C4EJ

Availability
of Civil
Legal Aid

How can
you help?

Availability of Civil Legal Aid

Limited and unstable funding for legal aid coupled with a poverty population that has doubled in the last decade has resulted in reduced numbers of legal aid advocates within the Alliance. Inadequate resources make it impossible for the overwhelming majority of low-income people to get the legal help they need.

The Washington State Supreme Court Task Force on Civil Equal Justice Funding issued its findings in the Washington State Civil Legal Needs Study in the fall of 2003. This historic report illustrates how justice is out of reach for the overwhelming majority of low-income families in our state:

•	Washington's low-income people experience more than one million urgent civil legal problems each year.
•	More than 80 percent of low-income families and individuals face their legal problems without legal help.
•	Legal problems of low-income people are more likely to relate to family safety and basic needs than legal problems of higher-income people.
•	Low-income people who get legal help experience better outcomes and have greater respect for the justice system than those who do not.

How can you help?

Through legal aid programs and local bar associations, attorneys statewide have united to create the Campaign for Equal Justice, an annual giving drive benefiting all of our state's legal aid programs that gives each of us the opportunity to make legal aid available to thousands more.

Paula Boggs and Bill Neukom are the 2009-2010 Campaign for Equal Justice Co-Chairs. They are assisted by 100 volunteers statewide who make phone calls, send e-mails and make personal visits to raise funds from individuals, law firms, foundations, corporations and other organizations to support over twenty-five legal aid programs throughout Washington.

Your annual gift to the Campaign benefits legal aid programs and clients statewide. Wherever you live in Washington, the Campaign for Equal Justice reaches your neighbors and your community through the free legal hotline, a legal services office, or a volunteer attorney program.

Please support the Campaign for Equal Justice where a gift to one is truly a gift to all. Together we can help low-income individuals and families in crisis achieve fair outcomes. Individuals benefit. Families benefit. Society benefits. Remember, it's not justice if it's not equal.

Donate Now to the Campaign for Equal Justice