As we enter March and embark on the season of rebirth, it is a good time to ask you for your input on pro bono opportunities.
Legal aid organizations have to do needs assessments every so often to make sure that our services align with the needs of the communities we serve.
In that vein, I am doing my own version of needs assessment to make sure that we are offering the opportunities that interest you while also aligning those opportunities with client needs.
Please take two minutes to complete this six-question survey. You can scan the QR code or go here https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/VQXTNYD.
As you may know, low-income residents have a difficult time obtaining legal assistance, with many reporting that they did not even seek legal assistance for their issues because of the expected cost.
A 2023 report found that low-income Americans did not receive enough or any legal assistance in 92% of their legal issues, including wills, advance directives, probate, family matters, sealing/expunging criminal records, getting driver’s licenses reinstated and maintaining housing.
In light of those numbers, and our The Florida Bar pro bono rule 4-6.1, which encourages 20 hours of pro bono service annually by admitted attorneys, we are taking a look at what we can do to help address this statistic.
There presently are more than 4,000 attorneys in Duval County that are eligible to practice. If each attorney contributed just 20 hours of pro bono service a year, we could provide more than 80,000 hours of pro bono service in one year.
With the average pro bono case taking less than five hours, we would assist somewhere between 20,000 and 40,000 people.
But first, we need a better understanding of what pro bono work you currently do or what would get you interested in helping those in need. So, please take a couple minutes to complete the survey.
If you are not sure where to find pro bono opportunities, there are hundreds of cases waiting for placement at https://fundingfla.org/florida-pro-bono-matters/ where you can narrow the options by county, agency or subject matter, and set up alerts so that you get an email when a case is posted that matches your preferences.