depending on their experience level in a particular area of law. The Justice Center also recruits law students to participate in a number of our projects, including the Veterans Assistance Project, the Legal Clinic for the Homeless, the Consumer Bankruptcy Project, and the Victims Compensation Fund Project. More recently, law students have been very active in our Sandy relief work, canvassing neighborhoods for the Neighborhood Entrepreneur Law Project to ascertain what disaster relief small businesses had received, what was still needed and the difficulties small businesses were experiencing in obtaining assistance; and in doing research on a Contractor Dispute Handbook for our Disaster Assistance Project. Pro Bono Statistics During , the following volunteers provided services in our program: Attorneys: 1,736 Volunteers 53,775 Hours Law Students: 78 Volunteers 6,317 Hours Other Volunteers: 69 Volunteers 534 Hours Total Cases Completed by Attorneys: 1,543 Cases Dollar Value of Attorney Services*: $13.44 million *estimated at $250 per hour The Justice Center also provides technical assistance to law firms and corporate legal departments that are considering implementing or strengthening pro bono programs, providing them with guidance, model documents and support throughout the entire process through the launch of their program. Additionally, our Public Service Network works with individual attorneys and matches them with other pro bono opportunities. Outcomes for Clients continued from page 2 liens on her home, Ms. P's equity was within the allowed homestead exemption, the Hotline attorney notified the Bankruptcy Trustee on the case, requesting that Ms. P's case be closed and the discharge be allowed. Agreeing with the CBP's findings, the Bankruptcy Trustee closed the case, discharged all of Ms. P's debts, and allowed her to keep her home. By advising, assisting and providing free legal services to Ms. P, the CBP was able to successfully use bankruptcy as a tool to assist Ms.Pin keeping her home while getting a financial fresh start. City Bar Justice Center - 5