Sam Halpert, NALP Director of Public Service Initiatives

Hello there, interested public! Busy week, both here at NALP and in the world. Thanks to everyone who made it here for the 2019 NALP/PSJD Public Service Mini-Conference. You all make this event what it is, and this year I think it turned out pretty well. Good luck to everyone who has students interviewing at EJW’s CCF this weekend (or who is an interviewing student)!

And now, the news: the Trump administration suffered a pair of high profile court defeats on its immigration policies this week, while in student loan news data indicates student debt is now worth twice as much as the entire housing market and the CFPB has an open call for a task “to examine ways to harmonize and modernize federal consumer financial laws.” In Canada, the Legal Services Society of British Columbia reached an unprecedented bargaining agreement shortly after a unanimous vote to authorize strike action.

As always, these stories and more are available below. But before I go, I’ll leave you with one more, from last spring:

“Speaking six blocks from where he grew up in South Baltimore, Congressman Elijah Cummings, D-Md., ‘begged’ lawyers to advance and protect voting rights in the nation…’Voter suppression remains a clear and present danger to the effective functioning of our democratic republic – and it must be stopped,’ Cummings said….He told the lawyers, ‘Without you we’re doomed.’”

See you around,

Sam

Immigration, Refugee & Citizenship Issues

• In Toronto ON, panelists at the Law Society of Ontario’s Hispanic Heritage Month “sa[id] they are navigating stricter policies and unstable legal aid funding, even as there is more need for their services amid humanitarian crises in Latin America.”
• In Hawaii, “[A] Shortage of Hawaii Pro Bono Attorneys Hobbles Legal Aid To Asylum Seekers”
• In Mississippi, “[t]he impact of the largest single-state work site immigration raid continues to reverberate through southern Mississippi as more criminal indictments for immigration-related felony charges…are stretching an already overloaded federal public defender’s office, with local civil rights attorneys and volunteers stepping up to assist those who have been charged.”
• In the Western District of Texas, “[a] federal judge ruled…that President Donald Trump violated federal law when he used his declaration of a national emergency to get millions for building a wall on the southern border.”
• In the Southern District of New York, “Attorney General Letitia James announced…that a judge…granted a nationwide preliminary injunction on the [Trump Administration’s ‘public charge’] rule as multiple lawsuits against it snake their way through the court system.”

Environmental Law & Disaster Legal Aid

• In Washington DC, “[t]he Supreme Court is set to decide soon whether to greenlight state-court proceedings for several cases in which state and local government officials seek to hold oil companies accountable for their role in climate change.”

Student Loans & Student Debt

• The Washington Informer reported that “[w]hen likely voters across the country were recently asked their opinions about student loan borrowing, 82% agreed that the still-growing $1.5 trillion debt is a national crisis[:] 74% of Republicans, 80% of independents, and 90% of Democrats.”
• In Washington DC, “Senator Elizabeth Warren [] urg[ed] the Trump administration to end its contract with Navient, one of the biggest contractors that collects payments on federal student loans.”
• Also in Washington DC, “[t]he College Affordability Act[] was introduced by the House Committee on Education and Labor[. It] aims to lower the cose of college, improve the quality of higher education and increase student opportunities[.]”
• Also also in Washington DC, “[Thirty] attorneys general around the nation…requested that the U.S. Department of Education extend the time frame to cancel student loans for students of now-closed schools.”
• Again also in Washington DC, “[f]our U.S. senators told the head of [the CFPB] that they want her to launch examinations into serious problems with a program designed to offer loan forgiveness to public service workers.”
• Yet again also in Washington DC, “[a] cross section of Capitol Hill staffers say the congressional-sponsored student loan repayment program can help mitigate costs for those [staffers] with large educational loans, while spurring recruitment, retention and diversity in the labor pool.”
• Yet again also also in Washington DC, “the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau says it’s forming a task force ‘to examine ways to harmonize and modernize federal consumer financial laws’. The CFPB’s [Director] Kraninger said that ‘as we work to set up the task force, we encourage interested individuals to apply to be considered to be part of the task force.” You can find the application here (Deadline 10/25/19)
• In Washington…State, “Attorney General Bob Ferguson is urging the state’s student loan borrowers struggling with public service loan forgiveness to register a complaint with the Attorney General’s office.”
• Benefit News published “5 reasons employers should offer student loan repayment benefits.”
• Realtor.com published data showing that “[t]he total student debt in the United States has grown to nearly double the housing market.”

Legal Technology

• In Mississippi, “Low-income Mississippians who have legal questions may [now] find assistance from the free legal information website ms.freelegalanswers.org.”
• In South Carolina, the Charleston Chronicle reported that “Amazon has been promoting DIY [] surveillance products to consumers….[b]ut what Amazon shoppers and most everyday Americans are just starting to find out is that the real target customers for these surveillance tools are police departments and other law enforcement agencies.”
  • In related news, in Tippecanoe & Clinton County IN, “police are joining 400 other law enforcement agencies across the country in using the new Neighbors by Ring [Amazon] app as a resource.”
• In Washington DC, the National Security Agency “worked with Penn State University, as part of a broader initiative from the Department of Homeland Security, to develop a free online course to educate people on cybersecurity operations, law and policy.”

Non-Profit & Government Management & Hiring

• In New York NY, “Niketa Sheth, Executive Director of Womankind, formerly the New York Asian Women’s Center, said…nonprofits like Womankind are struggling to pay staffers and keep programs running because 80 percent of domestic violence action are not reported.”
• In Miami FL, the Miami Herald reported that “[t]he Florida Coalition Against Domestic Violence…for the last 13 months[] has flouted the state’s oversight with little consequence.”
• In Washington DC, the Federal Circuit ruled that “[a] pair of nonprofit entities were correctly paid a lower interest rate on their tax refunds because they are incorporated under state law.”

Access to Justice – Civil

• In Canada, the Canadian Forum on Civil Justice released a report concluding that “[m]oney spent on justice programs pays off in terms of economic gains and efficiencies.”
• In Victoria BC, “[s]taff lawyers from The Legal Services Society (LSS), who service Legal Aid centres across BC, voted 100 per cent in favor of strike action[.]” The action appears to have been averted, as “[t]he British Columbia government has reached an agreement with legal aid lawyers [for a] two-and-a-half-year deal [that] will ensure better access to legal support and more stability for lawyers who have been giving services at below cost.”
  • In related news, “the association representing legal aid lawyers in the province is calling [the deal] unprecedented in Canada.”
• In Pennsylvania, “[t]he state Supreme Court heard argument…on whether it should grant a preliminary injunction that would restore the Pennsylvania General Assistance program that provided funding to some 12,000 people before it was eliminated Aug. 1.”
• In Rutland VT, “[r]epresentatives from two nonprofit agencies that help low-income and vulnerable Vermonters with civil cases…will be in the city at the end of the month to hear from the community about the needs and challenges in the state.” [Ed. Note: These agencies are holding meetings at locations around Vermont this month, as previously mentioned in this digest.]
• In Minneapolis MN, “city officials are applauding the first year of a program intended to help families maintain stable housing and keep them out of homeless shelters. …[When] Legal Aid and the Volunteeer Lawyers Network studied 374 eviction cases in Hennepin County…it found that fully represented tenants are twice as likely to stay in their homes and get twice as much time to move if they choose to.”

Access to Justice – Criminal

• In Missouri, “[m]embers of the state public defender commission met Thursday to outline the process for replacing Michael Barrett as director of the financially strapped agency[.] [The c]ommission chairman [] said his goal is to bring a new director on board no later than mid-January.”
• In Tulare County CA, “[a] design oversight at [the] newest jail may be putting the civil rights of prisoners in jeopardy. The problem, say defense attorneys is a lack of interview rooms…and the video conferencing system the [sheriff’s office] has chosen as a substitute.”
• In Butler County OH, “[t]he…Public Defender’s Office submitted the largest request for new staff to the commissioners at 12 [staffers].”

Criminal Justice Reform

• In New York, Indypendent.org published a story arguing that “[a]lthough the NY Working Families Party deserves credit for helping [Queens DA candidate] Tiffany Cabán initially prevail on primary night, there are some important questions surrounding the WFP’s handling of the next stage of the campaign, which ended last week with Cabán’s concession.”

The Organization

Philadelphia Legal Assistance (PLA) is a federally-funded civil legal aid organization providing free services to Philadelphia County’s indigent community. Their legal services extend to family law, federal taxes, housing, migrant farmworkers, public benefits, unemployment compensation, and more. PLA’s mission is to enforce and protect the rights of all individuals and families by providing accessible, creative, and high-quality legal assistance. PLA also works hard to achieve systemic change to improve the lives of the citizens of Philadelphia.

The Position

PLA seeks a Staff Attorney to join the Unemployment Compensation Unit, where the attorney will fight to provide temporary income replacement to workers who have lost their jobs. The attorney will service as a case advocate and litigator, representing clients in administrative hearings. Additionally, the attorney will work on policy and public education addressing new computer systems evaluations and payment of Unemployment Compensation benefits.

The ideal candidate will have 2 to 5 years of client representation experience and a commitment to workers’ rights and employment law.

See the full post on PSJD: https://www.psjd.org/opportunitydetails?OppID=96753

Sam Halpert, NALP Director of Public Service Initiatives

Hello there, interested public! Hope you’ve had a chance to check out the new face of PSJD.org, which went live yesterday morning. If you haven’t, please do! We’d love to know what you think. Or, drop by the 2019 NALP PSJD Public Service Miniconference (you can still register, here) and let us know in person! Hope to see you next week.

Now, on to the news. It’s been a big week. Rolling Stone reports that ICE has relocated hundreds of women in detention and will not tell their lawyers where they are. Secretary DeVos defied a federal court order to stop collecting student loan payments from borrowers who had been found eligible for forgiveness, and the Cato Institute published a study revealing that “lawyers whose formative professional experiences include serving as courtroom advocates for government[] are vastly overrepresented on the federal bench.”

As always, these stories and more are available below.

See you around,

Sam

Immigration, Refugee & Citizenship Issues

• Rolling Stone reported that “[after] RAICES began collecting female detainees’ testimones [concerning ‘egregious medical situations’ at the Karnes County Family Residential Center] and sharing them online…the hundreds of women who were housed there have been scattered to detention centers across the country, and ICE won’t tell [RAICES] where the women, many of whom are the organization’s clients, are.” [Ed. Note: the digest discussed the original complaints of these women in the 10-4-19 edition.]
• Courthouse News reported on six couples who have “[filed] a class action accusing federal agents of luring families to marriage interviews in Baltimore, only to detain the immigrant spouse for deportation…[T] American Civil Liberties Union says a growing number of [US CIS] officers have ‘cruelly twisted’ the rules by detaining immigrant spouses after marriage interviews…in Massachusetts[, …] New York, Virginia, Florida, Illinois and California.”
  • In related news, “U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agreed…to release three undocumented immigrants who have U.S. citizen spouses as a Massachusetts federal judge grilled ICE officials about the process they use to determine whether to keep immigrants jailed as they pursue green cards.”
• In University Park PA, Penn State Law’s Center for Immigrants’ Rights Clinic released a report on “Detained Immigrants and Access to Counsel in Pennsylvania,” which recommends “that Pennsylvania should fund and implement a public defender-style program for detained immigrants in removal proceedings to improve fairness and due process.”
• In Los Angeles CA, “City Attorney MIke Feuer…announced the filing of a brief [before the Supreme Court] in support of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals immigration program[.]”
• In Washington DC, “[p]rotesters prevented acting homeland security secretary Kevin McAleenan from giving a keynote address at an immigration conference at Georgetown University on Monday, the latest example of a Trump administration official being blocked from speaking in public.”

Environmental Law & Disaster Legal Aid

• In South Royalton VT, “the Environmental Advocacy Clinic at Vermont Law School [announced it] will serve as legal counsel to [the] National Wildlife Federation in its high impact litigation and policy advocacy.”

Student Loans & Student Debt

• In Washington DC, “U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos faces potential sanctions or a finding she’s in contempt of court for continuing to collect on the debt of former students at bankrupt Corinthian Colleges Inc., going so far as seizing their tax refunds and wages…The judge said she was ‘astounded’ that the department violated her June order to stop collecting the debts from students, who had been promised refunds of their tuition.”
• Also in Washington DC, “U.S. Representatives Mike Levin (D-CA) and Katie Porter (D-CA) introduced legislation to expand the Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) program for individuals who work at Veteran Service Organizations (VSOs).”
• The Wall Street Journal discussed how “a handful of companies are trying to prevent [student debtholder employees] from falling behind on retirement savings by matching their student-loan repayments with contributions to a 401(k) plan.”

Legal Technology

• Bruce Scheier, a fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society, gave a talk on “why technologists need to get involved in public policy.”
• In Berkeley CA, “UC Berkeley received a $3 million grant…from the Public Interest Technology University Network, or PIT-UN, a partnership between 21 different universities intended to grow the field of public interest technology…It aims to facilitate collaboration between technologists and public policy leaders in ‘serving society’.”
• In Mississippi, “[a] first-ever cybersecurity audit of Mississippi showed that a considerable percentage of the state’s agencies regularly failed to comply with its cybersecurity protocols.”
• In Massachusetts, the Massachusetts Appleseed Center for Law and Justice released a study recommending that the state “help litigants deal with their cases by developing an online help center that could guide people through the basics of legal proceedings, assisting them as they deal with their cases without crossing the line and actually imparting legal advice[.]”
• In Illinois, the Lawyers’ Committee for Better Housing, Illinois Legal Aid Online and the Lawyers Trust Fund of Illinois released Rentervention. The tool is “a free service [that] shows tenants how to advocate for themselves when it comes to things like evictions and maintenance issues[.]”
• In Washington DC, “[a] group of more than 30 civil rights groups on Tuesday signed an open letter calling on lawmakers to cut partnerships between Amazon’s Ring doorbell surveillance systems and local police.”
• In Washington DC, “U.S. Attorney General Bill Barr called on U.S. technology companies to give law enforcement ‘secure legal access’ to encrypted data as a way to provide ‘greater safety to the public.’”

Non-Profit & Government Management & Hiring

• The Cato Institute published a study confirming the “general[] perce[ption] that a disproportionate number of federal judges served as government lawyers before donning a robe.” According to their findings, “[f]ormer government lawyers–and more specifically, lawyers whose formative professional experiences include serving as courtroom advocates for government–are vastly overrepresented on the federal bench.”
• In Alaska, “Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s administration is negotiating a contract extension that would pay a Virginia law firm $125,000 for its services in a legal fight with Alaska unions…Under [state] Attorney General Kevin Clarkson’s interpretation of a 2018 U.S. Supreme Court ruling, the state’s unionized public employees must inform the state annually of their intention to remain union members. The system would be the first of its kind in the nation.”
• In Sebastian FL, the City Attorney “has given 60-days notice that he intends to resign [saying] ‘it [is] time to consider restructing the position to full time’.”
• In Philadelphia PA, the Defender Association of Philadelphia “has failed to secure a quick win in a case…where it faces allegations that it violated federal law by terminating an attorney found to have mental health problems rather than transfer her to another role.”
• In NonProfit Quarterly, a senior counsel with the Alliance for Justice wrote to examine the question: “Can a 501c3 Advocate for Impeachment of a Federal Office Holder?”

Access to Justice – Civil

• In Winnipeg MB, “[h]undreds lined up [] downtown [] for the chance to witness the Supreme Court of Canada hear cases outside Ottawa for the first time in its 144-year existence.”
• In Ontario, the Federation of Ontario Law Associations, in a “Submission Regarding the Review of the Legal Aid Services Act,” told the government that “[e]nlisting the services of the private bar is more efficient than loading more work onto duty counsel[.]”
• In Vermont, “Legal Services Vermont and Vermont Legal Aid…are holding seven meetings around the state to hear from Vermonters, their community partners and supporters. …They will use the information gathered to help decide where to put their legal aid resources.”
• In Charleston SC, “[r]enters facing eviction f[ound] help as Charleston’s housing court g[ot] underway.”
• In New York NY, “[m]ore than half of Bronx tenants facing eviction in housing court were unaware of the city’s new ‘right to counsel’ law, according to a survey conducted by a Bronx advocacy group.”
• In Chicago IL, “[as p]roposed reforms to further open the legal system to nonlawyers and tech companies to increase access to justice are being considered by several western state bar groups,” ABA president Judy Perry Martinez told Bloomberg Law these “[s]tate bar efforts to reform law firm ownership rules could spur the American Bar Association to eventually do the same[.]”

Access to Justice – Criminal

• In Pittsburgh PA, “[t]wo Duquesne University professors and one University of Pittsburgh professor have been given funding…to see if their innovative approach to holistic legal representation can improve the [sic] juvenile indigent defense representation.”
• In Greene County MO, “[County] Comissioners…approved spending $25,000 for contracted private attorneys to defend people in criminal court who are too poor to afford their own representation, making Greene County the first in the state to do so. Officials said they hoped the money would help ‘unclog’ a local criminal justice system [facing] a shortage of public defenders and a growing need for criminal representation.”
• In Crawford County PA, county government “is looking to fill the top two jobs in the county’s Office of Public Defender as a new country court criminal trial term looms next month.”
• In Montgomery County NY, the county “Public Defender’s Office is seeking to create its first full-time assistant public defender[.]”
• In Gregg County TX, “[t]he cost of providing adequate legal representation for [the county’s] indigent defendants continues to rise.”
• In Coshocton OH, “[l]ocal judges…recently met with Coshocton County Comissioners to discuss the [sic] possibly raising appointed [defense] attorney fees.”
  • In related news, “Coshocton County Commissioners are considering raising fees for appointed attorneys based on increased state funding in order to ensure those who need legal representation are properly represented.”

Criminal Justice Reform

• In California, “Governor Gavin Newsom…signed 25 bills aimed at setting a path to reform California’s criminal justice system. The bills include support for those reentering the community after serving their sentences, including creating a system to automatically expunge records of individuals previously convicted of low-level offenses, as well as reform unfair sentencing practices, and enhance support for victims of crime.”
• In San Francisco CA, Mayor London Breed appointed “Suzy Loftus, a former prosecutor and president of the San Francisco Police Commission [district attorney] on an interim basis until an election is held early next month…Critics of the move say Breed appointing a candidate she endorsed gives Loftus an unfair advantage over her rivals.”
• In Connecticut, “[state] residents for the first time have a chance to help the state appoint its top prosecutor, thanks to a new law that aims to make the criminal justice system more transparent.”
• In New York NY, “[t]he Bronx District Attorney’s Office has released some of its internal files on police dishonesty–the first D.A.’s office in the city [to] make such records available to the public.”

The Organization

Day One is a New York-based organization committed to ending dating abuse and domestic violence, particularly among young people. Day One achieves its goals through community education, supportive services, legal advocacy, and leadership development. Day One believes in empowering young people so they can have safe relationships for themselves and their peers. The organization provides counselling and legal services for survivors of relationship abuse, as well implements preventative educational programming about intimate partner abuse and the law. All of the organization’s services are provided to youth for free and in both English and Spanish.

The Position

Day One seeks an attorney with at least two years of experience to further the organization’s mission of promoting healthy relationships among young people. The staff attorney would be expected to represent clients in family and domestic violence courts, conduct trainings on intimate partner abuse and the law, collaborate with social service providers, and coordinate community outreach and awareness activities. The ideal candidate will be Spanish-English bilingual, creative, respectful, collaborative, and committed to empowering youth.

See the full post on PSJD: https://www.psjd.org/opportunitydetails?OppID=96656

Sam Halpert, NALP Director of Public Service Initiatives

Hi everyone!

Regular readers of our Public Interest News Digest may have noticed that we discontinued our weekly dispatches for a couple months over the summer. Since the Digest made its return this fall, I’ve hinted a few times that big changes were underway for PSJD.org.

I’m excited that beginning tomorrow morning you’ll be able to see where our time has been going in recent months. Visitors to PSJD.org tomorrow will find a whole new layout! Each page on PSJD has been re-designed based on common questions and problems we’ve encountered over the years when working with jobseekers and employers. Our hope is that the new site will feel more consistent, more immediate, and more intuitive for users.

Many things will change. In this post I’ll call your attention to just a few examples.

More Consistent

Throughout the site, we’ve looked at the different ways in which similar features have been presented in the past and worked to provide a single, predictable experience.

On today’s PSJD.org, when jobseekers and school administrators log in they’re able to bookmark the site’s content so that they can refer to it later. This goes for their search results and also for individual job notices, employer profiles, and resources in the resource library. But when you want to create a bookmark in each of these places, the button you need to press has a different label depending on which type of page you’re bookmarking–and is located in a different spot on each type of page as well.

On tomorrow’s PSJD.org, every type of page that can be bookmarked will have a bookmark button in the same place. So once you know where to look, you’ll never have to wonder if you’re missing something.

More Immediate

In the time since PSJD.org was last updated, the web has changed a lot. New options are available that make sites more immediately responsive.

On today’s PSJD.org, if you want to select a city from search returns, you have to scroll down a long list of checkboxes and hunt for it. If you want to reset your password, you visit a separate page from the one you were hoping to access and then must navigate back to where you were.

On tomorrow’s PSJD.org, search results can be refined with select boxes where as soon as you begin typing the option you’re looking for the list of results will narrow to only the possibilities you care about. When you ask for a new password, the form you need will appear in a popup, so you can make your request and then get right back to what you were doing.

More Intuitive

In phone conversations and via email over the years, we’ve developed a pretty good sense of which parts of PSJD do things that our users don’t expect. With this update, we’ve worked to eliminate these areas of confusion wherever possible. We hope the new site will do more to explain what is happening–and why–for users on the platform.

On today’s PSJD, we use icons to communicate concepts, like a rolling deadline or an archival job post.

On tomorrow’s PSJD, whenever you encounter an icon button, you can hover on it (or long-press) to get some explanatory text that will let you know what that button does. Status messages, which before were sometimes buried in the main text of the page in ways that users did not always notice, should be more obvious.

On today’s PSJD, if you want to understand how to use the platform you can download a PDF from the “About PSJD” section and follow along. (Or, of course, send us an email or give us a call.)

On tomorrow’s PSJD, pages will contain an ‘?’ button. When you press it, you’ll get a tutorial on how to use the portion of the site you’re currently viewing that’s specific to your user type (e.g., jobseeker or employer).

So if you load PSJD.org tomorrow and things look a bit different, try the tour! And of course, even though we hope it will be easier for you to find your way around without getting in touch we are still happy to answer your emails and take your calls.

Hope you enjoy the new site,
Sam

Sam Halpert, NALP Director of Public Service Initiatives

Hello there, interested public! Busy days here at NALP, where we’re putting the finishing touches on the 2019 NALP PSJD Public Service Miniconference (you can still register, here) and on the new design for PSJD, which will launch late next week!

In the meantime, though, the news marches on. Lots of big stories this week, including revelations from the National Association of Immigration Judges that judges are making decisions concerning asylum based on a fear of reprisals and a decision by the CEO of the loan servicer responsible for PSLF not to testify before Congress. As always, these stories and more are available below.

See you around,

Sam

Immigration, Refugee & Citizenship Issues

• In Washington DC, “[t]he union representing the nation’s immigration judges filed two labor complaints against the justice department[.]”
  • In related news, “Ashley Tabbador, president of the National Association of Immigration Judges, disclosed… in a panel discussion on sweeping changes to the nation’s immigration courts [that s]ome immigration judges hearing cases at the U.S.-Mexico border have confided to their fellow jurists they have issued decisions on an immigrant’s ability to enter or stay in the United States based on whether the decision would get them fired.”
  • More on this story from Prospect.org.
• On the U.S. southern border, the Associated Press reported that “Migrant child detention centers shifting from nonprofit to private sector.” The AP story observed that “[s]o far, the only private company caring for migrant children is…owned by beltway contractor Caliburn International Corp. …Former White House Chief of Staff John Kelly joined Caliburn’s board this string after stepping down from decades of government service [and] critics say this means Kelly now stands to financially benefit from a policy he helped create.”
• In Texas, “[i]mmigrant women being held in a [] detention center say they are being denied proper medical care — in some cases cancer treatment — and have become suicidal after lengthy stays in the facility.”
• In New York, “New York City together with the state has invested $1 million for legal services for immigrants who are facing imminent deportation.”
• Also in New York, “[t]he Trump administration asked a New York federal judge to let it enforce a new policy that would penalize immigrants for using certain public benefits, claiming the nonprofits and states behind a pair of lawsuits challenging the policy won’t be affected by it.”
• Also also in New York, “[a]t least two lawsuits have been filed in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York challenging the legality of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency of making civil immigration arrests for Caribbean and other immigrants without a judicial warrant or court order in and around New York State courthouses.”
• In Ontario, “Legal Aid Ontario said [] it will plan to make payments on refugee and immigration certificates up to and including March 31, 2020. The announcement is an update after the federal government announced on Aug. 12 it would offer LAO a one-time influx of $25.7 million for immigration and refugee services.”

Environmental Law & Disaster Legal Aid

• In New York NY, “[s]ixteen young people from around the world brought a legal complaint about climate change to the United Nations[.] Their petition outlines how their human rights are being violated by the failure of nations to seriously address the climate crisis.” [Ed. note: Here’s the petition.]
• In Washington DC, “[a] group of fossil fuel companies have appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court in a last-ditch effort to stop Baltimore’s climate liability suit against them from going to trial in state court.”

Student Loans & Student Debt

• In Washington DC, “[o]ne of the nation’s largest student loan servicers has refused to testify before Congress as lawmakers try to obtain more information regarding allegations of widespread mismanagement of student loan programs.”
• In The Hechinger Report, one of the co-founders of Student Defense discussed the Department of Education’s mishandling of a Presidential order “to automatically discharge [total and permanently disabled] veterans’ [student] loans”: “Because the federal government holds both the loans and the information about who qualifies, Secretary DeVos [could] erase the debt today. Instead, though, the Department of Education has instructed [] one of its contracted [] loan servicers [] to mail applications to the last known address of each borrower…As a direct result, fewer than half of the nearly 400,000 eligible borrowers identified by the SSA have received the relief they are owed.”
• In Rhode Island, “[l]egislation…to protect student loan borrowers and establish oversight of student loan servicers operating in Rhode Island was ceremonially signed by Gov. Gina M. Raimondo[.]”
• In New York, “[state] Attorney General Letitia James alleged in a new lawsuit [that t]he company that services loans eligible for the federal government’s Public Service Loan Forgiveness program has ‘proven itself unwilling or unable’ to do the job.”

Legal Technology

• In Los Angeles CA, “[t]he Los Angeles County Public Defender, which named its inaugural Chief Information Officer Mohammed Al Rawi in March, plans to modernize and integrate 23 legacy [technology] systems including the 1960s-era Trial Court Information system…with a go-live target date of summer of 2020.”
• In Michigan, “State Senator Jim Runestad [] introduced legislation to fix the state’s constitution [by] inject[ing] the words ‘electronic data’ and ‘electronic communications’ into the list of items protected by [the] state constitution[‘s protections from unreasonable searches and seizures.]”
• In Philadelphia PA, “you can monitor arrest and prosecution numbers in real time, thanks to a new public dashboard set up by the office of District Attorney Larry Krasner.”

Non-Profit & Government Management & Hiring

• In British Columbia, “[the province’s] Human Rights Tribunal has gagged both the province’s legal profession regulator and a law student who claims the regulator’s entry requirements are discriminatory…against those with mental health issues[.]”
• Law.com reported that “[a] study by the Clinical Legal Education Association finds that women are over-represented among law school clinical faculty, while black and Latino clinicians have made few gains over the past three decades.”
• The NonProfit Times reported that “the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy (NCRP) announced [a strategic] evolution with a restructuring to direct more philanthropy dollars toward social justice movements.”
• In Tokepa KS, “[the] mayor and city council next week will consider joining other government entities [by hiring attorneys to] su[e] prescription drug producers for the role they have allegedly played in bringing about the opioid crisis. The action being considered would seek to recoup increased costs Topeka’s city government has incurred[.]”
• In Dauphin County PA, local news reported that “the state attorney general’s office will soon charge Dauphin County’s chief public defender[, who] allegedly directly employees to work on the election campaigns of Dauphin County candidates while on county time.”

Access to Justice – Civil

• In Charlotte NC, the Charlotte Observer reported on the impact of the county’s decision to “allocat[e] $300,000 for Legal Aid [for tenants] in the last fiscal year … put[ting] Mecklenburg [County] among a small but growing number of places…spending government money to give tenants access to lawyers in eviction cases.”
• In Mankato MN, local news observed that “[t]he legal aid office established at Open Door Health Center could serve as a model for future legal/medical partnerships in rural settings.”

Access to Justice – Criminal

• In Wyoming, “[a]ttorneys for Circuit Court Judge Paul Phillips argue[d] that Phillips acted within his authority and interpreted state law correctly when he found State Public Defender Diane Lozano to be in contempt of court this summer, according to a brief filed with the Wyoming Supreme Court[.] … On May 1, [Lozano] notified Circuit Court judges that her attorneys in Campbell County would no longer represent people charged with misdemeanors [as they] had such a heavy workload that they were unable to fulfill their ethical obligations[.]”
• In Wisconsin, “[a] bipartisan group of lawmakers are sponsoring a bill that would increase merit-based pay for public defenders by roughly $4 million over the next two years.”
• In Richmond VA, “[l]awyers in [the] public defender’s office, in the midst of a campaign to increase their salaries, say they’re paid so much less than the prosecutors they face in court that it raises questions about whether low-income defendants are getting a fair shake at justice.”
• In Missouri, “[t]he head of [the state’s] public defender system–who in 2016 appointed former governor Jay Nixon to defend a case in protest of funding cuts–is resigning.”
• In Ionia County MI, “[a] new position has been created in the [county] Public Defender’s Office following a vote from the county’s board of commissioners.”
• In Adams County NE, “[a]n effort to make the Adams County Public Defender a full-time position failed[, leaving the position at ¾ FTE].”
• In Oklahoma, Oklahoma Watch reported that “despite reforms, high caseloads continue to stress [the state’s] public defender system.”

Criminal Justice Reform

• In Wichita KS, “[t]he federal public defender’s office [] is seeking nearly $224,000 in legal fees and expenses from the federal government because of prosecutorial misconduct during an investigation into recordings of phone calls between inmates and their attorneys at a prison.”
• In Seattle WA, “according to a report released Monday by local business groups…Seattle’s city attorney won’t prosecute approximately 50 percent of the non-traffic arrests brought to his office by police[.]”
• In Baltimore MD, “[the city’s] top prosecutor has begun asking judges to throw out nearly 800 convictions that she said were tainted by officers linked to a corruption scandal.”
• In San Francisco CA, local news interviewed “Chesa Boudin[, who] worked as a public defender in San Francisco for seven years and is currently on leave while running for office [in a bid to become San Francisco’s district attorney].”

The Organization

If/When/How is a national network of law students and lawyers working to ensure that everyone has the power to determine if, when, and how to define, create, and sustain families with dignity and to actualize sexual and reproductive wellbeing on their own terms. If/When/How uses advocacy, support, and organizing to transform law and policy as well as legal systems and institutions that perpetuate the oppression of sexual and reproductive rights.

The Position

If/When/How is now accepting applications for the 2020-2021 Reproductive Justice Fellowship Program. The Program offers three fellowship opportunities: (1) the RJ Federal Fellow, (2) the RJ State Fellow, and (3) the RJ-HIV Fellow.

The RJ Federal Fellow will be located in Washington, D.C. and will work to further If/When/How’s reproductive justice policy agenda at a federal level. The ideal candidate will be knowledgeable of reproductive rights law and be committed to social justice and racial equality.

The RJ State Fellow will be based in the South and will work for reproductive health policy changes at the local, state, and regional level. The ideal candidate will not only have knowledge of U.S. reproductive rights law, but will also be knowledgeable of critical issues affecting the U.S. South.

The RJ-HIV Fellow will be based in either Atlanta, GA or Oakland, CA. This Fellow will focus their work on policy that will promote reproductive justice for people living with and affected by HIV. Unlike the other two fellowships, the RJ-HIV Fellow’s work will not involve lobbying; rather, the Fellow will provide in-the-field advocacy and education to reduce stigma and empower people living with HIV. The ideal candidate will have relevant experience and a strong commitment to social justice and racial equality.

See the full post on PSJD: https://www.psjd.org/opportunitydetails?OppID=96354

Sam Halpert, NALP Director of Public Service Initiatives

Hello there, interested public! Interesting news week to share with you all, including a rare prosecutor/defender team-up in New York State (see Immigration, below). You’ll also want to look at the civil access to justice section, where there’s news out of Chicago concerning non-attorney involvement in the delivery of legal services and a Lexpert article analyzing proposed class action reforms in Ontario.

Thanks to all of you who have already turned in nominations for the 2019-2020 PSJD Pro Bono Publico Award! I look forward to reading what you have to say about your students.

One more thing: There’s still time for the public interest career counselors, pro bono program managers, and other public service career professionals out there to register for the 2019 NALP PSJD Public Service Miniconference, here in Washington DC on October 17th. It’s an ideal opportunity to meet and network with colleagues from across the country, attend substantive and skills-based programs, and interact with NALP staff members!

See you around,

Sam

Immigration, Refugee & Citizenship Issues

• In Texas, “U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement will soon resume detaining migrant families at a [] facility outside of San Antonio, clearing the way for the agency to detain hundreds of additional parents and children.”
• In New York, “Attorney General Letitia James filed a lawsuit [] against U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, alleging the agency’s practice of making arrests in and around Empire State courthouses violates the U.S. Constitution, federal law and state court rules.”
  • In further news, “[p]rosecutors and public defenders teamed up Wednesday to announce lawsuits against the federal Immigrations and Customs Enforcement [sic] for arrests of undocumented people in courthouses, which have spiked across New York state since President Trump took office.”
• In Hawaii, “[a n]ewly formed nonprofit, The Legal Clinic, an affiliate of national network Justice for Our Neighbors [began] working to provide free or low-cost services to immigrants, refugees and asylum seekers in need of legal assistance in Hawaii.”
• In Washington DC, “[t]he District will award $2.5 million in grant funding to provide legal help to undocumented residents and, for the first time, assist those detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.”

Disaster Legal Aid

• In Washington DC, a new report from the LSC’s Disaster Task Force “says that as natural disasters become an even greater concern, legal aid organizations should be working to establish relationships with disaster-relief agencies and community groups, as well as educating the public and training volunteers, so that when a disaster strikes, they will be poised to start helping right away.”

Student Loans & Student Debt

• In Forbes Magazine, a senior contributor argued that “while the rejection rate [for public service student loan forgiveness] is still high, it improved almost 3x in a year, and the [recent] report tells a better story of success than past reports.”
• ThinkAdvisor discussed the “Equity for Education” benefit designed by Chegg, “a publicly traded company that provides an online educational platform”. Under the benefit, “[Chegg] provides entry-level through manager-level employees with at least two years tenure at the company a $5,000 annual grant of company stock to help the employee pay off their student debt[.]”
• Access Lex published an argument that “PSLF Serves the Public Interest,” including a “fact sheet on the topic.”
• Inside Higher Ed reported that “[d]ata released by the Education Department Wednesday showed that the share of borrowers defaulting on their student loans has declined for the sixth straight year.”

Legal Technology

• The World Justice Project launched its Access to Justice Data Portal, a “new data microsite [that] brings [its] latest global report to life with user-friendly visualizations of global survey data on legal needs and access to justice.”

Non-Profit & Government Management & Hiring

• In Illinois, JDSupra warned that “Illinois employers must begin preparing for the host of new legal requirements impacting the workplace beginning in 2020[ when] legal changes on topics ranging from hiring practices and pay equity to drug testing and severance agreements [will come into force].”
• In Washington DC, Kiva Zytnick gave an interview to Equal Justice Works on “the Importance of Facilitating Opportunities for Future Public Interest Leaders.”

Access to Justice – Civil

• In Ontario, Lexpert analyzed the potential impact of the “47 recommendations aimed at improving judicial efficacy, access to justice, and reducing legal costs” that came out of the “Law Commission of Ontario[‘s] Final Report recommending changes to Ontario’s class action legislation and practice.”
• In California, “a new survey released by the state bar shows [that i]ndigent California residents have more legal problems than wealthier counterparts but less access to legal professionals who could help them[.]”
• In Illinois, “the Chicago Bar Foundation and Chicago Bar Association pan to launch a join task force Oct. 7 to explore how state attorney regulations could be modified to encourage more innovation in the legal sector and ultimately increase access to justice.” Law360, discussing the story, observed that “some say [this move] could be a ‘tipping point’ for such efforts to increase access to legal help, despite heated attorney opposition in places like California.”
  • Relatedly, in California “[h]undreds of responses…about various California bar proposals that could…open a door to nonattorney ownership of firms reveal[ed that m]ost of those who shared their thoughts don’t support a wholesale reshaping of how legal clients are served[.]”
• In New York, the “state has committed an unprecedented amount of funding to provide legal representation for low-income individuals in civil matters in recent years, but leaders from organizations that provide those services testified at a hearing Monday in Albany that the demand for that help has continued to grow.”
• In Massachusetts, “[f]our new members have been appointed to the Massachusetts Access to Justice Commission, [namely] Superior Court Judge Valierie A. Yarashus; Laura W. Gal, supervisory attorney at Northeast Legal Aid; Benjamin K. Golden, health law clinical fellow at Suffolk University Law School; and J.D. Smeallie, litigation partner at Holland & Knight.”
• In Columbia SC, “[u]nder a new city [] ordinance, ‘extreme risk’ residents who are poor might get a court-appointed lawyer — despite not facing any criminal charges — before they could be ordered by a municipal judge to turn over their guns.”

Access to Justice – Criminal

• In Wisconsin, the state’s “2019-2021 budget won’t provide Door and Kewaunee counties with additional assistant district attorneys. Increased compensation for public defenders, however, is expected to help process cases faster.”
  • Meanwhile, “until that new rate kicks in Jan. 1, the public defender’s office is having a difficult time finding lawyers willing to handle their cases.”
• In Georgia, the “Public Defender Council will have to furlough public defenders across the state for 10 days between now and next June to meet Gov. Brian Kemp’s budget-cut requests, according to state budget documents.”

Criminal Justice Reform

• In Chicago IL, “the ABA’s Death Penalty Representation Project reached a major milestone[:] 100 capital cases have been finalized with a sentence of less than death with the assistance of the project and its pro bono partners.”
• In St. Louis MO, “[m]ore than 65 prosecutors have quit or have been fired from the Circuit Attorney’s Office since January 2017. That’s more than 100% turnover — a half-dozen more lawyers have left the office than were on the roster when [Circuit Attorney] Kimberly M. Gardner took charge 2 ½ years ago.”
• In Cambridge MA, “researchers at Harvard Law School’s Criminal Justice Policy Program la[id] out a road map for reforming how courts across America can reform the imposition of excessive fines and fees, the devastating impacts of which fall disproportionately on the poor and on people of color.”
• In Los Angeles CA, “City Attorney Mike Feuer announced [] that the Dispute Resolution Program his office oversees is expanding to include both traditional community mediation services and community policy outreach effort.”
• In San Diego CA, “City Attorney Mara W. Elliott [] announced that her Office is moving forward on the dismissal of thousands of low-level marijuana cases prosecuted by the San Diego City Attorney’s Office under laws that are no longer on the books.”

The Organization

The Human Rights and Special Prosecutions Section (HRSP) of the U.S. Department of Justice investigates and prosecutes cases involving human rights violations, international criminal law, and complex immigration crimes. The HRSP sees its mission as a deep commitment to human rights as a domestic law enforcement imperative and as part of the international effort to end impunity for human rights violators. The HRSP investigates war crimes, torture, genocide, human trafficking, and other international crimes.

The Position

The HRSP seeks law student volunteers for the Spring semester to assist in the HRSP’s investigations. Student interns would conduct legal research culminating in written assignments on topics involving international, criminal, and immigration law. Second- and third-year law students as well as International Law LL.M. candidates are encouraged to apply. The ideal applicants will have experience or interest in criminal and international law.

See the full post on PSJD: https://www.psjd.org/opportunitydetails?OppID=95881

Sam Halpert, NALP Director of Public Service Initiatives

Hello there, interested public! Here at NALP, I’m still focused on overhauling the technology that powers PSJD.org. Out in the world, there’s a variety of legal technology news as well, with Ohio rolling out a new statewide legal information portal and several commentators talking about the importance of data analytics to legal services organizations and non-profits.

In other news, commentators are examining a report out of Utah, where a work group on regulatory reform proposed new rules that would allow nonlawyers to own and invest in law firms as part of an effort to narrow the access-to-justice gap (published while we were on hiatus, in August). Student loans continue to make headlines, with consumer advocates accusing the U.S. Department of Education of shielding student loan services from investigations into illegal activities and a new poll indicating that a majority of voters support student debt cancellation. Immigration law at the southern border also continues to evolve, with legal volunteers heading into Mexico and Border Patrol agents taking over duties from asylum officers.

One more thing: PSJD subscriber schools have until Friday, September 27th to nominate students for the 2019-2020 PSJD Pro Bono Publico Award. The award goes to a law student who has made significant contributions to pro bono work at their institution and in their community, and it comes with a commemorative plaque and a check. So if you have anyone on your campus you think I should know about, please consider nominating them.

See you around,

Sam

Immigration, Refugee & Citizenship Issues

• In Dilley TX, “Border Patrol agents, rather than highly trained asylum officers, are beginning to screen migrant families for ‘credible fear’ to determine whether applicants qualify for U.S. protection[; t]he first Border Patrol agents arrived last week[.]”
• In San Diego CA, “[t]he National Immigration Justice Center (NIJC) announced [] it would be collaborating with the Federal Defenders of San Diego, Inc., in hopes of providing legal counsel to asylum seekers and other migrants.”
• In Atlanta GA, Georgia State announced “the first law clinic at any university in Georgia specifically dedicated to immigration law will open [in January 2020].”
• In New York NY, “[c]ity officials and advocates are reaching out to immigrant communities to provide information about the Trump Administration’s pending ‘public charge’ rule. The policy, which could potentially take effect Oct. 15, seeks to make it harder for some immigrants to get their residency permit or a visa if they receive social benefits or are likely to do so in the future.”
• In Mexico, lawyers are arriving from around the United States to counsel asylum-seekers “being released by U.S. federal agents to the streets of Matamoros, Mexico, prior to their hearing dates” under a new Administration policy. “Previously, asylum-seekers either were held in U.S. detention facilities until their federal immigration court dates, or they were released with a Notice to Appear in court on their own.”

Disaster Legal Aid

• In Texas, “[t]he State Bar of Texas and Lone Star Legal Aid s[ought] to alert residents that free legal resources are available to low-income individuals affected by severe storms and flooding spawned by Tropical Storm Imelda.”

Student Loans & Student Debt

• In a Hill-HarrisX poll, “[a] majority of voters said they support the idea of free state college and canceling student debt.”
• In Washington DC, “[t]he Education Department is intervening on behalf of student loan servicers, some accused of illegally exploiting borrowers, by declining to turn over information to law enforcement agencies in multiple states investigating the businesses, some consumer advocates say.”
• Also in Washington DC, the U.S. House of Representatives’ Subcommittee on Higher Education and Workforce Investment held a hearing on “Broken Promises: Examining the Failed Implementation of the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program.”
  • At the hearing, “[a] New York City middle school art teacher testified…about why she joined a lawsuit against Education Secretary Betsy DeVos over her handling of a student loan forgiveness program.”
• Also also in Washington DC, the Federal News Network published a podcast arguing that the “[f]ederal loan forgiveness program [is] too complicated for intended users.”
• Again also in Washington DC, “[t]he U.S. Army has already achieved its recruiting goal this year, after falling short about 6,500 recruits in 2018. At the Pentagon this week, the head of Army Recruiting Command Maj. Gen. Frank Muth attributed the success to America’s crippling student debt crisis.”
• In Pennsylvania, “[a] bill…that would offer student loan forgiveness to volunteer first responders has passed a House committee and could get a floor vote next month.”
• In Washington State, the “State Department of Financial Institution (DFI) has published proposed revisions to its student loan servicer regulations.”
• In Minnesota, “[t]he first set of labor contracts negotiated by Gov. Tim Walz’s administration provide for worker raises, slightly increase employee health costs, expand student loan repayment offerings and set a $15 per hour minimum wage for members of the largest union.”

Legal Technology

• In San Francisco CA, “Microsoft Corp. President and Chief Legal Office Brad Smith said…that U.S. tech companies will change how they moderate online platforms in response to new laws from foreign governments, regardless of whether U.S. lawmakers take action.”
  • Meanwhile, “Rep. Suzan DelBene, D-Wash., a long-time advocate for stronger data privacy rules and current sponsor of the Information Transparency and Personal Data Control Act, said today it’s unlikely that Congress will take action on this issue this year.”
  • Meanwhile, “[a] landmark California law that will alter the way internet giants like Google and Facebook collect and deploy user data has survived heavy lobbying from industry groups and is set to take effect in January with most of its major consumer privacy protections intact.”
• In Ohio, Ohio Legal Help, “a website created to help all Ohioans access the civil justice system by providing free information on common legal issues, details about court and other legal forms and referrals to legal aid and bar association referral programs, formally launched[.]”

Non-Profit & Government Management & Hiring

• Findlaw.com examined a trend in which, “[i]n recent years, local governments and public offices have begun turning to crowdfunding to finance projects and needs.”
• In San Diego Magazine, spoke with Josh Shapiro of UC San Diego’s Center for Research on the Regional Economy about how “in an increasingly data-driven world, nonprofits need numbers to prove that their good intentions are actually having an impact.”
  • Relatedly, Law.com held a webinar on how “there is still a disconnect between what [legal services] clients [are] hoping to see from [law departments’] data and what they are currently getting out of it.”
• In California, “[t]he U.S. Department of Justice is backing a lawsuit that seeks to invalidate a new California state retirement plan, taking aim at the growing number of states sponsoring retirement savings plans for people who lack access to one at work.”
• In San Bernardino CA, “San Bernardino plans to appeal a judge’s ruling that city leaders have no authority to reduce the total compensation of two elected officials [the City Clerk and City Attorney] ahead of the expiration of their terms early next year.”
• In Washington DC, “House Republicans and Democrats agreed during a tax panel hearing [] to examine how they could strengthen laws and regulations to either deny or revoke the tax-exempt status for organizations that promulgate hate.”

Electoral Access

• In Washington DC, “the House Judiciary’s Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties…focused the nation’s attention on the VRA with a hearing titled ‘Evidence of Current and Ongoing Voting Discrimination.’”
• In Nashville TN, “Judge Aleta A. Trauger issued an opinion granting a preliminary injunction in Tennessee N.A.A.C.P. v. Hargett, enjoining a new Tennessee law that threatens criminal and civil penalties on civic engagement organizations that conduct voter registration drives[.]”

Access to Justice – Civil

• In Denver CO, “the Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System [announced it] is partnering with Netherlands-based The Hague Institute for Innovation of Law (HiiL) to assess the justice needs of people and businesses in the UNited States [in a] two-year US Justice Needs study.”
• In Utah, Findlaw.com reported on the Utah Work Group on Regulatory Reform’s Report on ‘Narrowing the Access-to-Justice Gap by Reimagining Regulation’ [Ed. Note: released in August 2019, when the digest was on hiatus]. According to FindLaw, “[the] report outlines an overhaul of the state’s regulatory structure for law practices, including new rules that would allow nonlawyers to own and invest in law firms.”
• In New York NY, “[i]n a bid to root out so-called tenant blacklisting, the city may expand its list of protected classes to include people who have been involved in housing court cases.”

Access to Justice – Criminal

• In Wisconsin, the Western District of Wisconsin ruled that “Wisconsin indigent criminal defendants’ constitutional claim for timely appointment of counsel can’t proceed in federal court even though the state’s public defender system needs ‘urgent repair.’”
• In Milwaukee WI, local news reported that “[b]ody cam video…valuable as it is, [] can also be a time-consuming burden to lawyers[. S]omeone has to watch all the footage. It can be difficult for defense attorneys, who are already stretched thin.”
• In Tompkins County NY, “[the county] Legislature has approved unanimously a five-year performance-based contract to support the Assigned Counsel Department[, providing] more than $2.5 million through the New York State Office of Indigent Legal Services[.]”
• In Ionia County MI, the county “Board of Commissioners are considering partnering with other counties for indigent defense services.”

Criminal Justice Reform

• In St. Paul MN, “[t]he…City Attorney’s Office [launched] a pilot program…this month giv[ing] some offenders a second chance if they agree to work with their community.”
• In Florence SC, “the South Carolina Supreme Court ordered the creation of [a ‘homeless court’] in the city’s municipal court system.”