I recently attended a Continuing Legal Education (CLE) class outlining the structure of Washington’s Civil Legal Aid to Low Income people. Here is how it breaks down in a nutshell:
- The Aliance for Equal Justice is a network of civil legal aid groups all working on providing access to legal services to those who can’t afford them. This is the umbrella group helping to direct people to the organization that will be the most helpful depending on a person’s problem.
- If you live in King County then you will be directed to the King County Crisis Clinic.
- If you live anywhere else in the state you will be directed to CLEAR (Coordinated, Legal, Advice, and Education Referral system). You have to contact CLEAR through their hotline at 1-888-201-1014, Mon.-Fri at 9:15-12:15. CLEAR is the filtering system which will direct you to whatever Legal Services are available in your area as long as you are eligible.
- If you are over 60 years old you can call CLEAR*Sr. at 1-888-387-7111
- Organizations CLEAR might put you into contact with:
- Northwest Justice Project
- Columbia Legal Services
- Self help Resources
- Center for Justice
- Northwest Immigrants Rights Project
- Volunteer Legal Service – The availability of pro bono legal services depends on where a person lives. CLEAR is the best way to get connected with whoever is available locally.
You might be wondering why there isn’t just one organization to do all the civil legal aid in the State (I was). There are two main reasons. First, the structure was built as funds were available and there was no cohesive plan. Therefore a patchwork of organizations developed over time which addressed issues as they came up. The Aliance for Equal Justice is the response to that circumstance.
Second, much of what an orgnazation can do depends on the source of their funding. For example, the Northwest Justice Project cannot sue the state because the state funds much of their work and that would be a conflict of interest. However, Columbia Legal Services’ and the Center for Justice’s funding is independent of state and federal funds so those organizations may sue the state without worrying about conflicts of interest.
