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Access to Justice Committee

The ATJ Committee brings together civil legal aid providers to collaborate and address issues
impacting their efforts to provide access to legal services to low-income Louisianans. Detailed
below are the group’s subcommittees, through which issue-specific projects are completed:

Disaster Planning Subcommittee, Chair Ann Gregorie

The Louisiana State Bar Association (LSBA), in conjunction with the American Bar Association
Young Lawyers Division (ABA/YLD) and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA),
coordinates the statewide disaster plan for legal assistance when disaster strikes in Louisiana. As
part of this plan, the LSBA maintains a webpage, www.lsba.org/dr, as a portal for disaster
information that is activated once the disaster plan has been enacted. The subcommittee also works
with Louisiana Appleseed to maintain a Disaster Training Manual, a guide for attorneys who
volunteer to aid disaster victims. Additionally, the LSBA houses and maintains the toll-free
disaster hotline (1-800-310-7029) stipulated in the statewide disaster plan.

As provided in the disaster plan, the subcommittee meets regularly, activates the LSBA Disaster
Response website when needed, hosts disaster-related legal trainings, implements and recruits
volunteers for the ABA/YLD hotline, and monitors the needs in Louisiana to determine statewide
disaster response strategy. The disaster plan and hotline protocols were updated both in response
to COVID-19 and the 2020 hurricanes, as well as after Hurricane Ida. With this new iteration,
hotline calls were forwarded to Southeast Louisiana Legal Services, allowing those who qualify
for legal services to be quickly and efficiently ushered through Southeast Louisiana Legal
Services’ intake process. Those who did not qualify for legal services were then put into a database
for LSBA Young Lawyer Division volunteers to return their call and provide brief legal advice
and information.

When there is no ongoing disaster, the disaster hotline 1-800 number directs callers to the
appropriate civil legal aid based on the caller’s zip code. This was done this past year after SLLS,
Louisiana Appleseed, and the LSBA ATJ Department applied for a grant from the United Way.

Pro Bono Subcommittee, Co- Chairs Kathryn LaFrentz and Elena Perez

This subcommittee is tasked with developing and supporting local pro bono organizations’ efforts
to engage the private bar and judiciary in pro bono service, as well as recognizing pro bono
volunteers. In the recent past, the subcommittee assisted Lagniappe Law Lab in revising the
statewide pro bono website, probono.net/la. And last calendar year, the subcommittee and the ATJ
Commission launched the “20 in 2022” pro bono campaign, encouraging all attorneys to provide
20 hours of pro bono service in 2022. The campaign includes communications from the Justices
of the Supreme Court to judges and attorneys encouraging them to support and participate in pro
bono, as well as publications in the LSBA’s news and social media.

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