Here’s an opportunity to do some important work!

Idaho Legal Aid Services, Inc. (ILAS) is seeking applicants for an attorney position with its satellite office located at the Nampa Family Justice Center. The Nampa Family Justice Center is a partnership of agencies dedicated to ending family violence and sexual assault through prevention and response by providing comprehensive, client-centered services in a single location. Supervision of Justice Center staff is provided by the Caldwell ILAS office.

The Justice Center office is staffed by one and one-half attorneys and a half time support staff person.  The Justice Center office focuses solely on providing services to victims of domestic violence, stalking and/or sexual assault cases in the Third Judicial District.

Ready to apply? Find out how at PSLawNet!

By: Steve Grumm

These are oldies but goodies.  At this time last year we posted cover letter and resume-drafting tips for summer, public interest job applications.  So while we’re gearing up for our free, two-part summer job search webinars series that will take place on 1/25 and 2/1 (click for registration and details), we wanted to re-circulate last year’s posts, which retain all of their currency today:

• Public interest cover letters: tips and best practices for summer job applications;
• Public interest resumes: tips and best practices for summer job applications.

Good luck, and try to join us for both webinars to get your 2012 summer job hunt on.

The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and the Brodsky family have established the Edward Brodsky Legal Internship Program in order to inspire and facilitate the emergence of new young leaders in civil rights law. Edward Brodsky was a well-respected member of the legal community and a passionate leader committed to the furtherance of civil rights law. This internship was created in his memory through the generosity of the Brodsky family.

Brodsky Interns will work in the League’s National Office in New York, NY and will be afforded the opportunity to participate in critical day-to-day legal work on exciting issues on ADL’s docket, including First Amendment issues such as separation of church and state, religious freedom, free speech, as well as civil rights and discrimination issues. Brodsky Interns will engage in legal research and writing under the supervision of ADL attorneys, and be given the opportunity to assist in the preparation of amicus curiae briefs, testimony, model legislation, op-ed submissions and ADL Civil Rights Division publications when appropriate.

Are you a first or second-year law student with a commitment to First Amendment issues? Find out how to apply at PSLawNet!

By: Steve Grumm

Happy Friday, dear readers.  It’s been a relatively slow week as many of us have eased our ways back into the office.  Political junkies likely braved the fiasco that is cable news as it aired BREAKING, UNIVERSE-ALTERING DEVELOPMENTS (not involving grain elevators) from places like Coon Rapids, Iowa.  Today the Washington Post has run a funny picture of candidate John Huntsman reacting to a goat bite in New Hampshire.  This man is a former two-term governor and Mandarin-fluent ambassador to China.  Now he dodges Isak the Goat.  And that’s exactly how democracy should work.

Where was I? Oh, before we get to the news, one quick plug for a NALP/Equal Justice Works webinar series aimed at law students on the summer public interest job hunt.  Our two webinars will focus on cover letter and resume writing (part one) as well as interviewing and networking (part two).  Get the dates/details here.

At last, this week in public interest news:       

• criminal and civil justice gaps in the Volunteer State;
• possible monkey business in a Utah criminal case reads like a Law & Order script;
• is it more than the economy driving more law students into public interest careers?;
• the National Law Journal’s Pro Bono Hotlist profiles some headline-generating work;
• public interest items from January’s ABA Journal include a feature story on controversy involving an Illinois-based innocence project;
• animal law practice blowing up in Portland, OR (and why I loathe cats);
• the fiscal woes confronting Virginia-based legal services programs;
• the fiscal woes confronting West Virginia’s legal services program.

Here are the summaries:

• 1.5.12 – the widening civil and criminal justice gaps, as seen from the vantage point of Shelby County (Memphis, TN) Public Defender Stephen C. Bush, who writes in the Memphis Flyer: “In this moment, we cannot compromise on justice; living in poverty is hard enough. Our community has more than its share of hurting families, unemployment, substance abuse, hunger, sickness, mental illness, homelessness … the list goes on. These problems create more have-nots, more gaps. We cannot afford that. We must bear these costs together.”  Trivia: Shelby County has the 4th oldest defender program in the country.

• 1.4.12 – how’s this for a Law & Order twist: a prosecutor in the Utah County Attorney’s office faxed to county commissioners and the local defender’s office a letter which “called the public defenders’ [sic] office a ‘huge embarrassment’ and a ‘waste of money’.”  The letter referred to three defenders who worked on a homicide case – the defendant was convicted – as “a huge joke” and opined that “monkeys would do a much better job.”  The Salt Lake Tribune reports that the letter, which also referred to a defender sleeping at trial and throwing “temper tantrums,” was “signed by a ‘taxpayer in Utah County’.”  The prosecutor claims that an unknown third party handed her the letter, which she did not write but did fax…from a FedEx office.  Is there monkey business afoot?  Who knows?  But here’s the crazy part: in appealing the homicide conviction, a new defense legal team is asserting ineffective assistance and using the letter in making its case!  Apparently Utah’s standard for effective assistance is something above just monkeying around. 

• 1.3.12 – a short piece entitled “New Lawyers Have Rising Interest in Public Interest,” published on the higher-ed-focused Braintrack website, suggests that: “While the vast majority of new law school graduates find jobs with private law firms, many law schools have seen a significant uptick in the percentage of students pursuing careers in public interest….  Undoubtedly, the economy has played a role in these numbers: Since fewer opportunities are available at private firms, presumably students are more open to pursuing careers in public interest. But experts say that’s not the whole story.”  The piece goes on to suggest that students are increasingly public service minded and looking for meaningful careers in service.  Interesting.  Certainly the relative dearth of law firm jobs isn’t the only factor that’s driven more law students to consider careers in nonprofit and government arenas. But the weight of the anecdotal evidence that’s come my way suggests the altered job market is by far the biggest driver.  While I think it’s terrific that more students are considering public service careers, and while I have high hopes for the Millenials, I just haven’t seen evidence of non-economic factors having an oversized impact on student career choices.  But I was wrong about the Eagles making the playoffs and maybe I’m wrong about this.  

• 1.2.12 – Biglaw pro bono.  The NLJ’s Pro Bono Hotlist profiles the work of a handful of large law firms.  Their causes range from Holocaust victim reparations to education and election reform.  Without question, these pro bono efforts are laudable and I’m heartened to see Biglaw resources channeled to these ends.  But I’m disappointed that more pro bono poverty law work – those unsexy, non-headline-generating eviction, domestic violence, and veterans’ benefits cases – doesn’t figure prominently into the HotList mix.  Even the firms selected by NLJ are doing great poverty law work.  I’d love to see the HotList zoom in on the unheralded work of lawyers helping poor clients with nowhere else to go.

• January, 2012 – this month’s ABA Journal includes some noteworthy public-interest items:
  • one feature piece, entitled “Journalism & Justice: Did Innocence Project Student Reporters Get Too Close to Lawyers?” looks at a controversy that enveloped Northwestern’s Medill Innocence Project and which has raised questions about the role of student journalists in investigating convicts’ claims of innocence.
  • some coverage of the ABA’s work w/ the Legal Services Corporation (LSC) to address the justice gap.
  • an interesting new corporate structure for socially conscious entrepreneuers is being accepted in a growing number of states.  The new “…corporate form – seven states in the last two years have amended their constitutions to allow for it – allows corporate officers to consider a social, community or environmental purpose as part of their mission.  It also helps shield benefit corporations from shareholder lawsuits for doing what they think is the right thing.”  

     

• 12.30.11 – the Portland Business Journal looks at the growth of “animal law” practice.  The article is password-protected and I don’t have access to it, so I include this just as an FYI to the animal enthusiast types in our readership.  (I am an animal enthusiast, having in my youth owned a retriever named Reggie and a rabbit named Crusader.  Turns out it’s tough to raise a rabbit in a Philadelphia neighborhood.  Cats paid all kinds of attention to Crusader and did not have his best interests at heart.  I have loathed cats ever since. Vile creatures.)  

• 12.31.11 – Virginia legal services programs are facing extraordinary fiscal challenges.  They expect layoffs and service cuts, particularly with last November’s LSC appropriation slash.  The legal services community is looking to the state legislature for help, in the form of establishing mandatory IOLTA program and increasing some court filing fees.  From the Virginian-Pilot: 
  • The program that sends interest on money held in trust to legal aid in Virginia is voluntary. It is mandatory in all states except Virginia, Alaska, South Dakota, Wyoming, Nebraska and Idaho. With backing of Virginia’s bankers, the General Assembly passed a law in the 1990s stopping the program from becoming mandatory.  Delegate Manoli Loupassi, a Richmond Republican, has introduced a bill to repeal that law and thus allow the Virginia Supreme Court to consider requiring all lawyers to participate in the program. Similar bills died in the General Assembly a year ago.
  • Legal aid will ask lawmakers to approve a budget amendment that would increase the civil filing fee that goes to legal aid from $9 to $13.

•  12.30.11 – a call to the West Virginia bar: pick up pro bono efforts because legal aid is underfunded.  An editorial in The Intelligencer and Wheeling News-Register (a newspaper so badass it needs two names) highlights how the LSC cuts will impact Legal Aid of West Virginia and continues, “If Legal Aid is forced into layoffs, it will be up to local attorneys to swallow the loss of pay and offer their services pro bono. Here in our area, lawyers have a praiseworthy record of stepping up to the plate. In the past, they have been recognized for their high rate of pro bono work. The need for help will not disappear, even when the money does. 

The Fair Elections Legal Network (FELN) is a nonpartisan policy and advocacy organization based in Washington, D.C. Its overall mission is to remove barriers to registration and voting for traditionally underrepresented constituencies and improve election administration through administrative, legal, and legislative reform.

FELN is seeking a lawyer with elections, organizing and/or campaign experience to serve as a staff attorney. Responsibilities include: 1) outreach and collaboration with voter registration and mobilization groups and other progressive organizations, to identify and eliminate barriers to voter participation; 2) legal research, analysis and writing to support FELN’s legal and administrative election reforms and ongoing assistance to outside organizations; 3) communication with election officials and other audiences; and 4) overseeing and coordinating organizational efforts in assigned target states, which may include some travel.

Ready to apply? Check the listing at PSLawNet to find out more!

The Legal Aid Justice Center seeks a bilingual attorney to join its office in Falls Church, Virginia. The Center’s work includes the provision of general civil legal assistance in the areas of housing, consumer, and employment law for Northern Virginia’s diverse low-income immigrant communities. Also, Legal Aid Justice Center provides extensive representation to, and works closely with, the region’s predominantly Latino day laborers.

The Legal Aid Justice Center is a nationally recognized, non-profit program providing free civil legal assistance from four offices throughout the state of Virginia. Our dynamic staff of more than thirty advocates pursue systemic legal advocacy for all low-income Virginians using a wide array of strategies. Through legal representation, community organization, and statewide advocacy, the Legal Aid Justice Center works both to eliminate the immediate symptoms and to address the underlying causes of poverty in Virginia. We encourage diversity, value unique voices, pursue our goals with passion, and have fun while working for the public interest.

Want to join the team at Legal Aid Justice Center? Check out the listing at PSLawNet!

By: Steve Grumm

This ABA Journal piece is a must-read if you’re interested in how legal education is financed (i.e. the widespread availability of loans), the intersection of the lending system with a bleak job market, and what may happen from here.  The news ain’t all good.  Authors William Henderson and Rachel Zahorsky begin with some sobering present-day statistics…

In 2010, 85 percent of law graduates from ABA-accredited schools boasted an average debt load of $98,500, according to data collected from law schools by U.S. News & World Report. At 29 schools, that amount exceeded $120,000. In contrast, only 68 percent of those grads reported employment in positions that require a JD nine months after commencement. Less than 51 percent found employment in private law firms.

The influx of so many law school graduates—44,258 in 2010 alone, according to the ABA—into a declining job market creates serious repercussions that will reverberate for decades to come.

…

The piece then goes on to trace the historical role of federal lending (both in backing private loans and direct lending) in funneling cash into the legal education system.  Henderson/Zahorsky identify a serious, looming problem for federal lending.  Now that Uncle Sam is doing so much direct lending he is betting that, as a lender, he’ll make money back on future interest revenues paid by law-student/attorney borrowers.  But is this realistic in light of a stagnant (and maybe in the long term, shrinking) job market?

By failing to make rigorous, realistic actuarial assumptions in deciding who to lend money to and how much to lend, the federal government avoids politically uncomfortable trade-offs. Everyone can go to college. And if you can get accepted into law school, the government will finance that, too.

But as the economist Herbert Stein once said, “If something cannot go on forever, it won’t.” The federal government’s gamble that higher education will continue to result in higher personal incomes eerily echoes Wall Street’s risky assumption that historical patterns in real estate values would carry forward forever and enable many sliced-and-diced mortgage-backed securities to attain AAA ratings.

While it may be politic, even patriotic, to assume that the higher-education-equals-higher-income equation is fact, for investors it remains, at best, aspirational. Since 2008, private investment in nearly any market has been reluctant. The capitalists aren’t taking this education-equals-high income bet; if they did, the terms they would demand would likely change the choices that student borrowers are now making.

Unless the government’s actuarial assumptions on student loan repayments turn out to be correct, federal funding of higher education is on a collision course with the federal deficit.

Optimistic assumptions of future growth and earning power, however, are completely at odds with the financial landscape that has given rise to the so-called scamblogger movement and some recent lawsuits by graduates alleging their schools committed fraud and other deceptive practices regarding portrayals of job prospects.

I wish I had more time to go into depth on this article, but for now the above must suffice as a teaser.  It’s worth a full read.

Are you a public interest law enthusiast? Are you a social media pro? Well, if so, keep reading because today’s Job o’ the Day is for you!

The PSLawNet Fellow is the principal manager and administrator of the PSLawNet website.  PSLawNet, which is housed at the NALP, is the nation’s largest public interest law jobs database, and also includes detailed information on thousands of public interest and government employers, as well as a library of resources to aid job seekers.

The Fellow has responsibilities for: development of online educational content, management of student interns, basic technology and data management, co-editing the PSLawNet Blog, using social media to promote PSLawNet, interacting with NALP members, delivering presentations about the public interest job search, and other tasks as they arise.  Just before the 2012-13 PSLawNet Fellow begins work, NALP will launch a new version of PSLawNet.  The fellow will play an integral role in marketing the new website, improving its functionality, and orienting website users to new features.  The fellow reports to NALP’s director of public service initiatives.

The PSLawNet Fellowship provides a wonderful opportunity for a public-interest minded law graduate who also has an interest in nonprofit administration and technology. Further, the fellowship offers a bird’s-eye view of the public interest arena for law graduates on public service career paths.

For more information or to learn how to apply, see the listing at PSLawNet!

Founded in 1991, the Asian American Justice Center works to advance the human and civil rights of Asian Americans, and build and promote a fair and equitable society for all.

The Asian American Justice Center is one of the nation’s leading experts on issues of importance to the Asian American community including: affirmative action, anti-Asian violence prevention/race relations, census, immigrant rights, immigration, language access, television diversity and voting rights. Our expertise is widely acknowledged: in the media, by the public and lawmakers at the very highest tiers of government.

The AAJC clerkship program is a competitive program for law students. Law clerks work together with staff attorneys. Typical duties clerk perform include researching and writing memoranda, preparing case briefs, drafting summaries of legislation for AAJC attorneys, and developing community education and advocacy briefs. Clerks will also have the opportunity to attend briefings, hearings, and lobby visits on Capitol Hill and attend coalition meetings with other human and civil rights organizations.

Clerks will have the opportunity to rotate among different practice areas at AAJC in order to gain a wide breadth of experience. By the end of the semester, clerks will have had exposure to many of the types of work that AAJC attorneys perform.

Interested? Check out the listing at PSLawNet!

By: Steve Grumm

Happy Friday, dear readers.  2011: the end is nigh.  At the close of every year the Washington Post publishes a “what’s going out?/what’s coming in?” piece about cultural trends, the changing zeitgeist, etc.  The piece seems perfeclty designed if the goal is to remind me how out of touch I am.  For instance, “Ovaltine nostalgia” is out while a “Tang renaissance” is coming in.  I love Ovlaltine!  How did I miss that!?  And, while seemingly crass but otherwise a mystery to me, “Pippa’s bum” is losing in favor of “Kate’s uterus.”  Sorry, Pippa.  Greek yogurt, which I had noticed was all the rage in 2011, is being pushed out by something called Icelandic skyr.  I hope Pippa’s not Greek.  That would be a double-whammy for her.  Anyway, as we turn to 2012 I wish you a happy and safe New Year’s holiday.

Here’s what we’ve got in the public interest department:

• it’s a revolving employment door for Wisconsin’s assistant prosecutors;
• lots of news about how LSC cuts will affect Virginia legal services providers;
• Michigan Community Resources expands to provide more than legal assistance to its nonprofit clients;
• DC’s LRAP program is coming up dry (boo!!);
• study shows that a homicide defendant with a public defender will fare a lot better than with court-appointed counsel;
• prosecutors and defenders square off, but this time everybody wins;
• Legal Aid Services of Oklahoma bracing for the LSC funding cut pinch;
• a good idea for raising legal services funding from law firm associates.

This week:

• 12.28.11 – Wisconsin struggles to retain its prosecutors, according to a new study.  Here’s a report from WISC-TV: “They carry much of the workload in Wisconsin’s criminal justice system, and a study found that many assistant district attorneys, or ADAs, are leaving their posts at an alarming rate.  The study called “Public Safety and Assistant District Attorney Staffing in Wisconsin” surveyed past and present ADAs and found that while an overwhelming majority of these state workers went into the field to perform a public service, for several years most are leaving for better paying jobs with better benefits in the private sector….”

• 12.28.11- three stories about how LSC cuts will impact Virginia-based legal services providers:
  •  From WVIR: “Legal aid groups across the commonwealth are preparing to lobby the Virginia General Assembly for losses in funding. That funding has decreased by $8 million since 2008, affecting the services available to more than a million Virginians that cannot afford other legal help.  For some, it could mean job cuts. That is why groups across the state plan to ask the General Assembly for increased funding when its session begins in January.”
  • The News-Leader reports on how Blue Ridge Legal Services, in central/western Virginia, will be impacted: “Congressional action in mid-November reduced federal funding for civil legal services to low-income residents by 15 percent. This cut came on the heels of an earlier 4 percent cut in federal funding in April, sparking Blue Ridge’s first round of cuts, halving the number of attorneys at its Harrisonburg office, which serves Staunton, Waynesboro and Augusta County, said John Whitfield, executive director and general counsel for the organization.”
  • Here’s a statewide look at the potential for cuts, from the Northern Virginia Daily: “A statewide agency that gives legal aid to the poor faces layoffs as a result of congressional funding cuts.  Representatives with Legal Services Corp. of Virginia said Friday they plan to ask the General Assembly to help restore funds lost this fall when Congress reduced grants by 15 percent, according to a news release.  The agency provides funding and oversight of the state’s legal aid system — nine direct-service programs in 38 offices statewide and the Virginia Poverty Law Center, which assists with advocacy, education and litigation support.  Statewide the agency faces losing 20 attorneys and 10 support staff, according to legal services group’s executive director, Mark D. Braley. 

• 12.27.11 – Michigan Community Resources, formerly known as Community Legal Resources, outgrew the “Legal” in its name.  MCR used to provide legal assistance to under-resourced nonprofit organizations.  Now it offers a broader range of services, and works with an expanded circle of client organizations.  From the Huffington Post: “MCR now services the entire state and offers planning, technical and educational support in addition to legal aid. Its clientele has expanded, too. Many of the groups MCR assists are 501(c)3 nonprofits, but the organization also helps groups like block clubs and neighborhood associations.”  I used to work with a transactional pro bono program that served nonprofits in need of legal help.  Often times, they would also require technical assistance that was not directly legal in nature.  Taking a more holistic approach to client services makes a lot of sense to me.  Congrats, MCR.  

• 12.25.11 – the LRAP program for DC-based poverty lawyers is short on the cash to meet demand from debt-laden lawyers.  From the Washintgon Post: “For the first time in its five-year history, the privately funded program that helps lawyers at Washington nonprofits repay law school debt — the Loan Repayment Assistance Program — fell short of covering the majority of lawyers’ eligible monthly loan payments. In past years, the program managed to cover at least 90 percent of those monthly loan repayments; this year, they only have enough money to cover about half.  That’s because the need for aid is outpacing the money coming into the program. In 2007, the first year of LRAP, 14 percent of lawyers applying for the grants had debt of more than $150,000, and their average debt was $92,000. Today, 27 percent have debt of more than $150,000, and their average debt has jumped to $119,000.”

• 12.24.11 – here may be our data points of the week.  A study of indigent homicide defendants that took place in Philly found a sharp difference in outcomes based on whether they had a public defender (on staff w/ the Defender Association of Philadelphia) or a court-appointed lawyer.  An NY Times editorial summarizes the RAND study: “The study examined murder cases of indigent defendants with similar profiles in the city from 1994 to 2005. The conviction rate of clients represented by staff lawyers working for the public defender association…was 19 percent lower than those represented by court-appointed lawyers working alone. Their expected time served in prison was 24 percent lower, and they were far less likely to get a life sentence.”   

• 12.24.11 – on a lighter note, prosecutors and defenders in Alaska engaged in some non-hostile combat to generate a whole bunch of food donations for the needy.  From the Peninsula Clarion: “A friendly competition between the Kenai’s District Attorney’s Office and the Public Defender Agency helped people in need this holiday season. The two offices, which generally compete toe-to-toe at the Kenai Courthouse, collected food last week as part of a private food drive. The public defenders won the competition, donating 1,547 pounds of canned and dried foods. The district attorneys donated 978 pounds of food.”

• 12.23.11 – on the heels of the LSC funding cut, Legal Aid Services of Oklahoma is bracing for impact.  From the Express-Star: “Oklahoma’s statewide nonprofit law firm providing free civil legal services to elderly and low-income persons who are about to lose their children, housing, health care or income or who are victims of domestic violence, is preparing for a federal funding cut of approximately $700,000 for the coming fiscal year.”  ($700,000 represents about 10% of LASO’s budget.)  “No decisions have been made by LASO’s Board of Directors regarding implementation of LSC’s funding cut.”

• 12.22.11 – a good legal services fundraising idea.  Here’s some information on the “One Hour of Sharing Associates’ Campaign, which encourages Minnesota-based law firm associates to make a cash donation, in the amount of their hourly billing rate, to the Fund for the Legal Aid Society.  The JD Rising blog has more detail.