At the October Mini-Conference, we announced the finalists for this year’s PSJD Pro Bono Publico Award. To commend each finalist on their hard work and to demonstrate how difficult it will be to select the winner, we will feature a different finalist on the blog every Monday for five weeks.

This week we feature Chelsea Reese from the University of Georgia School of Law in Athens, Georgia.

Chelsea Reese

Chelsea was selected as a finalist because of her compassionate commitment to children and victims of domestic violence. During her 1L year, Chelsea began working as a Court Appointed Special Advocate with Athens-Oconee CASA, where she not only produced quality work product, but also showed her supervisors her passion for ensuring children in temporary foster care receive the best possible outcomes. Chelsea grew attached to a pair of siblings and her dedication to these children has led her to follow their case with CASA and encouraged her to help as many children and families as she can. At school, Chelsea participated in UGA’s Family Justice Clinic where she provided sole representation for 10 clients and served over 600 hours. Chelsea’s devotion to family law and her exceptional work allowed her to become a teaching assistant with the Family Justice Clinic’s clinical professor for whom she supervised students’ work and addressed clients’ concerns. Alongside her clinical professor, Chelsea was also able to publish an article in the Georgia Law Review Online about the factors that cause women and children of color to become overrepresented in cases involving domestic violence. Chelsea has successfully served her community and her school as an advocate, a role model, a leader in pro bono service, and as her clinical professor describes Chelsea, someone who cares.

The Organization

GLBTQ Legal Advocates & Defenders (GLAD) is a nonprofit organization serving the LGBTQ community in the New England area. Their mission is to create a just society free of discrimination based on gender identity and expression, HIV status, and sexual orientation. GLAD staff achieve their mission through strategic litigation, public policy advocacy, and public education. Because discrimination against LGBTQ people and individuals living with HIV is prevalent in almost all areas of the law, GLAD works in every area to achieve full equality under the law.

The Position

GLAD seeks legal interns! Interested students can apply for term-time or summer internships. Legal interns will assist with active litigation, legislative and public policy advocacy, and public education initiatives.

Ideal candidates will have completed their first year of law school and have excellent research and writing skills. Most importantly, ideal candidates will be dedicated to achieving GLAD’s mission.

See the full post on PSJD: https://www.psjd.org/job?OppID=99560

At the October Mini-Conference, we announced the finalists for this year’s PSJD Pro Bono Publico Award. To commend each finalist on their hard work and to demonstrate how difficult it will be to select the winner, we will feature a different finalist on the blog every Monday for five weeks.

This week we feature Emily Holland from Pepperdine University School of Law in Malibu, California.

Emily Holland

Emily was chosen as a finalist because of the strength of her dedication to pro bono service, which has taken her overseas to help ensure individuals’ rights are protected. Emily’s passion for volunteering began before law school, and her experiences have driven her to continue her work at Pepperdine. During her 1L summer, Emily worked as a judicial extern to the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Rwanda, where she learned about the ethics of sentencing and criminal justice. She was able to apply what she learned on a week-long clinic in Uganda where she successfully negotiated a plea deal based on insufficient evidence. But Emily’s passion for service knows no borders as is evident by her participation in the Community Justice and Legal Aid Clinics at Pepperdine. Her work with these clinics allowed her to advocate for human rights and access to justice in international and domestic contexts. As her supervisors have stated, Emily’s “priority is people,” and she is described as “a true representation of the spirit of pro bono.”

Sam Halpert, NALP Director of Public Service Initiatives

Hello there, interested public!

Major news this week includes regulatory changes concerning student loans, with a new MOU between the Department of Education and the CFPB, as well as a streamlined application process for Public Service Loan Forgiveness. Additionally, the ABA received pushback about its proposal to encourage state bars to explore “new approaches” in the practice of law. And in the top story below, Mother Jones spoke with immigration judges and attorneys about the logistical challenges they face implementing the Trump administration’s “Migrant Protection Protocols”.

As always, these stories and more are in the links below.

See you around,

Sam

Immigration, Refugee & Citizenship Issues

• Mother Jones published a piece examining the impact of the Trump administration’s “Migrant Protection Protocols” on immigration courts:

  According to immigration judge Ashley Tabaddor, who spoke to me in her capacity as union president of the National Association of Immigration Judges, MPP has constituted a fundamental change to the way courts are run. DHS, she says, is “creating a situation where they’re physically, logistically, and systematically creating all the obstacles and holding all the cards.” The MPP program has left the court powerless, “speeding up the process of dehumanizing the individuals who are before the court and deterring anyone from the right to seek protection” All this while the Department of Justice is trying to decertify Tabbador’s union—the only protection judges have, and the only avenue for speaking publicly about these issues—by claiming its members are managers and no longer eligible for union membership. Tabaddor says the extreme number of cases combined with the pressure to process them quickly is making it difficult for judges to balance the DOJ’s demands with their oath of office.

  Immigration attorneys in El Paso, San Antonio, and San Diego have told me they are disturbed by the courtroom disarray: the unanswered phones, unopened mail, and unprocessed filings. Some of their clients are showing up at border [sic] in the middle of the night only to find that their cases have been rescheduled. That’s not only unfair, one attorney told me, “it’s dangerous.” Central Americans who speak only indigenous languages are asked to navigate court proceedings with Spanish interpreters. One attorney in El Paso had an 800-page filing for an asylum case that she filed with plenty of time for the judge to review, but it didn’t make it to the judge in time.

• In Olympia WA, “[s]tate lawmakers are crying foul after a series of Immigration Customs Enforcement arrests outside of the Grant County Courthouse in Ephrata and Adams County District Courthouse in Othello last year [and considering] House Bill 2567[, which] ultimately could put an end to ICE courthouse arrests.”

Student Loans & Student Debt

• In Washington DC, “[t]he U.S. Department of Education and Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) – essentially a cooperation agreement – to address and better manage student loan complaints. The agreement calls for the Education Department and CFPB to meet quarterly and share complaint information, data, recommendations and analytical tools. Importantly, the MOU more clearly defines role and responsibilities.”
• Also in Washington DC, “the Department [of Education] said it would create one application for both PSLF and TEPSLF [Temporary Expanded Public Service Loan Forgiveness]. This would make it much easier as [forgiveness-seekers] could apply once and no longer be denied and forced to reapply if they qualified.”
• Also also in Washington DC, “House Oversight Chairwoman Carolyn Maloney [] threatened Education Secretary Betsy DeVos with a subpoena, saying DeVos’ office “stonewalled and delayed” when the committee tried to confirm a date for her testimony…about ‘critical issues facing the Department,’ including oversight of federal student loans.”
• In Virginia, “the Virginia Senate joined the House of Delegates in passing what’s known as the ‘Student Borrower’s Bill of Rights.’”
• A new report from the Student Borrower Protection Center revealed that “[f]inancial companies often use data on borrowers’ higher education to determine access to credit and the price of consumer financial products. And those education data can lead to redlining, a form of discrimination against borrowers who attended community colleges, historically black colleges and universities, or Hispanic-serving institutions.”
• Nationwide, “a coalition of attorney generals…from [26] states as well as the District of Columbia…renewed a request that the U.S. Department of Education Secretary Betsy DeVos discharge federal student loans for people who were enrolled in now closed schools operated by Dream Center Education Holdings, LLC.”

Legal Technology

• In Memphis TN, “[t]he Memphis Bar Foundation, Community Legal Center and Memphis Area Legal Services are joining to spearhead [a] new initiative [whose] goal is to provide resources and information through an online legal portal[.]”
• In Washington DC, “the Federal Circuit heard oral argument in this case involving the $0.10 per page fee for downloading documents from PACER. The basic argument here is that ‘PACER fees must be limited to PACER costs.’”
• In Chicago IL, ChicagoInno profiled JusticeText, “a software platform that allows public defenders to quickly and efficiently sift through video footage that can be imperative in how they build a case and defend a client.”

Non-Profit & Government Management & Hiring

• In Bowling Green KY, “[a] new full-time staffed federal prosecutor’s office opened[.]”
• In Montgomery AL, “[t]he executive director of Amnesty International USA will take over as chief executive of Southern Poverty Law Center, which is trying to steady itself after months of turmoil that included the firing of its founder.”
• In Allendale MI, “[n]ew research by Teri Behrens and Tory Martin of the Grand Valley State University Dorothy A. Johnson Center for Philanthropy shows nonprofits are succeeding in changing with the times [and accommodating millenials’ new role as the largest sector of the workforce] in some areas but struggling in others.”

Access to Justice – Civil

• In Chicago IL, “[a] proposal before the American Bar Association that would encourage states to consider “new approaches” in the practice of law is facing mounting opposition by some state bar leaders who say it will lead to outside investment of law firms and nonlawyers practicing law.”
  • Meanwhile, in Arizona “[t]he University of Arizona James E. Rogers College of Law has started a two-year pilot project that licenses a small group of nonlawyers to give limited legal advice on civil matters stemming from domestic violence.”
• In California, the California Commission on Access to Justice (CalATJ) published a report finding that “California’s housing crisis stems from an inadequate supply of affordable housing coupled with insufficient legal protections for renters and homeowners. The resulting access-to-justice challenge for low-income and modest-means residents is aggravated in rural areas by the underfunding of legal-aid organizations and the state’s rural lawyer shortage. …Free, high-quality Legal Aid is needed urgently.”
• In Brooklyn NY, “[a] community legal service planted a new home in a Brooklyn neighborhood in growing need of help with housing displacement, deed theft and foreclosure.”
• In New York NY, “State Supreme Court justices from Arizona and Utah…said they support considerations to open up the legal industry to greater participation from nontraditional players largely to tackle the country’s growing access to justice gap.”
• In Little Rock AR, “[a] state Supreme Court justice and a chief judge on a federal appeals court emphasized the need to increase access to civil legal aid for people with low incomes at a Legal Services Corp. board meeting[.]”

Access to Justice – Criminal

• In Seneca County OH, “County Commissioners [] approved a pay increase for attorneys who handle the defense in court matters for indigent people to $60 per hour. The increase was recommended by the judges of Seneca County.”
• In Virginia, “[b]ills to create a public defenders’ office in Prince William County and the cities of Manassas and Manassas Park were approved by the Virginia Senate and House of Delegates with bipartisan support[.]”
• In Manitoba, “criminal defence lawyers are taking job action, resulting in the halting of bail court services for Legal Aid Manitoba clients.”
• In Travis County TX, “commissioners announced [] they had hired Adeola Ogunkeyede to serve as chief of the county’s forthcoming public defender’s office. She will begin April 20.”
• In Louisiana, “[f]or the sixth consecutive year, an annual report has declared Louisiana’s public defense system is in crisis.”

Criminal Justice Reform

• In Washington DC, “Justice Department lawyers have improperly used requests for overseas evidence to buy more time to bring some fraud cases, a memo filed with the agency’s internal watchdog alleges.”
• In San Francisco CA, Chesa Boudin, the city’s new District Attorney, sat for an interview with local news to discuss his approach to criminal prosecution.
• In Dallas County TX, the county “public defender’s office plans to hire social workers to help keep its mentally ill clients out of jail.”
• In Cohoes City NY, “[a]n upstate judge set up a legal battle over the state’s new bail reform law [] with a ruling that intentionally challenged the controversial statute.”
  • Meanwhile, “NYPD brass and police unions blamed a new state bail reform law for an increase in overall crime in New York City, though murder, rape and hate crimes decreased significantly last month compared to January 2019.”
• In Savannah GA, “[a] Georgia district attorney has taken steps to help people remove criminal charges from their records if they are qualified to do so.”
• In Billings MT, “[t]he domestic violence prosecutor for Montana’s largest city says changes to the state’s probation and parole system are coming at a cost to victims.”

The Organization

The Southern Environmental Law Center (SELC) is a regional nonprofit organization working to protect the South’s natural resources as well as the health and well-being of Southern people. Their work may center on the Southern region, but the impact of their advocacy and litigation efforts is nationwide. SELC’s programs focus on six areas: clean energy and air; water; forests; the coast and wetlands; transportation; land-use and communities; and wildlife and special places. SELC attorneys and staff work in all branches and all levels of government to ensure that environmental laws are strengthened and enforced, to hold government agencies accountable, and to prevent environmental abuses.

The Position

SELC seeks an associate attorney to begin this fall in their Charleston, SC office. This is a two-year term position with the option for a third year and is perfect for recent law graduates looking to jump-start their careers. The associate will gain invaluable experience litigating and advocating in state and federal courts and before regulatory agencies.

The ideal candidate will have litigation experience and a background in environmental law.

More info on PSJD: https://www.psjd.org/job?OppID=99610

At the October Mini-Conference, we announced the finalists for this year’s PSJD Pro Bono Publico Award. To commend each finalist on their hard work and to demonstrate how difficult it will be to select the winner, we will feature a different finalist on the blog every Monday for the next five weeks.

This week we feature Ashley De La Garza from St. Mary’s University School of Law in San Antonio, Texas.

Ashley De La Garza

We selected Ashley as a finalist because she has shown unending dedication to pro bono work and criminal justice reform since she began law school. Ashley saw a need in Texas for devoted public defense and jumped in wholeheartedly to provide her support and skills. Ashley has worked in two public defender offices and has participated in her school’s Criminal Justice Clinic and Wrongful Conviction Review Project as well as the ABA’s Death Penalty Representation Project. Moreover, Ashley’s passion for service has extended to frequent participation in St. Mary’s Pro Bono Program, an alternative spring break in Washington, D.C., and public interest student organizations. As a former supervisor describes, Ashley’s compassion and advocacy for indigent clients has led her to achieve “one of the most critical student successes [the supervisor] has witnessed.” Her service has been invaluable in practice but also in the promotion of social justice reform through the selection of her legal journal article for publication in The Scholar. Ashley’s commitment, professionalism, and positive attitude has led her to be described as a leader in pro bono work among her classmates and colleagues.

Sam Halpert, NALP Director of Public Service Initiatives

Hello there, interested public!

In another down-to-the-wire week, stories on Immigration and Civil Access to Justice dominated. As always, these stories and more are in the links below.

See you around,

Sam

Immigration, Refugee & Citizenship Issues

• In Washington DC, “[t]he Trump administration is pushing ahead with a project that could lead to the government collecting DNA from hundreds of thousands of detained immigrants, some as young as 14 years old, alarming civil rights advocates. Once fully underway, the DNA program could become the largest U.S. law enforcement effort to systemically collect genetic material from people not accused of a crime.”
• In Washington DC, “[t]he U.S. Supreme Court ruled [] hat the Trump Administration can go ahead with its new public charge rule aimed at preventing low-income, legal immigrants from obtaining green cards.”
  • Meanwhile, in New York, “[i]mmigrants’ rights advocates [] urged noncitizen families to seek legal advice Tuesday, following a setback in the fight to block the federal government’s so-called ‘public charge rule.’”
• The Wall Street Journal reported that “[p]eople seeking asylum in the U.S. are less likely to have legal representation under a Trump administration policy that sends them to await court hearings in Mexican border cities, recently released research shows.”
• In Houston TX, Houston Public Media reported that “[s]ince President [] Trump[‘s] administration has repeatedly tightened the rules[] and narrowed who qualifies for asylum[, i]mmigration attorneys are turning away from the ‘gold standard’–asylum–and putting more effort into the two major legal alternatives: withholding of removal and the U.N.’s Convention Against Torture.”
• In Derby CT, “[a] judicial marshal accused of assisting a Connecticut resident in avoiding apprehensive [sic] by immigration officials was fired.”
• In Boston MA, “Judge Richard Stearns dismissed the case of an Iranian student who…US Customs and Border Protection deported [] despite an emergency stay issued by US District Court Judge Allison Burroughs[.] …Stearns said in court that he didn’t think the government would “listen” to him, and that he did not jurisdiction over the issue because Abadi had been deported, calling the case ‘moot.’”

Student Loans & Student Debt

• In Madison WI, “Governor Tony Evers [] signed an executive order to create a task force on student debt.”
• In Washington DC, “Sen. Elizabeth Warren, in a letter to Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, urged the federal government to collect $22.3 million that it’s owed by one of the biggest student loan servicers in the country.”
• Also in Washington DC, the Department of Education “revealed [] that it will simplify the process for borrowers to apply for an expansion of the troubled Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) Program.”

Legal Technology

• In Mountain View CA, “Google has announced it will charge law enforcement and other government agencies for access to user data to “offset the costs” of compiling responses to information requests.”
• In Iowa, “[t]he state court system is offering a new lawyer-free service for couples seeking a divorce. Judicial Branch Public Information Associate Marissa Gaal said the interactive service is only for people looking for a divorce who don’t have children.”
• The ABA Journal published a piece on legal hackathons.
• In Utah, “Utah Supreme Court Chief Justice Matthew Durrant called on lawmakers to spend more than a million dollars to upgrade the judiciary’s tech.”

Non-Profit & Government Management & Hiring

• In Washington DC, “[t]he Trump administration is attempting to decertify the National Association of Immigrant Judges (NAIJ), the union that since 1971 has represented federal immigration judges. The attack on the union appears to be in response to its vocal opposition to administration efforts to limit judges’ authority, force them to speed up hearings, silence critics of immigration policy, and cut resources for support staff.”
• In DC, “[t]he D.C. bar is joining the ranks of jurisdictions considering rule changes that would allow nonlawyers to own firms[.]”

Access to Justice – Civil

• In Canada, Former Canadian Chief Justice Beverly McLachlin began “a periodic [column] series showcasing access to justice in action across Canada” for The Lawyer’s Daily.
• In Manitoba, “[c]lients of Manitoba’s Public Interest Law Centre are questioning a proposal to stop the advocacy centre from operating within Legal Aid Manitoba [after] a government-commissioned review of legal aid was released recommending the Public Interest Law Centre no longer be part of legal aid services offered by the province.”
• In Ontario, Legal Aid Ontario “clarified its policy for imprisoned clients seeking help with family law issues[:] Incarcerated persons may apply for all the family law services offered by Legal Aid Ontario, subject to fulfilling the requirements for legal and financial eligibility.”
• In New York NY, the city council considered “two bills–Intros 1529 and 1104– [that] look to expand Right to Counsel [in eviction] not only geographically but also economically.”
• In New Mexico, “[m]ore [] residents would have access to civil legal aid services under proposals approved by the state Supreme Court [which] include efforts to attract more out-of-state law school graduates to practice in New Mexico and possible financial incentives for attorneys who practice in rural or underserved communities.”
• In Utah, “Chief Justice Matthew Durrant told state legislators during the annual State of the Judiciary Address Monday that Utah faces a “crisis” in legal services[.]”

Access to Justice – Criminal

• The Indiana Lawyer reported that “[r]ural communities’ access to justice, bail reform and ensuring voting rights for individuals with criminal convictions will be chief among several criminal justice topics set for discussion during next month’s 2020 American Bar Association Midyear Meeting.”
• In Missouri, “[a] federal judge [] has refused to approve a consent decree that would have limited state public defenders to no more than 173.3 hours worth of cases each month, a standard that is based on a 40-hour workweek.”
• In Allen County OH, “County Commissioners will continue deliberating how best to improve the state of indigent defense in 2020, with the possibility of establishing a full-time public defender’s office still under consideration.”
• In Butler County OH, “attorneys who are appointed by judges to represent indigent defendants have received their first hourly rate hike in about 16 years.”

Criminal Justice Reform

• In Albany NY, “[a] law that would have convened a special panel to evaluate complaints of misconduct levied against the state’s prosecutors was struck down [] by a state judge[], who said the measure was unconstitutional as written by the Legislature.”
• In New York NY, “[t]he NYPD’s largest police union has sued the Civilian Complaint Review Board over a ballot measure that expanded the watchdog agency — claiming the voter-approved legislation was ‘an illegal power-grab.’”

The Organization

The Asian Pacific Institute on Gender-Based Violence (Institute) is an Oakland-based national non-profit organization that provides resources on domestic violence, sexual violence, trafficking, and other forms of gender-based violence in the Asian and Pacific Islander communities. Not only does the Institute act as a clearinghouse of information, but its staff also provides training, technical assistance, and policy analysis. All of the Institute’s work is done to promote a vision of gender democracy.

The Position

The Institute seeks a law graduate to act as a Program Coordinator of the Improving Language Access in the Courts project. The Coordinator will be asked to collaborate with senior staff and national partners to develop trainings, translation guidance tools, and an iconography resource guide that will address the needs of individuals with limited English proficiency in the legal process.

The ideal candidate will have experience with the development and management of complex projects and programs, knowledge of gender-based violence, and experience with legal professionals and judicial processes. Additionally, it is preferred that the candidate be bilingual or bi-literate in an Asian or Pacific islander language.

See the full post on PSJD: https://www.psjd.org/job?OppID=98854

At the October Mini-Conference, we announced the finalists for this year’s PSJD Pro Bono Publico Award. To commend each finalist on their hard work and to demonstrate how difficult it will be to select the winner, we will feature a different finalist on the blog every Monday for the next five weeks.

Starting at the beginning of the alphabet, our first finalist is Leslie Alvarez from St. Mary’s University School of Law in San Antonio, Texas.

Leslie Alvarez

We selected Leslie as a finalist because her achievements in pro bono demonstrate a clear commitment to serving her community. Using her experiences as a first-generation U.S. citizen and with navigating the special education system, Leslie is a passionate advocate for disability rights. At work, she represented detained immigrant children with disabilities. Her supervisor describes Leslie as having “an unmatched work ethic” and “dedication to protecting the autonomy of people with disabilities.” At school, she coordinated two pro-bono legal clinics: one clinic to improve access to guardianship for individuals with disabilities, and another to “prepare psychiatric advance directives and other documents for individuals with mental health challenges.” Her tireless and compassionate efforts have made her an invaluable addition to the South Texas pro bono community. As Leslie herself asserts, “My current focus is on the disability rights fight, but my passion will always be service.”

Sam Halpert, NALP Director of Public Service Initiatives

Hello there, interested public!

Digest is squeaking out just under the wire this week, so I’ll be brief. Major stories include a proposal to fund the Right to Counsel for Eviction at the federal level, the new San Francisco DA’s decision to end pretrial cash bail, and the Trump Administration’s decision to relocate hundreds of immigration detainees’ hearings from northern to southern California. Thematically, work conditions for public defenders dominated the news, with Philadelphia public defenders preparing for a unionization ballot while state-wide policy proposals moved forward in Wisconsin, where public defenders are set to receive pay parity with state prosecutors, and in Georgia, where the governor is proposing to cut public defender funding by $3 million–and to increase prosecutors’ funds by about the same.

As always, these stories and more are in the links below.

See you around,

Sam

Immigration, Refugee & Citizenship Issues

• In San Francisco CA, “Northern California immigration attorneys are reeling after learning of a controversial Trump administration decision to move hundreds of immigrant detainees’ court hearings out of San Francisco and to a new courthouse in Van Nuys, a neighborhood in north Los Angeles.”
• In Texas, “Gov. Greg Abbott [explained] in a TV interview [] why Texas will be the only state in the nation to reject refugees seeking resettlement, saying that aid groups working with refugees should instead prioritize other Texans in need, including the state’s homeless population.”
• Also in Texas, “[w]ith a substantial increase in filing fees for immigration benefits looming, advocates are urging migrants to get their applications in as soon as possible. Once the fees go up, attorneys and nonprofits who assist migrants fear the benefits of U.S. citizenship, legal residency for relatives, work permit renewals and a host of other services will be out of reach for many of their clients.”
• In a motion before the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles CA, “[l]awyers representing undocumented immigrants detained by ICE allege that courts and government authorities under the Trump administration are not complying with a federal court order that protects mentally disabled immigrants in California, Arizona and Washington.”

Student Loans & Student Debt

• In New York NY, “Educational Credit Management Corporation (ECMC) — a nonprofit that guarantees and services student loans on behalf of the Department of Education (ED) — is challenging the January 7 decision made by Chief U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Cecelia G. Morris, who discharged $221,385.49 in student loan debt for Navy veteran and lawyer Kevin Rosenberg under chapter 7 bankruptcy.”
• In California, “[i]n an opposition motion [to a federal court’s $100,000 sanction against Education Secretary DeVos for violating a court order and billing thousands of students with loans tied to now-defunct Corinthian Colleges], the Education Department said it’s been doing its best to comply with a preliminary injunction that prevents it from demanding repayment for Corinthian-related student debt.”
• In Washington DC, “Sen. Elizabeth Warren [] praised the IRS and Treasury Department’s decision to provide tax relief to more people with discharged student loans.”
• The Chronicle of Higher Education, surveying the legislative agendas of the Democratic presidential candidates featured in the last debate, determined that “Free College, Student-Debt Forgiveness, and Pell Grant Expansion Dominate Higher-Ed Policy for Top Democratic Candidates.”
• Moody’s Investors Service released a report indicating that “student loan debt still stands at $1.7 trillion [with] borrowers taking longer to pay it back, which means they’re paying more interest in the end.”

Disaster Law & The Environment

• In San Francisco CA, “the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals threw out…Juliana vs. the United States[,]” in which “21 young people sued the US government, alleging that by contributing to climate [change] despite knowledge of its dangerous consequences, it was violating their constitutional rights to life, liberty, and property.” The opinion found that “the plaintiffs’ case must be made to the political branches or to the electorate at large.”
  • Time Magazine has more on this story and “what it might mean for the future of climate litigation.”

Legal Technology

• In New York State, “Elizabeth A. Garry, Presiding Justice of the Appellate Division, Third Department, provide[d] an update on access to justice in rural communities, writing that court simplification will ameliorate some of the challenges rural attorneys currently encounter.”
• In Washington DC, Above the Law, citing reporting from the Wall St. Journal, reported that “[w]hile Barr is trying to turn the public against Apple by suggesting it protects terrorists and murderers, FBI employees are worried his words and actions will harm them more than help them.”
  • In related news, Reuters reported that “Apple [] dropped plans to let iPhone users fully encrypt backups of their devices in the company’s iCloud service after the FBI complained that the move would harm investigations, [according to] six sources familiar with the matter[.]”
• Also in Washington DC, “[a] year after passage of a law requiring federal agencies to improve the quality and accessibility of digital services, the General Services Administration on Wednesday released a set of website design standards agencies across government can use to meet that mandate.”
• In Canada, “[t]he RCMP [] would neither confirm nor deny that it’s using Clearview AI’s technology, which allows police forces to check photos against a database of three billion images scraped from the web.”

Non-Profit & Government Management & Hiring

• In Washington DC, “Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) says she wants to expand the use of direct hire authorities to fill critical vacancies throughout the federal workforce. She wants to find ways to reinstate qualified former federal employees back to the workforce. Warren is also recommending a government mentorship program specifically for employees of color. As well as expanding the cooling off period to six years for lobbyists before they can take a government job.”
• In Hawaii, “Hawaii Attorney General Clare Connors subpoenaed [] KAHEA, or the Hawaiian Environmental Alliances [because t]he AG believes the group involved in protests against the Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) on Mauna Kea is illegally using donations to fund civil disobedience.”
• In Alberta, “Legal Aid Alberta (LAA) is asking its roster lawyers to update their online profiles in order to reflect changes it is implementing on choice of counsel for clients and travel compensation for those who take on legal aid certificates.”
• On the internet, “[a] private equity fund backed by three prominent Republican billionaire families is expected to buy the dot-org domain, throwing into question whether the online safe haven for rights organizations and nonprofits could now face censorship or spiralling costs[; ] a small and vociferous group of nonprofits, charities, and human rights organizations have banded together to make a last-ditch attempt to block the sale.” (See previous editions of the digest for additional coverage of this story.)

Access to Justice – Civil

• In Washington DC, “Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro (D-Connecticut)…re-introduc[ed] what’s known as the Eviction Prevention Act[:] ‘It would allow the U.S. Attorney General to authorize $125 million in grants to states, counties and cities to provide people with representation by an attorney [in] any eviction cases[.]”
• In California, “State Bar leaders took another step…toward opening up the regulation of legal services in the state, launching the assembly of a task force to explore a licensing scheme under which paraprofessionals would provide certain legal services and advice to consumers.”
• In New York NY, the New York Daily News argued that “with the housing and homelessness crises unabated, it is more imperative than ever to expand the right [to counsel for eviction] to include the many low-income New Yorkers who are currently ineligible.”
• In Manitoba, “Legal Aid Manitoba has a short-term “contingency” plan ready should the province’s private criminal lawyers stop taking new cases to protest the current rates of compensation, says an official with the service provider.”
• LegalShield, “the world’s leading provider of affordable legal and identity theft protection plans, released the results of The 2019 LegalShield Workplace Study[.]” Among the study’s findings were that “77% of employers believe access to affordable legal services can help improve employees’ financial well-being [and] 61% of employers would consider offering identity theft and / or legal protection plans.”

Access to Justice – Criminal

• In Philadelphia PA, “public defenders will vote to decide whether to unionize their workplace after informal negotiations with management stalled.”
• In Mercer County OH, “Justice Judith French [] talk[ed] to local judges about the issues they are facing and what resources the Ohio Supreme Court can provide to them. [On the shortage of public defenders,] French says even though the state has tried to address the problem with more funding, the solution is simple, Ohio needs more lawyers on both the criminal and civil side.”
  • In related news, the Ohio state legislature deliberated on “House Bill 5[, which] would give lawyers who become public defenders tuition loan assistance up to $85,000 for five years of service.”
• In Macomb County MI, local news reported the county “will create an office to represent indigent criminal defendants as part of statewide and national efforts to improve their legal representation.”
• In Atlanta GA, “Governor Brian Kemp has unveiled his proposed budget for the upcoming fiscal year, which will begin on July 1, 2020. In it, he asks lawmakers to slash the funds available to state public defenders by more than $3 million—and to increase the funds available to prosecutors by about the same amount.”
• In Madison WI, “[t]he state Senate [] passed an amended version of Senate Bill 468 to provide a pay-progression plan for assistant state public defenders.”
• In Jefferson City MO, “[d]uring the annual State of the Judiciary address, given to a joint session of the Missouri Legislature, Chief Justice George Draper III [stated that] ‘Speaking from the perspective of both a former prosecutor and a former trial judge, I can tell you the system simply does not work without a sufficiently funded and staffed public defender system’[.]”
• In Prince William County VA, “[a] proposal to create a public defender office for Prince William County has won two favorable votes already at the General Assembly.”

Criminal Justice Reform

• In San Francisco CA, “San Francisco’s new top prosecutor says his office will no longer ask for cash bail as a condition for defendants’ pretrial release, fulfilling one of his key campaign promises.”
• In Los Angeles CA, LA Magazine profiled “Rachel Rossi, the Progressive Ex-Public Defender Running for DA”
• In Honolulu, Hawaii News Now reported that “[p]rosecutors [have] recently started looking for warrants of witnesses and victims who are set to testify in upcoming trials.”
• In Washington DC, “Attorney General [] Barr [] swore in 16 members of a new national commission to study crucial issues in law enforcement, which aims to follow in the footsteps of a similar commission formed in 1965 that launched such concepts as improved training for police, increased data collection in policing and the 911 emergency dispatch system.”
• In Milwaukee WI, “Milwaukee’s District Attorney and the head of the Wisconsin Public Defender’s office have crossed turf lines to develop a system of ‘community-oriented’ justice whose end goal is to put fewer people in prison.”
• In Harris County TX, the Houston Chronicle reported that while “[t]he Harris County District Attorney’s office contends it needs more staff to ensure due process and increased diversion options [ c]ritics and primary challengers to District Attorney Kim Ogg contend that doing so would reverse justice reform efforts, believing more prosecutors equate to more convictions.”