This module helps you think about how to approach the myriad opportunities for state government partnerships with legal aid and includes some sample materials prepared by state partners. Depending on your state and its policy goals, you can focus on 1) a specific issue relevant to policymakers and legal aid – for example, helping people with a criminal record get a second chance to succeed – which can tap several funding sources, or 2) a specific federal pass-through funding source that allows spending on legal aid and its role in advancing a particular policy goal.
Start With the Issues
Arizona’s Priorities: Domestic Violence, child support, opioids, and second chances
Leaders of Arizona’s Access to Justice Commission prepared these mini-briefs for meetings with state policymakers to discuss how legal aid reduces barriers to employment, helps with re-entry, and keeps Arizonans working:
- Legal aid reduces barriers to employment and helps re-entry efforts
- Legal aid offers a second chance and keeps Arizonans working, helps fight the opioid epidemic, increases child support payments, and assists domestic violence survivors
Kentucky, Ohio, West Virginia, and Oklahoma’s priorities: Help victims of crime related to the opioid crisis
Civil legal aid programs in Kentucky, Ohio, Oklahoma, and West Virginia received funding from the U.S. Department of Justice Office for Victims of Crime (DOJ OVC) Enhancing Community Responses to the Opioid Crisis: Serving Our Youngest Crime Victims grant to launch projects that help children and their caregivers affected by the opioid crisis. These projects will work collaboratively with schools, law enforcement, health and social service providers, and other community partners. Building on this endorsement by the federal government – i.e., DOJ OVC recognizes that child victims of the opioid crisis need legal aid – several of these grantees are exploring ways to expand these services statewide with funding sources.
Hawaii’s priorities: Increase collaboration and identify programs that would produce better outcomes by embedding legal aid
The Hawaii Legal Aid Interagency Roundtable is a pilot project of the Department of Human Services, Access to Justice Committee, and the Hawaii Justice Foundation. The roundtable seeks to increase collaboration and efficiency across state departments, identify programs that would be more effective, efficient, and produce better outcomes by adding legal services to the supportive services provided, and leverage federal funds to increase access to legal aid for Hawaii’s most vulnerable.
Focus on a Specific Funding Source
- AmeriCorps Court-Based Navigator Programs in Illinois and California
- CARES Act Awards Fund New Hampshire and Kansas Courts’ Pandemic Response
- CDBG Supports Legal Help for Low-Income Tenants in Philadelphia
- STOP Funds Support Court Technology Innovations
- Title IV-D Funds Online Dispute Resolution Tools in Ottawa County, Michigan
- Study Examines Effectiveness of Virtual Mediation in Parenting Disputes: Federal Access and Visitation Grant Supports Mediation in Missouri
- Title IV-E Supports Parent Representation in Oklahoma’s Child Welfare System
- JGP VOCA and California case study
Legal Aid Association of California (LAAC) case studies
LACC 2-pager on how civil legal aid helps after a disaster - JGP and Michigan Advocacy Project (MAP) VOCA and Michigan case study
- JGP, Massachusetts Access to Justice Commission, and Massachusetts Legal Assistance Corporation (MLAC) VOCA and Massachusetts case study
Massachusetts Office for Victim Assistance press release for civil legal services available for Massachusetts crime victims - VOCA and New York Crime Victims Legal Network (CVLN)
- VOCA and Washington State
Washington State Office of Civil Legal Aid Report
Washington State Civil Legal Aid to Crime Victims Plan (2016) - Other Helpful VOCA Tools
JGP’s FAQs About Legal Aid and VOCA
DOJ OVC’s resource map
National Association of VOCA Assistance Administrators state administer directory - Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) Funds for Legal Services to Keep Oklahomans Working (see also Workforce Tulsa’s supportive services policy)
NLADA Project to Advance Civil Legal Aid Collaborations (PACC) Case Studies
- State Opioid Response (SOR) Funds for Medical-Legal Partnership in Vermont
- DOJ OVC grant supports Legal Aid of West Virginia’s Lawyer in the School Project
- TANF Funds “2Gen” Approach to Family Poverty in Tennessee
- AmeriCorps VISTA supports Legal Aid Chicago’s Juvenile Expungement Help Desk
- DOJ and DOL Grants Fund Reentry Services in Oklahoma
- DOL Demonstration Funds Support Workforce Development in Maryland