Lippman calls for change in legal aid

By John Fulmer
Posted: 3:53 pm Fri, June 11, 2010

New York State Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman, in Rochester on June 10, called for systemic change in the delivery of civil legal representation for the state’s poor, and has appointed a 28-person task force to deal with the problem.

Chief Judge Lippman, keynote speaker at “The Critical State of Access to Justice” speakers forum held at the Monroe County Bar Association’s Rubin Center for Education last week, several times metaphorically likened the task force’s job as a way to “fix the plumbing” in an underfunded system that is close to breaking down in the country’s current economic downturn.

Lippman’s task force includes Rochester attorneys Sheila Gaddis, executive director of Volunteer Legal Services Project of Monroe County Inc., Anne Erickson, president and CEO of the Empire Justice Center and C. Bruce Lawrence, of Boylan, Brown, Code Vigdor & Wilson LLP.

Lippman also outlined an attorney emeritus program that turns soon-to-be retired or retired lawyers into a resource for legal aid services.

Moderator Michael Wolford, of The Wolford Law Firm LLP, highlighted the desperate condition in which the New York State Interest on Lawyer Account Fund now finds itself. Started in 1983 as a response to then-President Reagan’s cuts to Justice Department funding, IOLA funds legal services for low-income clients who need help with problems affecting basic needs such as food, shelter, jobs and access to health care. A legal aid contingent requested the state Senate in December 2009 to support a $15 million bailout of the IOLA Fund in the judiciary’s proposed budget but that has been seen as a piecemeal approach.

Wolford called it “crunch time” and said IOLA grants have “significantly declined from a top of $31 million to $8 million. At the same time, the demand for legal services, in view of the economic conditions, has increased significantly. According to some observers, there are more than 2 million people who appear in court in civil matters without legal representation.”

Lawrence, part of the forum, offered an historical perspective. In the 1920s, the state bar said access to justice for low-income New Yorkers was a societal responsibility and in 2001 it called for permanent funding programs for legal aid. To compensate for federal cuts, Lawrence said the Assembly every year would appropriate money for legal services.

“The problem is, it was never in the budget. You never knew how much it was going to be. You never knew if it was actually going to get there,” he said, adding that it was at least a consistent source since 1993, expect one year when Gov. George Pataki vetoed the appropriation.

“The state bar has also consistently rejected the notion that pro bono efforts alone can solve the problem. It really calls for adequate funding for agencies and pro bono efforts by attorneys,” he said.

Lawrence said permanent funding was never a part of the budget until Gov. Eliot Spitzer made it a line item. Legal services agencies “were thrilled,” he said, “but that lasted one year.”

Another forum speaker, Lauren Breen, a professor in the University at Buffalo School of Law Community Economic Development Clinic, said, “civil legal representation is just as important as criminal legal representation,” and that “now is the time to stabilize legal aid programs.”

Breen said that for every legal service client lawyers see, another eligible client is being turned away. A 2007 report estimated that to be 1 million people, and in some states, 80 percent of legal services needs go unmet.

“It sounds like they’re making it up,” she said. “I had to read it three times myself and my students were astounded by that.”

Alan Harris, president and CEO of The Legal Aid Society of Rochester, focused his discussion on legal aid services in the region, and said the United Way, historically a solid funding source, also has fallen on hard times.

“They do a wonderful job but … the United Way has seen their campaign go down, down, down,” Harris said. “This year, for the first time in five years, they exceeded their goal, but what they raised was $7 million less than their high-water mark.”

Financial help for low-income clients dealing with unemployment and workers’ compensation issues, and transactional assistance for micro-entrepreneurs “are not available here,” Harris said, adding that grants limit the legal areas in which legal aid attorneys can help. Other areas with limited representation are immigration, consumer bankruptcies, discrimination health and education.

“That’s quite a list of legal services,” Harris said, “which all of us in some way provide some help, but we’re not even close to meeting the need.”

Back to IOLA

In his keynote address, Chief Judge Lipmann said IOLA’s troubles are just the tip of the iceberg. Access to civil legal aid is critical and the economic downturn has had a catastrophic effect on the delivery of services to those facing foreclosures, unemployment, broken families and debt.

“People’s very livelihoods and sustenance have been so affected by this — I think it’s fair to say the worst economic crisis since The Great Depression,” Chief Judge Lippman said.

It’s the state judiciary’s duty to provide legal aid, but the chief judge also said, “we were bitterly criticized by the executive branch … over our judicial budget, essentially because we had the nerve [to ask for IOLA bailout money]. I don’t say this to pat ourselves on the back, but they went after the budget — and for that reason and that reason alone — we put this $15 million in the budget.

“I can tell you the executive branch called for reducing the judiciary budget by $138 million because we stood up for legal services,” he said. 

New York is one of eight states without a stable funding source for legal assistance, Chief Judge Lippman said. IOLA, tied to interest rates and financial vagaries, is not the answer, and without systemic change and a stable source of money from the state’s general fund, legal services shops will be shutting down.

“This is not an exaggeration,” he said.

Civil representation is just as necessary for the needy as assistance in criminal cases, Chief Judge Lippman said, and the state Legislature needs to understand it’s as important as funding for schools and health care.

“We’re the lobbyists of this cause. Our job is to make the other branches of government understand this is a priority,” he said. “Their lives are at stake. From the judiciary’s perspective, there is nothing more important to us than getting that through to the policymakers in Albany.”

To build the structure of change, the chief judge pledged to hold hearings within the state’s four Appellate Divisions, with their presiding justices, the state bar president and the chief administrative judge to discuss unmet needs in civil legal services in each region and prepare a full report to the Legislature. The Fourth Department hearing is set for Sept. 29 at the Appellate Division courthouse on East Avenue.

“We need to get public attention for this issue,” he said. “We don’t want to sit in the back room where no one is listening. … What we are trying to do is to memorialize a process in the state budget. We hold the hearings; we find out what is necessary.

“It doesn’t mean we’re going to do it all in one year — I’m not going to fool you, it’s not going to happen tomorrow,” he said. “But if we can build the plumbing, so it’s a regular part of state government, as equal and just as important as funding for schools and hospitals — all the things we have been fighting about — we will succeed.”