that we are one nation indivisible with
liberty and justice for all
it also tells us that we have
inalienable that rights that we are all
equal and that we all can pursue life
and happiness justice for all
it doesn’t say that justice is to be
metered out according to the means of
the individual it is justice for the
poor and for the rich
it doesn’t say justice only for the
corporation’s
I’m not the consumer it’s justice for
all
each country society understands justice
in different ways and in our country we
understand it very much as a systems of
rights and obligations and process do
you process substantive process and
we’re very familiar with the concept of
criminal law where the state comes and
takes your liberty civil civil law it’s
a little different civil law is a meshed
in our daily activities and it is not
the state coming to take your Liberty
it’s more the relationships and the
obligations that you have to each other
and to other parties and so civil law
includes healthcare and it includes
education for example if your child is
disabled and he’s struggling at school
maybe there’s discipline issues maybe
he’s truant there may be civil law
issues involved there where if you had
an attorney you may do a little better
if you knew what your rights were about
the process of disciplining or it could
be an issue with housing you know you
could be living in a property that
you’re renting you have a relationship
with your landlord and there’s something
going on with the heat
that’s a similar issue and their rights
and obligations and if you knew the
process or if you know what the law
provides for you and your landlord
maybe the resolution of the problem will
be a lot smoother
same thing with family law now the thing
with civil law is that different from
criminal law is that you’re on your own
you don’t have a right to a free lawyer
when you’re in the civil realm of life
which is most of your life so in the
school issue you don’t have a right to a
free lawyer if your mom went to the
hospital and now she’s getting hounded
by creditors from a non-profit hospital
she doesn’t have the right to a free
lawyer you get the point you’re on your
own now in the United States we have 60
million people who are low-income 60
million people and when we look at how
many times they’re experiencing at least
in a year one civil legal aid program
civilly what’s civil law problem it’s
seventy one percent one problem a year
that’s almost three-quarters of them are
facing one of the issues on their own
now if you happen to have a household
where you have a veteran it could be
your spouse it could be your parent
it could be your son who serve this
country that house who has a higher
likelihood of experiencing one civil
legal a problem and if you happen to
have children under 18 right you’re
bringing up the next generation your
likelihood of having at least one
problem it’s even higher so happy
birthday
so when we look at the supply in
Washington State of three lawyers that
are working in law firms that are
nonprofit to work with the community in
helping them preserve their individual
problems according to the Justice index
in Washington state we have one point
zero nine lawyers per 10,000 people that
need one now
you know this justice index is a
national measure and you can check it
out justice indexed org every state has
a different measure the state that’s
doing the best has nine lawyers per
10,000 people that’s the number one
state that happens to be the District of
Columbia right and in Washington State
we’re not doing that bad
we are number six and in being number
six we have one free lawyer for 10,000
people so how many lawyers do we have to
help people that need not enough really
not enough now also in our state
according to the office of civil legal
aid in a survey that they did only on
need for free lawyers and what they
found out in 2015 is that in our state
we’re not we’re a little higher than the
average in terms of the need and for
families that have more than four
problems a year almost half of all of
our families that are low income have
more than four problems a year now mind
you that some of these problems are not
like you know it’s not like Express they
don’t get rich so you’re on your own
you’re stressed out you may be sick you
are low income you may be depressed you
may be middle-class but the problem is
not going to take care of itself every
three months right you could be dealing
with a problem from last year so we have
families living with us in our
communities that have a cumulative
weight of problems that are affecting
their
their children their health their salary
their employment just think about it
it’s an incredible amount of need so
that’s the justice gap right all these
problems one per 10,000 with some
families having so many problems so to
understand how people deal with this
situation in every in everyday life the
American Bar Association did a study
where they surveyed in a city that they
pick to be the average Mid City and they
sampled it sauce so that it would be
representative of a Mid City in the
United States and they asked people what
do you do when you have a civil law
program how do you solve it how do you
go about taking care of these things
that you have to take care of so that
you don’t lose your kid or end up
homeless or the kid is kicked out of
school and one of the things that was
really astonishing for everyone finding
out this result is that only 7% of
people seek help from an advisor and
this is an advisor loosely define it’s
not a lawyer
it’s a priest it’s a person that’s in a
position of confidence it could be a
friend that they go to it can either go
to person or a lawyer so only 7% of
people that are facing one of these
crisis’s six help meaning that 93
percent of people don’t seek help so Wow
right that’s amazing so they ask people
so why are you not seeking help with
this problems right you’re going to lose
your housing you could lose your job
you’re not getting paid and so what they
found out is that a lot of people view
these problems basically as bad luck
many people think that it’s fate that it
it was meant to happen or it’s
irreversible right now that’s very sad
and about one in five think it’s a
private matter you know some of these
issues are embarrassing they’re shame
there may be an
you of power maybe between an employer
and an employee or your car mechanic or
whoever right and we don’t talk about
that outside the house that’s a cultural
thing too and then many people found
that they didn’t think or they said they
have no idea that there may be a legal
dimension where they may have there some
remedy they just don’t even consider
these problems they think it’s a bad bad
luck or fate it’s not a legal problem so
why am I even going to look for help and
what we were very shocked in the field
in the legal aid field is that we always
think that people are not looking for
for advice or anything because we think
that people think that it’s very
expensive
in reality that was not the reason now
digging a you know digging a little
closer people don’t view the problems as
legal and many people think that they
can do them by themselves the ones that
don’t seek help think that they can do
it by themselves not realizing that
every it can be a very nuisance problem
resolution right and they start out by
themselves and they don’t show up they
get overwhelmed etcetera
so the result and so being less than
optimal now the good news is that to get
to justice for all
they’re actually multiple doors right
you can find justice going through many
different doors so there’s not just one
path and what we’re learning in
providing freely free civil legal
services is that what we’re learning is
that oftentimes if you co locate a
lawyer in a hospital let’s say you have
an attorney place at a clinic that’s
dealing with chronic conditions like
asthma and diabetes
having the lawyer with the doctor still
in the medical condition if you’re
resolving let’s say there’s somebody
that’s in the emergency room for Orcutt
uncontrolled diabetes that person is
not controlling their diabetes because
they are not going home because there’s
a conflict with the landlord or the
roommate so they’re not taking care of
their diet they’re not taking their
medicine and if you resolve the housing
problem you resolve the chronic
condition and if you can and what the
studies are showing us is that now not
only does the health improve but also
the the issue the person may be able to
get long-term stable housing that they
can afford through the legal
intervention right so this is called the
medical legal partnership model and it’s
been around for about 15 years and it’s
expanding across the country because
it’s good outcomes in health good we’re
good outcomes you know injustice and it
comes from through a hospital right
which is a place where you would not
think you would find justice a path to
justice the other thing that’s happening
across the country is that you know the
law clerks are seeing 300 400 people a
day with the same question and they can
help because the law clerks don’t do
advice and this is in the court in many
many states now courts have set up what
they call self-help centers and in these
self-help centers they’re helping people
with eviction with foreclosure with
guardianship with all type of problems
by bringing in law students AmeriCorps
volunteers hiring lawyers from legal aid
and using technology computers and
people can go to because people
oftentimes go to the court looking for
help and instead of saying oh no we only
do the family law cases here and
actually we cannot even tell you how to
fill out the form that the courts have
changed that and with the community are
partnering like with librarians and
stuff like that they’re creating these
spaces where people can go and ask
questions and if they have the help
they’re hey yeah this is the housing
workshop you can come and you can learn
how you can take care of the problem and
do your form and then file it and it’s
it’s wonderful so the courts are
becoming now more and more a service
center where people can go and get
and many other doors right there’s pro
bono there’s always been firms that
donate their time for free we have a pro
bono project here in Benton County etc
so there are many paths to justice now
in them in the world of helping people
out what we have realized and the vision
that we’re working out because there’s
only one per 10,000 right is that it’s
not practical and I’m quoting here from
Glenn drought and who works at legal
services corporation that funds a
hundred and thirty six legal aids across
the country is that it’s not practical
to think that anyone that asks for help
will get a lawyer we’re no longer able
to do one lawyer one client most of the
time but what we’re trying to do is find
the best resources for that person and
not send them out without nothing and so
this is technology where technology
comes it this is the vision that we’re
working with in the technology legal aid
nonprofit world and so in 1989 right
we’ve heard the internet get invented in
1989 and in around 1999 the question was
can we use this wonderful web to get
this information to people so that they
can help themselves so that they can
know what what is a reasonable
expectation how a case could be so is
solved etc so I work with a company that
is called pro bono net and we powered up
a lot of technology that’s now used to
resolve civil problems for people online
for free now you know that websites and
the tools that we were using in 1999 are
nothing like the tools that were using
now and now we’re going through a mobile
revolution right the Pew studies the Pew
Internet studies tells us that most
people are using handheld platforms
basically phones and tablets to find
health and legal information so
everything is more
being from a static brochure studying
website or even PDF to handheld devices
where you can interact and so one of the
things that happen in 1999 is that the
decision was made each state will have
one website what domain door or website
where the legal aid groups will take the
best expertise in the top problems that
families face and that will be available
out there for free online and you will
be collated it would be the most
relevant and what you know from 99 to
now we’re going through and we’re like
doing everything that’s done you know
it’s centered on the user needs its
tested its plain language its
interactive its cetera so in every
single state there’s one of these
websites so if somebody has a problem in
Illinois or somebody has a problem in
Michigan and its housing they can find
their domain or org website and they can
read the law for that state and this has
been around and continues to improve and
in these websites we have web chat we
have video we have quizzes people can
answer questions and interact and get a
custom printer or what they need to do
to bring when they’re gonna go see this
particular type of case etc one of the
most valuable tools is online forums and
I actually manage the national platform
that we have about four thousand or nine
forums and people can go do any
interview and create their own legal
document as difficult or complex as
their cases because what we’re doing
with technologies that were taking the
brains of the best lawyers about this
issue and were hard-coding it into the
software so that a person that is not an
expert can interact with it and create
something that is professional complete
the
have any holes instead of spending four
hours takes 45 minutes and you can do
this and you can do this by yourself so
from January to August 31st through
these no help interactive tool that I
manage we have managed to create over
four hundred and six thousand free legal
documents across the United States that
were you know one Hawaii etc and in
Washington state right now we have six
forms in different areas of law that
anyone that is in need of some consumer
issues some simple divorces juvenile
expungement for anyone that has a kid
that’s gonna be looking for a job or
graduating from high school I’m trying
to rent a place there are all these
tools that people can use and this is
just one example of a technology tool
that is helping close the justice gap
but we know that technology is not the
end of it all right you can have the
most wonderful technology but to close
the Justice gap and how do we close it
the technology is getting us there but
how do we really close it and what I’ve
concluded is that the only way we’re
going to close the justice gap is if we
do it together as a community and by
that I mean is that we start opening
those doors for each other and that you
put on your institutional hat or your
aunt hat or your custom hat and the
first thing is if you hear somebody say
oh I have such bad luck you know I’m not
getting paid whatever and I’m just gonna
get paid late and I’m gonna miss the
rent and I’m gonna get a notice of
eviction but there’s nothing I can do
the bail should go on and should be like
no don’t just do nothing go you know
there are there are resources there
laugther
and do something and talk to me about it
and you know encourage people not to
accept these problems as fate or as bad
luck empower them to think hey this
could have a civil law dimension and the
law is fair and it’s beautiful so that’s
the one thing so how do we close the
Justice gap we become an empowered
community so we have the lawyers who
arguably are the experts and we have the
person that has the need but in between
there’s all of us including you
and so in your institutional hat ad work
whatever you’re doing your hobbies or
whatever you can help close the gap and
so this is exactly how you come in and
like I said you can become the go-to
person you could decide I’m gonna learn
what’s available in Washington law
helped are or you know I work with kids
or I see that the counter and people are
not able to pay the whatever the library
fee or whatever it is and I ask them why
and 80% of them tell me it’s because of
this issue I’m gonna be curious and I’m
gonna go to read and next time somebody
comes I’m gonna say hey go read this
here or hey there’s this website so be
the person that becomes the resource for
your community the other thing is if
you’re feeling the problem yourself you
may be feeling really stressed out you
may have even sought legal aid you may
have even called and they probably maybe
told you sorry we can’t help you you
know it’s not the type of case we take
or we don’t you know our lawyers are not
available for that date don’t give up
there’s not enough lawyers so don’t give
up figure out how you’re going to avail
yourself of the additional information
or ask somebody that you trust for help
the other thing is if you’re working in
the nonprofit sector or in the
government sector talk to your phone
maybe you can open a door maybe you can
start a collaboration with your local
legal aid or a statewide legal aid or
legal aid that specializes in a
particular type of problem you know the
other thing is because these groups
recognize that there’s not enough of
them they do realize that training and
outreach is super important if you have
a lot of people in your organization
that are coming in with the same problem
request the training if you assure them
that you will bring enough people to
make it worth their while they will go
and they will train you in a particular
poverty law area or civil area and it
will do it for free because to them the
more people that know about the law the
less problems the less the less calls to
the hotline the better outcomes for
everyone because nobody likes to say no
right like who wants to be saying no we
can help you so you know get together
with people that you’re working with and
request training and become a legal aid
Ally Facebook Twitter all of these tools
are also being used to share the world
and these groups are coming with very
innovative ways of providing services so
if they’re doing a workshop on the
weekend if they’re doing something at
the library and follow them on Twitter
follow them on Facebook you never know
when you’re going to see something that
somebody in your community needs so just
to end I think that the only way we’re
gonna close the justice gap is if we do
it together and we do it as a community
thank you
[Applause]
liberty and justice for all
it also tells us that we have
inalienable that rights that we are all
equal and that we all can pursue life
and happiness justice for all
it doesn’t say that justice is to be
metered out according to the means of
the individual it is justice for the
poor and for the rich
it doesn’t say justice only for the
corporation’s
I’m not the consumer it’s justice for
all
each country society understands justice
in different ways and in our country we
understand it very much as a systems of
rights and obligations and process do
you process substantive process and
we’re very familiar with the concept of
criminal law where the state comes and
takes your liberty civil civil law it’s
a little different civil law is a meshed
in our daily activities and it is not
the state coming to take your Liberty
it’s more the relationships and the
obligations that you have to each other
and to other parties and so civil law
includes healthcare and it includes
education for example if your child is
disabled and he’s struggling at school
maybe there’s discipline issues maybe
he’s truant there may be civil law
issues involved there where if you had
an attorney you may do a little better
if you knew what your rights were about
the process of disciplining or it could
be an issue with housing you know you
could be living in a property that
you’re renting you have a relationship
with your landlord and there’s something
going on with the heat
that’s a similar issue and their rights
and obligations and if you knew the
process or if you know what the law
provides for you and your landlord
maybe the resolution of the problem will
be a lot smoother
same thing with family law now the thing
with civil law is that different from
criminal law is that you’re on your own
you don’t have a right to a free lawyer
when you’re in the civil realm of life
which is most of your life so in the
school issue you don’t have a right to a
free lawyer if your mom went to the
hospital and now she’s getting hounded
by creditors from a non-profit hospital
she doesn’t have the right to a free
lawyer you get the point you’re on your
own now in the United States we have 60
million people who are low-income 60
million people and when we look at how
many times they’re experiencing at least
in a year one civil legal aid program
civilly what’s civil law problem it’s
seventy one percent one problem a year
that’s almost three-quarters of them are
facing one of the issues on their own
now if you happen to have a household
where you have a veteran it could be
your spouse it could be your parent
it could be your son who serve this
country that house who has a higher
likelihood of experiencing one civil
legal a problem and if you happen to
have children under 18 right you’re
bringing up the next generation your
likelihood of having at least one
problem it’s even higher so happy
birthday
so when we look at the supply in
Washington State of three lawyers that
are working in law firms that are
nonprofit to work with the community in
helping them preserve their individual
problems according to the Justice index
in Washington state we have one point
zero nine lawyers per 10,000 people that
need one now
you know this justice index is a
national measure and you can check it
out justice indexed org every state has
a different measure the state that’s
doing the best has nine lawyers per
10,000 people that’s the number one
state that happens to be the District of
Columbia right and in Washington State
we’re not doing that bad
we are number six and in being number
six we have one free lawyer for 10,000
people so how many lawyers do we have to
help people that need not enough really
not enough now also in our state
according to the office of civil legal
aid in a survey that they did only on
need for free lawyers and what they
found out in 2015 is that in our state
we’re not we’re a little higher than the
average in terms of the need and for
families that have more than four
problems a year almost half of all of
our families that are low income have
more than four problems a year now mind
you that some of these problems are not
like you know it’s not like Express they
don’t get rich so you’re on your own
you’re stressed out you may be sick you
are low income you may be depressed you
may be middle-class but the problem is
not going to take care of itself every
three months right you could be dealing
with a problem from last year so we have
families living with us in our
communities that have a cumulative
weight of problems that are affecting
their
their children their health their salary
their employment just think about it
it’s an incredible amount of need so
that’s the justice gap right all these
problems one per 10,000 with some
families having so many problems so to
understand how people deal with this
situation in every in everyday life the
American Bar Association did a study
where they surveyed in a city that they
pick to be the average Mid City and they
sampled it sauce so that it would be
representative of a Mid City in the
United States and they asked people what
do you do when you have a civil law
program how do you solve it how do you
go about taking care of these things
that you have to take care of so that
you don’t lose your kid or end up
homeless or the kid is kicked out of
school and one of the things that was
really astonishing for everyone finding
out this result is that only 7% of
people seek help from an advisor and
this is an advisor loosely define it’s
not a lawyer
it’s a priest it’s a person that’s in a
position of confidence it could be a
friend that they go to it can either go
to person or a lawyer so only 7% of
people that are facing one of these
crisis’s six help meaning that 93
percent of people don’t seek help so Wow
right that’s amazing so they ask people
so why are you not seeking help with
this problems right you’re going to lose
your housing you could lose your job
you’re not getting paid and so what they
found out is that a lot of people view
these problems basically as bad luck
many people think that it’s fate that it
it was meant to happen or it’s
irreversible right now that’s very sad
and about one in five think it’s a
private matter you know some of these
issues are embarrassing they’re shame
there may be an
you of power maybe between an employer
and an employee or your car mechanic or
whoever right and we don’t talk about
that outside the house that’s a cultural
thing too and then many people found
that they didn’t think or they said they
have no idea that there may be a legal
dimension where they may have there some
remedy they just don’t even consider
these problems they think it’s a bad bad
luck or fate it’s not a legal problem so
why am I even going to look for help and
what we were very shocked in the field
in the legal aid field is that we always
think that people are not looking for
for advice or anything because we think
that people think that it’s very
expensive
in reality that was not the reason now
digging a you know digging a little
closer people don’t view the problems as
legal and many people think that they
can do them by themselves the ones that
don’t seek help think that they can do
it by themselves not realizing that
every it can be a very nuisance problem
resolution right and they start out by
themselves and they don’t show up they
get overwhelmed etcetera
so the result and so being less than
optimal now the good news is that to get
to justice for all
they’re actually multiple doors right
you can find justice going through many
different doors so there’s not just one
path and what we’re learning in
providing freely free civil legal
services is that what we’re learning is
that oftentimes if you co locate a
lawyer in a hospital let’s say you have
an attorney place at a clinic that’s
dealing with chronic conditions like
asthma and diabetes
having the lawyer with the doctor still
in the medical condition if you’re
resolving let’s say there’s somebody
that’s in the emergency room for Orcutt
uncontrolled diabetes that person is
not controlling their diabetes because
they are not going home because there’s
a conflict with the landlord or the
roommate so they’re not taking care of
their diet they’re not taking their
medicine and if you resolve the housing
problem you resolve the chronic
condition and if you can and what the
studies are showing us is that now not
only does the health improve but also
the the issue the person may be able to
get long-term stable housing that they
can afford through the legal
intervention right so this is called the
medical legal partnership model and it’s
been around for about 15 years and it’s
expanding across the country because
it’s good outcomes in health good we’re
good outcomes you know injustice and it
comes from through a hospital right
which is a place where you would not
think you would find justice a path to
justice the other thing that’s happening
across the country is that you know the
law clerks are seeing 300 400 people a
day with the same question and they can
help because the law clerks don’t do
advice and this is in the court in many
many states now courts have set up what
they call self-help centers and in these
self-help centers they’re helping people
with eviction with foreclosure with
guardianship with all type of problems
by bringing in law students AmeriCorps
volunteers hiring lawyers from legal aid
and using technology computers and
people can go to because people
oftentimes go to the court looking for
help and instead of saying oh no we only
do the family law cases here and
actually we cannot even tell you how to
fill out the form that the courts have
changed that and with the community are
partnering like with librarians and
stuff like that they’re creating these
spaces where people can go and ask
questions and if they have the help
they’re hey yeah this is the housing
workshop you can come and you can learn
how you can take care of the problem and
do your form and then file it and it’s
it’s wonderful so the courts are
becoming now more and more a service
center where people can go and get
and many other doors right there’s pro
bono there’s always been firms that
donate their time for free we have a pro
bono project here in Benton County etc
so there are many paths to justice now
in them in the world of helping people
out what we have realized and the vision
that we’re working out because there’s
only one per 10,000 right is that it’s
not practical and I’m quoting here from
Glenn drought and who works at legal
services corporation that funds a
hundred and thirty six legal aids across
the country is that it’s not practical
to think that anyone that asks for help
will get a lawyer we’re no longer able
to do one lawyer one client most of the
time but what we’re trying to do is find
the best resources for that person and
not send them out without nothing and so
this is technology where technology
comes it this is the vision that we’re
working with in the technology legal aid
nonprofit world and so in 1989 right
we’ve heard the internet get invented in
1989 and in around 1999 the question was
can we use this wonderful web to get
this information to people so that they
can help themselves so that they can
know what what is a reasonable
expectation how a case could be so is
solved etc so I work with a company that
is called pro bono net and we powered up
a lot of technology that’s now used to
resolve civil problems for people online
for free now you know that websites and
the tools that we were using in 1999 are
nothing like the tools that were using
now and now we’re going through a mobile
revolution right the Pew studies the Pew
Internet studies tells us that most
people are using handheld platforms
basically phones and tablets to find
health and legal information so
everything is more
being from a static brochure studying
website or even PDF to handheld devices
where you can interact and so one of the
things that happen in 1999 is that the
decision was made each state will have
one website what domain door or website
where the legal aid groups will take the
best expertise in the top problems that
families face and that will be available
out there for free online and you will
be collated it would be the most
relevant and what you know from 99 to
now we’re going through and we’re like
doing everything that’s done you know
it’s centered on the user needs its
tested its plain language its
interactive its cetera so in every
single state there’s one of these
websites so if somebody has a problem in
Illinois or somebody has a problem in
Michigan and its housing they can find
their domain or org website and they can
read the law for that state and this has
been around and continues to improve and
in these websites we have web chat we
have video we have quizzes people can
answer questions and interact and get a
custom printer or what they need to do
to bring when they’re gonna go see this
particular type of case etc one of the
most valuable tools is online forums and
I actually manage the national platform
that we have about four thousand or nine
forums and people can go do any
interview and create their own legal
document as difficult or complex as
their cases because what we’re doing
with technologies that were taking the
brains of the best lawyers about this
issue and were hard-coding it into the
software so that a person that is not an
expert can interact with it and create
something that is professional complete
the
have any holes instead of spending four
hours takes 45 minutes and you can do
this and you can do this by yourself so
from January to August 31st through
these no help interactive tool that I
manage we have managed to create over
four hundred and six thousand free legal
documents across the United States that
were you know one Hawaii etc and in
Washington state right now we have six
forms in different areas of law that
anyone that is in need of some consumer
issues some simple divorces juvenile
expungement for anyone that has a kid
that’s gonna be looking for a job or
graduating from high school I’m trying
to rent a place there are all these
tools that people can use and this is
just one example of a technology tool
that is helping close the justice gap
but we know that technology is not the
end of it all right you can have the
most wonderful technology but to close
the Justice gap and how do we close it
the technology is getting us there but
how do we really close it and what I’ve
concluded is that the only way we’re
going to close the justice gap is if we
do it together as a community and by
that I mean is that we start opening
those doors for each other and that you
put on your institutional hat or your
aunt hat or your custom hat and the
first thing is if you hear somebody say
oh I have such bad luck you know I’m not
getting paid whatever and I’m just gonna
get paid late and I’m gonna miss the
rent and I’m gonna get a notice of
eviction but there’s nothing I can do
the bail should go on and should be like
no don’t just do nothing go you know
there are there are resources there
laugther
and do something and talk to me about it
and you know encourage people not to
accept these problems as fate or as bad
luck empower them to think hey this
could have a civil law dimension and the
law is fair and it’s beautiful so that’s
the one thing so how do we close the
Justice gap we become an empowered
community so we have the lawyers who
arguably are the experts and we have the
person that has the need but in between
there’s all of us including you
and so in your institutional hat ad work
whatever you’re doing your hobbies or
whatever you can help close the gap and
so this is exactly how you come in and
like I said you can become the go-to
person you could decide I’m gonna learn
what’s available in Washington law
helped are or you know I work with kids
or I see that the counter and people are
not able to pay the whatever the library
fee or whatever it is and I ask them why
and 80% of them tell me it’s because of
this issue I’m gonna be curious and I’m
gonna go to read and next time somebody
comes I’m gonna say hey go read this
here or hey there’s this website so be
the person that becomes the resource for
your community the other thing is if
you’re feeling the problem yourself you
may be feeling really stressed out you
may have even sought legal aid you may
have even called and they probably maybe
told you sorry we can’t help you you
know it’s not the type of case we take
or we don’t you know our lawyers are not
available for that date don’t give up
there’s not enough lawyers so don’t give
up figure out how you’re going to avail
yourself of the additional information
or ask somebody that you trust for help
the other thing is if you’re working in
the nonprofit sector or in the
government sector talk to your phone
maybe you can open a door maybe you can
start a collaboration with your local
legal aid or a statewide legal aid or
legal aid that specializes in a
particular type of problem you know the
other thing is because these groups
recognize that there’s not enough of
them they do realize that training and
outreach is super important if you have
a lot of people in your organization
that are coming in with the same problem
request the training if you assure them
that you will bring enough people to
make it worth their while they will go
and they will train you in a particular
poverty law area or civil area and it
will do it for free because to them the
more people that know about the law the
less problems the less the less calls to
the hotline the better outcomes for
everyone because nobody likes to say no
right like who wants to be saying no we
can help you so you know get together
with people that you’re working with and
request training and become a legal aid
Ally Facebook Twitter all of these tools
are also being used to share the world
and these groups are coming with very
innovative ways of providing services so
if they’re doing a workshop on the
weekend if they’re doing something at
the library and follow them on Twitter
follow them on Facebook you never know
when you’re going to see something that
somebody in your community needs so just
to end I think that the only way we’re
gonna close the justice gap is if we do
it together and we do it as a community
thank you
[Applause]
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