Minnesota Legal Services Coalition
Website:
http://mnlegalservices.org Location:
Saint Paul, MN
The mission of Mid-Minnesota Legal Assistance (MMLA) (www.midmnlegal.org) is to assist disadvantaged persons in exercising their rights and supporting their efforts to resolve legal issues. Its goals include providing legal aid to low-income and disabled people; empowering clients through education about legal rights; promoting self-advocacy; and ensuring the interests of low-income persons are represented before legislative bodies.
Founded in 1981, the Minnesota Legal Services Coalition (MLSC) State Support office (www.mnlegalservices.org) is a division of MMLA that seeks to improve the delivery of legal aid to low-income Minnesotans by enhancing coordination between civil legal services and pro bono providers across the state. MLSC aims to prevent wasteful duplication of effort; to keep legal aid advocates and their clients informed about critical legal matters; and to advance technological enhancements that result in improved access to justice for low-income Minnesotans.
Project Description:
The applicant proposes to undertake large-scale development of automated legal forms for low-income Minnesotans and their attorneys. Law offices nationwide use programs to create guided interviews that result in the creation of legal pleadings, letters, and other forms. Programs creating the interviews upload the forms to a server and formulate questions that correspond to blanks in the forms where entries such as names and addresses of plaintiffs and defendants, etc., would go. Because the forms use logic-based variables, and because most legal proceedings require filing numerous documents, the interviews save a great deal of time for attorneys, who can avoid entering the same information again and again. From the perspective of a low-income person proceeding on his/her own, the interviews help by restructuring the process of filling out forms into a way that makes sense. Legal forms on their own are intimidating to non-lawyers, but the guided interviews are similar to the way an attorney interviews a client. TurboTax is a common example of an automated forms program.
The main software product the legal community uses for automated forms is HotDocs® (www.hotdocs.com). Through a joint grant with LexisNexis® and the Legal Services Corporation (LSC), MLSC recently received free HotDocs software. A second program, A2J Author® (short for “access to justice”) (www.a2jauthor.org), is intended specifically to develop interviews for low-income persons and free to legal services programs. It uses HotDocs, but adds a user-friendly interface for those navigating the legal system without an attorney.
MLSC has used both products for small-scale development of automated forms. However, MLSC lacks the staff to embark on large-scale forms development. With continuous direction from MLSC’s staff attorney/website coordinator, the CTC VISTA would be the primary forms developer. Minnesota Courts and legal services attorneys have already developed many of the forms that would be automated.
MLSC coordinates a group of justice community stakeholders interested in the LawHelp and ProJustice websites. Group members have expressed great interest in automated forms development, and are especially intrigued by the efficiencies created for attorneys by the forms as well as how their guidance reduces errors in filling them out. Other groups, such as Minnesota’s largest pro bono placement organization, the self-help center at the state’s largest judicial district, and the law library that serves Minnesota’s second largest county, have approached MLSC to develop automated forms.
As a statewide provider of support services to programs addressing the legal needs of the low-income community, MLSC is in a unique position to provide this service, given adequate resources. In addition, MLSC maintains Minnesota’s primary websites for the poverty law community and its client community – LawHelp and ProJustice – where the interviews can be accessed.
The timeliness of the project is evident, as funding cuts are requiring legal services providers to create more efficient ways to serve clients. Clients are turned down routinely due to limited resources, and it is imperative that assistance for those forced to navigate the legal system on their own exists. This project will provide enhanced support to low-income persons in that position. Also, as noted above, MLSC recently received at no cost the new version of HotDocs software, and can access A2J for free. Finally, the developer of MLSC’s websites, Pro Bono Net (www.probono.net), makes available to MLSC, through a grant with LSC, access to a national server for posting the developed interviews. These reasons, and the fact that many of the forms that would be used to develop interviews already exist, make the timing of this project ideal.
The increase in community engagement this project will foster will have two major components. First, by developing interviews in concert with and using forms created by MLSC’s partners, MLSC will further relationships with the governmental and non-profit entities that are serving Minnesota’s poverty community. This includes the Courts, the Bar Association, pro bono programs, and legal aid providers. Second, we know that low-income people are routinely forced to initiate or defend legal proceedings on their own, an intimidating prospect. The guided interviews would empower these individuals by building-in the expertise of attorneys and instilling confidence to engage the legal system.
Finally, the project is a perfect synthesis of MLSC’s mission and goals. The interviews will make the services provided to low-income Minnesotans more effective and efficient. Further, they will be accessed from MLSC’s statewide websites, greatly enhancing those resources.
Project Tangibles:
The project will result in dozens of interviews that will produce court forms addressing the critical legal needs of low-income Minnesotans. The forms will be hosted on the Automated Documents Online for Nonprofit Legal Services (NPADO) national server (https://npado.org/). Through websites such as LawHelp, ProJustice and, as appropriate, the Courts’ Self-Help Center (www.mncourts.gov/selfhelp), the interviews will be shared statewide with justice community partners, including legal aid offices, domestic violence advocates, the courts, and pro bono attorneys.
The coding used in the interviews developed through this project will also be available to legal services providers nationwide on the NPADO server. Although some changes will need to be made, states creating similar interviews will be able to do so more efficiently by building on the coding work done in Minnesota.
Supported Projects
Automated Court Forms Development
Esther Kim
9/2009 — 9/2010
Law offices nationwide use programs to create guided interviews that result in the creation of legal pleadings, letters, and other forms. Programs creating the interviews upload the forms to a server and formulate questions that correspond to blanks in the forms where entries such as names and addresses of plaintiffs and defendants, etc., would go. Because the forms use logic-based variables, and because most legal proceedings require filing numerous documents, the interviews save a great deal of time for attorneys, who can avoid entering the same information again and again. From the perspective of a low-income person proceeding on his/her own, the interviews help by restructuring the process of filling out forms into a way that makes sense. MLSC currently lacks someone primarily dedicated to developing and promoting automated court forms, even as the justice community’s interest in the forms is rapidly increasing. A CTC VISTA would fill that void.
In short, the responsibilities of the VISTA member will be to develop, promote, and evaluate the use of guided interviews based on legal forms, with continual assistance from the project supervisor.
The primary goal of the project was the creation of court form assembly interviews for low-income Minnesotans and volunteer attorneys who serve them. Ms. Kim was successful in meeting that goal, creating 16 interviews, some of which including sets of multiple forms. These interviews allow attorneys and clients to efficiently complete complex court forms, educating them about the process throughout, and avoiding duplicative effort in completing repeated fields. Low-income Minnesotans and volunteer attorneys now have an easier, more efficient way to complete dozens of critical court forms. Some of these interviews have been used hundreds of times. For clients, the structure of the interviews eliminates a great deal of the intimidation usually associated with form completion. The impact to low-income clients is immeasurable because of this. Other beneficiaries are pro bono attorneys, who can now more easily provide assistance in areas of law unfamiliar to their daily practice without a great learning curve, and courts, which should expect to see many more informed and prepared self-represented litigants.
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