The astounding election of the nation’s first African American President, who is also the first President of any ancestry that many of us here in Illinois personally know, is an occasion for all kinds of reflection and almost countless ramifications.  Here are some initial thoughts on what it means. 

It means that we have taken a giant step in the struggle against racism.  It is immensely moving, and it will play out powerfully in aspirations, lives, attitudes, national self-image, moral positioning in the world, and many other ways.     

It means we can lay to rest, perhaps forever, the incredibly unfair and damaging “joke” that the most feared words in the English language are, “I’m from the government and I’m here to help.”  A generation ago, this wry bromide was the signal sent by a newly elected President that the national government would be smaller and would retreat from forthright grappling with difficult domestic problems, like poverty and inequality of opportunity.  We had entered an era characterized by the notion that all of us are and ought to be “on our own”, to sink or swim according to our merits, our luck, and our hereditary advantages and disadvantages.  As a nation we had forsaken the ethos that, while personal enterprise is important, we are also all in this together.  That ethos is back. 

It means there is a new commitment that there is an important role for government in addressing difficult problems.  There is a new desire for and insistence on competence.  If there is an effort by the government that fails or falls short, the first option will be to figure out how to do it better, not to shrug and call it evidence that government cannot do the job. 

It means that one of those difficult problems that the national government will resume efforts to address is the problem of poverty and the improvement of justice and opportunity for low income people.  It is clear from the track record we know here in Illinois and from the Obama campaign’s many policy positions on these issues that the president-elect understands the complexity of this problem and will act on it in many different ways.  At least two of the top announced priorities for the immediate crisis are directly on point:  jobs and health care.

It means that to make the needed investments, the new administration will need to find the money.  Those who support the effort to address poverty, justice and opportunity will need to support the needed tax policies and budget changes.  One clear change is that the new president will call for shared effort and sacrifice in order to accomplish important goals.

It means that it will be possible to think of many strategies and outcomes that have been unthinkable at the crucial and difference-making levels of government not in the daily public consciousness:  the courts, the executive orders, the regulatory processes, the day-to-day decisions of implementers of programs and budgets, the discretion of regional and local federal officials.  

It means we have to understand the incredible pent-up wishes and demands now laid at the door of the new administration.  They cannot possibly all be met.  Some will have to wait, and some may not happen at all.  There will be compromises and disappointments in addition to real and significant progress.  The high symbolic idealism of the campaign and the election result must be tempered by the practical demands of governing.  This cannot be regarded as a disappointment - but as the real world asserting itself.  If we get an effective, pragmatic and result-oriented national government, guided by values that conclude that “we are in this together”, and motivated by a genuine desire to improve justice and opportunity, then we will have a profound sea-change in this country and much will be accomplished. 

By Karen Harris

In recent years several states have enacted annual percentage interest rate (APR) limits that eliminate the triple-digit interest rates charged by payday lenders. The payday lending industry is now fighting back by sponsoring ballot initiatives that threaten these sensible payday lending regulations in two states: Arizona and Ohio.

A “no” vote on Proposition 200 in Arizona will ensure that payday lenders’ current predatory practices will no longer be permitted when the exemption for such lenders from the state’s 36 percent APR cap expires in 2010. In Ohio, by contrast, a “yes” vote on Ballot Issue 5 will create a 28 percent APR cap on payday loans, while a “no” vote will allow payday lenders to continue charging up to 391 percent interest rates. Thus Arizona voters should vote “no,” and Ohio voters should vote “yes,” on these critical ballot measures to protect their communities from the debt traps caused by abusive payday loans.

Interest Rate Limits and the Debt Trap

People usually obtain payday loans by using their anticipated paychecks as collateral. The payday lender, for a fee, gives the borrower cash and promises not to cash the check until the borrower’s next payday. Since most borrowers cannot afford to pay off the loan rapidly, they continuously renew the loan, accruing additional fees with each renewal and resulting in a triple-digit APR on the loan. A 2007 report by the Center for Responsible Lending found that 90 percent of the payday lending business was generated by borrowers who had become trapped with five or more loans or renewals per year. As a result, payday lending costs American families $4.2 billion annually in excessive fees.

The payday lending industry contends that interest rate limits in Arizona and Ohio will unfairly restrict access to short-term credit for low-income individuals. This argument, however, is not consistent with data from states that have already regulated payday loans. For example, a UNC Community Capital report on North Carolina’s payday lending ban found that “more than twice as many former payday borrowers reported that the absence of payday lending has had a positive, rather than negative, effect on their household.”

Although some states have eschewed rate caps in favor of alternative forms of regulation, the Center for Responsible Lending concludes that “the only meaningful way to address the debt trap is through a comprehensive small loan law with an interest rate cap.” In fact, 12 states and the District of Columbia have already saved their citizens more than $1.4 billion by capping small loans at or around 36 percent. Ohio and Arizona can follow their example, but only if voters in those states take appropriate action on November 4.

Payday Loan Reform in Illinois

In 2005 Illinois capped payday loans at 36 percent through the Illinois Payday Loan Reform Act. However, this law did not protect consumers whose loans were for 120 days or more. Payday lenders simply extended their loan terms to 120 days or more in order to resemble consumer installment loans and be exempt from the law. The Shriver Center is working with the Monsignor John Egan Campaign for Payday Loan Reform to close this loophole and propose consumer protection amendments to the Consumer Installment Loan Act.

By Marcia Henry

The inaugural issue of Civil Right to Counsel Update  is now available. To be published quarterly, the Update will report on all aspects of advocacy to achieve recognition of a right to counsel for low-income people in civil cases that affect basic human needs. In criminal cases, a right to counsel has long been recognized any time a defendant faces even a brief period of incarceration. But no parallel right exists in civil cases, despite consequences-like permanent loss of custody of a child, or loss of safe and subsidized housing, or denial of health care-that can be at least as devastating.

The National Coalition for a Civil Right to Counsel coordinates advocacy strategies at the state level to expand the right to counsel in civil cases. The inaugural issue of Civil Right to Counsel Update reports on thinking strategically about starting a right-to-counsel effort, litigation in Alaska, new legislation in Alabama and Louisiana, pilot projects being supported by the Boston Bar Association,  and more.

The Shriver Center produces the Update in its capacity as one of the partners-along with the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU Law School, the Public Justice Center in Maryland, and the Committee for Indigent Representation and Civil Legal Equality (CIRCLE) housed at the Northwest Justice Project-in the Civil Right to Counsel Leadership and Support Initiative.

Subscribe now! Go to www.civilrighttocounsel.org, enter your e-mail address in the lower left corner of the home page, and complete the subscription form. Civil Right to Counsel Update will keep you apprised about litigation, legislative activity, involvement of bar associations and the access to justice community, research on the importance of counsel and the impact of the lack thereof, related conferences and workshops, and more.

John Bouman

Poverty is a complex, daunting issue that requires action on a variety of different fronts, but we can’t disregard the necessary job of keeping it in the public eye and on the political radar. That’s why, today, bloggers across the world participate in the UN’s 2^nd Annual Blog Action Day.  This event aims to provide a platform for bloggers to discuss poverty from a variety of perspectives and hopefully mobilize audiences to increase awareness of the problem.

Part of the Shriver Center’s strategy in fighting poverty has been to describe the multiple aspects of poverty and develop an understanding of all the different ways poverty must be attacked.  The 2008 National Agenda: 12 Ways to Lead the Change is both a comprehensive prescription for the fight against poverty and a practical to-do list for advocates.  The current presidential election season is an occasion to push candidates to advance the battle against poverty on the national agenda.  During an age of high unemployment, rising gas prices, a housing foreclosure crisis and escalating food costs, it’s about time.  Additionally, states are ahead of the national curve in passing large-scale health care initiatives, minimum-wage increases, and other antipoverty measures.  At this time of renewed promise in the fight against poverty, the Shriver Center’s agenda calls for long overdue action on the national scale. For each policy idea, we cite opportunities for action which all antipoverty advocates can take on both the federal and state levels in 2008 (after the elections, we will update these action steps for 2009). Now is an excellent time to renew our energy and push the nation forward across this broad front to create opportunity and eliminate poverty.

Another initiative that we are currently creating is our 2008 Poverty Scorecard, the only national analysis that ranks members of Congress solely on their performance in fighting poverty.  We will assign letter grades to each member of the United States Senate and House of Representatives according to their voting records on the most important poverty-related issues that came to a vote in 2008, including legislation on affordable housing, health care, education, labor, tax policy and immigrants’ rights.  We began this annual report in 2007.  In our 2007 Scorecard, we discovered that members of Congress in states with the highest poverty were least likely to support anti-poverty measures.  The 2008 Scorecard will be released early in 2009, and it will be web-based and easily accessible.   The value of the Scorecard is that it is a good opportunity to teach the ways that varied legislation affects poverty for better or worse, an angle that many legislators and advocates do not immediately appreciate when considering legislation.  And it is good for legislators to be aware that they are being watched and assessed on their poverty-fighting records.

Finally, as a state, Illinois is in the midst of its own anti-poverty initiative, called the Commission on the Elimination of Poverty.  The Commission will focus on those who live in extreme poverty, defined as 50 percent of the federal poverty line, or an income of merely $11,000 per year for a family of four.  The Commission’s eight areas of focus align with our National Agenda.  There will be a summit in December 2008 to set a specific policy agenda, and the state is going to adopt an ambitious goal to cut deep poverty in half within ten years.  It’s exciting to see a state not only elevate the issue to a position of importance, but also commit itself to an ambitious goal. 

Whether the focus of today’s event revolves around the next president’s national agenda, or anti-poverty initiatives in our states  or conversations around the water cooler, let’s take time today to push the agenda to fight poverty forward by letting our voices be heard and contributing to the global discussion.

By Margaret Stapleton, Senior Attorney

Lots of things about health insurance are ironic. Example: Getting health care (which prevents more serious trouble or restores health) can trigger difficulties staying insured due to premium adjustments upward and preexisting-condition exclusions if the patient needs to change insurance plans. 

But the biggest irony is that, in some states, it’s okay for insurers to look at information of questionable relevance (past medical treatment), but now nowhere in the United States is it okay to look at information of quite certain relevance (genetic test results). 

Newly enacted federal legislation sets up the irony. On May 21, 2008, President Bush signed the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act of 2008 (GINA), H.R. 493, into law. Although it took such legislation 13 years to work to gain passage, it passed unanimously in the Senate and 414 to 1 in the House. 

GINA prohibits the use of genetic information and tests in all health insurance underwriting decisions. It prohibits insurers from requiring individuals to have genetic testing and from using a person’s genetic information in determining eligibility, adjusting premiums, or excluding preexisting conditions from coverage for either group or individual policies. After GINA, genetic information is not usable by insurers. 

The logic that drove GINA’s adoption (information is good; people should not be afraid to get information that will help them make health care decisions and manage their health) should also drive similar prohibitions on using individual medical and family history, past treatments, medical test results, medication usage, etc., in insurance underwriting decisions. Allowing insurers to inquire about and make adverse decisions based on such considerations is dangerous and unfair. It discourages people from learning about their health status and from getting necessary and beneficial treatment, and it punishes those who behave responsibly and get appropriate treatment .

Bottom line: If individual or group health insurance is going to remain a fact of life in the United States, then it is time to make insurance free of health status or history considerations. Age, maybe; location, maybe; but not health status or history. Such reform would restore insurance to its original purpose-spreading risk widely-something that has been lost in the current world of insurers’ cherry picking the healthy and rejecting or pricing out the rest.

By Bill Wilen

Prior to 1996, federal housing law provided that every public housing unit that was demolished had to be replaced on a one-for-one basis with another public housing or equivalent unit.   In this manner, the nation’s inventory of public housing units would remain constant, and housing would remain available to meet the housing needs of the nation’s most vulnerable populations, such as the very-poor, the elderly and the disabled.  However, in 1996, this requirement was suspended and later repealed by Congress. 

During the intervening years, the nation’s supply of low-income public housing has dwindled precipitously.  In fact, from 2000 to 2008, almost 100,000 units of public housing have been demolished, but only about 40,000 units of public housing have been constructed.  This means that over 60% of the public housing units demolished over the last eight years have not been replaced, and the nation has lost over 60,000 public housing units.  

The Shriver Center, along with the National Low-Income Housing Coalition  and the National Training and Information Center, is currently working with the U.S. House Financial Services Committee, chaired by Congressman Barney Frank (D-MA), to amend Section 18 of the United States Housing Act, 42 U.S.C. §1437p,  to re-instate the one-for-one requirement.   Section 18 governs the demolition of public housing units, and currently provides no obligation on the part of public housing authorities to replace any units that are demolished.  

As part of its examination of Section 18, the committee has received data from the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) showing that in addition to the 100,000 units already demolished by the current administration, there are pending at HUD 89 additional applications from public housing authorities to demolish another 17,000 units.  The committee concluded that due to the high number of pending applications and the clear need for legislative reform of Section 18, it is desirable to have a moratorium on all pending demolitions until the law is amended. 

Accordingly, on August 13, 2008, the Committee Chairman, Rep. Barney Frank, and the Chairwoman of the Subcommittee on Housing and Community Opportunity, Maxine Waters (D-CA), asked HUD Secretary Steven Preston to cease approval of any further applications for demolition until legislation is enacted to reform this program.  As of the date of this article, Secretary Preston has refused to stop the Section 18 demolition-approval process at HUD. 

For these reasons, the committee intends to introduce legislation, prior to the scheduled adjournment of Congress this month, to re-instate the one-for-one replacement requirement.  Under the proposed legislation, a public housing authority would have to replace each demolished unit with a newly-constructed, rehabilitated or purchased public housing unit, or a newly-constructed, rehabilitated or purchased unit (including project-based assistance) that is subject to requirements regarding eligibility, tenant contributions toward rent and long-term affordability restrictions which are comparable to public housing units. In addition, at least one-third of all replacement units shall be public housing units constructed on the original public housing location or the same neighborhood as the original public housing location.  More than one-third will be public housing units if necessary to accommodate those residents who wish to return to the site or neighborhood of the original public housing location.  

In addition, the legislation provides that any resident who occupies a public housing unit that is subject of an application for demolition shall have an absolute right to occupy replacement units, as long as the resident’s tenancy or right of occupancy has not been validly terminated.  

Because the House has passed similar legislation regarding the HOPE VI, program (H.R. 3524) which is a major source of funding for public housing demolition and revitalization activities, it is anticipated that the House will pass the proposed legislation regarding Section 18 and send it on to the Senate..       

By John Bouman, President

On Tuesday, Aug. 26 the U.S. Census Bureau released data about income levels, poverty rates, and health insurance from 2007. At first glance, the data look like good news. The nation’s poverty rate held steady at 12.5 percent, not statistically different from the 12.3 percent in 2006. Median household income increased. The number of people without health insurance decreased. However, digging deeper into the data shows we have work to do.

Part of that work is keeping our state children’s health insurance programs strong and successful. Across the United States, the number of uninsured children went down in 2007 as a result of the expansion of these publicly supported programs. In Illinois we can be grateful for All Kids, which ensures that all children have access to comprehensive, quality affordable health care. Because of this program, we have been able to cut down on time and money spent in the emergency room and link our children to regular primary care doctors. We need to safeguard and protect All Kids by enrolling more children in this cost-effective program.

Although the poverty rate didn’t dramatically change in 2007, let’s not discount the fact that 37.3 million people lived in poverty. That number has steadily increased since 2000, the year before the last downturn. We’ve gone through a full economic cycle with higher poverty and with middle-income workers losing ground. The poverty level didn’t get any worse, but it certainly didn’t get any better.

Most important, we need to keep the census data within the context of 2008, a year with even more people out of work and squeezed by the high cost of food and fuel. The 2007 data will probably be as good as they get for a while. At this time we need thoughtful strategies by the government to address the poverty problem. Congress should act quickly in September to boost the economy by allowing more poor families to get the Child Tax Credit and by increasing aid for food, unemployment, and state Medicaid programs. Basic steps such as these should form the beginning of a national commitment to cut poverty.

Visit http://www.census.gov for more information.

By Wendy Pollack, Director, Women’s Law & Policy Project

The combination of a weak economy and the inflation of food prices has taken its toll on all households, but low-income households have been particularly hard-hit. As the national unemployment rate rose to 5.7 percent in July, the number of people receiving food stamp benefits hit a record high of over 28 million. The Illinois unemployment rate in July stood at 7.3 percent. Recent flooding has only compounded the difficulties for residents of the affected Illinois counties. Illinois is experiencing record numbers of food stamp recipients as well. In April the number of people receiving food stamps was almost 1.3 million.

The cost of food between May 2007 and May 2008 increased 5.8 percent, according to the U.S. Department of Labor. Milk increased by 13.5 percent, and bread increased by 14.1 percent. Hefty increases are expected in 2009. With no corresponding increase in the amount of their food stamps, recipients’ food stamp allotments have progressively run out earlier and earlier in the month, leaving individuals and families to turn to food pantries for help. In turn, the food pantries, which have seen a significant increase in visits, are worried because donations have been decreasing as people try to cut back on spending. Even with the rise of food stamp participation, there are still individuals and families who are eligible but are not taking advantage of the program. The Greater Chicago Food Depository reports that between 30 percent and 40 percent of visitors to food pantries, soup kitchens, and shelters in Cook County, Illinois, may be eligible for food stamps but have not applied.

One of the quickest and most cost-effective ways to stimulate the economy while helping those struggling economically is to increase the amount of food stamp benefits. Enacting a raise in food stamp allotments, even a temporary one, would get money out quickly to be spent in local grocery stores across the country and generate in local communities nearly twice as much economic activity as the investment would cost. An increase was not included in the economic stimulus legislation that passed earlier this year. The need is even greater now.

Congress recently reauthorized the Food Stamp Program as part of the Food, Conservation, and Energy Act of 2008, also known as the 2008 Farm Bill. Effective October 1, 2008, an increase in the minimum benefit for one- and two-person households will be indexed to inflation so that the minimum benefit will increase annually. Other beneficial provisions include the elimination of the cap on the deduction for dependent care expenses, the deduction from income of the full cost of dependent care, the exclusion of certain combat-related military pay from consideration as income, and the exclusion of education accounts (e.g., 529s) and retirement accounts (e.g., IRAs) from countable resources. However, the Farm Bill amendments are not enough to stave off the food insecurity that too many low-income individuals and families confront everyday. Congress must act immediately to strengthen the Food Stamp Program and increase food stamp allotments for all recipients as part of another economic stimulus package.

States must do their share not only by ensuring that all those who are eligible for food stamps actually receive them but also by implementing supplemental nutrition assistance programs. The Shriver Center has recommended to the Illinois Department of Human Services that Illinois implement some version of this program, such as a $50 per month supplement for low-wage workers similar to the programs that twelve states recently started. The nutrition supplement (instead of $50 in cash) has the benefit of not reducing the family’s food stamp monthly allotment. We all must ensure that parents no longer have to skip meals to make sure that their children have something to eat.

For more information about the rising cost of food, the effects of hunger and food insecurity, and action on the federal level, go to the Food Research and Action Center (FRAC) website, http://www.frac.org/. For more information, contact Wendy Pollack, director, Women’s Law & Policy Project, Shriver Center, at wendypollack@povertylaw.org.

By Kate Walz, Senior Staff Attorney

On July 30 President Bush signed the Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008, H.R. 3221, passed by Congress in mid-July. But media coverage of the bill has largely focused on how it will help beleaguered homeowners facing foreclosure. As a low-income housing advocate, whose clients live almost exclusively in rental housing, I was pleasantly surprised to find items benefiting renters.

H.R. 3221 provides $3.92 billion to states and local governments to, within the next 18 months, preserve rental housing and stabilize neighborhoods hard-hit by foreclosures. The money may be used to buy foreclosed properties and maintain them as affordable housing. It may also go toward helping very low-to moderate-income individuals secure affordable housing.

The bill establishes this country’s first permanent national Affordable Housing Trust Fund. Spearheaded by the National Low-Income Housing Coalition and advocates throughout the country, it’s one of the first new federal housing production programs created since 1990. By 2012 the fund will have generated per year approximately $300 million aimed at creating and preserving affordable rental housing (see www.nlihc.org).

Congress’ last-minute addition of these protections makes sense. After all, one lesson from the foreclosure crisis is that the American dream of owning a home is not for everyone. Millions of low-income families, seniors, and persons with disabilities rely upon or are in need of federal subsidies to make their rental housing affordable and help them escape poverty.

For the most part, renters have been the invisible casualty of the mortgage foreclosure crisis. When the housing market was hot, a lot of people jumped into the landlord market, only to see it crashing down in front of them. In a recent report on the foreclosure crisis the Woodstock Institute found that over 35 percent of Chicago’s foreclosures were of nonowner-occupied rental properties.

What happens to these renters? They are evicted from their homes, often in spite of diligently paying rent and being a responsible tenant. And advocates doubt that foreclosed rental housing will remain rental housing postforeclosure. It’s up to laws such as H.R. 3221, as well as state and local legislative efforts aimed at preserving this stock, to make that happen. 

Katherine Walz is a senior staff attorney in the housing unit of the Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law.  

By Richard P. Weishaupt,

What would a blog on ethics and legal aid discuss? While some might argue tongue in cheek that the terms are an oxymoron, most legal aid lawyers and other advocates are very concerned about being ethical in both the professional and the moral sense. This blog aims to be a practical guide to the Rules of Professional Responsibility and a forum for discussion of some of the more difficult problems that legal aid lawyers face. Too often the ethics training we experience as part of our continuing legal education requirements is geared to a practice that bears little resemblance to our day-to-day challenges. (This blog appears as a column in Clearinghouse Review: Journal of Poverty Law and Policy, published by the Shriver Center.)

It is my hope that this will not be the kind of blog that will discuss ever more fanciful hypotheticals, whose purpose seems designed to convey that legal ethics is so complicated that there are no clear answers. Rather, I will discuss ways to achieve the goal of legal services programs everywhere-to help people deal with the challenges of being poor in America and to ensure justice for our clients.

One of the difficult realities of legal aid practice is that we are often the law firm of last resort. Even if a private attorney were willing to represent your homeless client, would that lawyer understand the vagaries of Medicaid and whom to call to make sure your client is properly served? The legal aid office is often literally the only option in town. Thus we should do everything in our power to represent people within the bounds of our ethical obligations.

Being wary of creating unnecessary conflicts of interest is one way to assure that we do not unwittingly prevent people from accessing our services when they are most in need. Another frequent challenge is dealing responsibly with clients with diminished capacity. The American Bar Association’s Model Rules of Professional Conduct address this question as follows: “When a client’s capacity to make adequately considered decisions in connection with a representation is diminished, whether because of minority, mental impairment or for some other reason, the lawyer shall, as far as reasonably possible, maintain a normal client-lawyer relationship with the client” (American Bar Association, Model Rules of Professional Conduct, Rule 1.14 Client with Diminished Capacity, www.abanet.org/cpr/mrpc/mrpc_toc.html; the model rules have no legal effect, but they serve as the basis for most states’ rules of professional responsibility). While most legal aid advocates would agree with a formulation that tries to maintain a “normal” client-lawyer relationship, the rule is a bit vague, especially when the lawyer is sitting across from a severely mentally ill client and a judge is pressing the lawyer for an answer. At such times, it is best to have thought through the problem in advance.

An example from my own experience illustrates the benefit of advance planning. Into one of our two offices a client came complaining that a check-cashing agency was taking her and her husband’s Supplemental Security Income (SSI) check. The client revealed very little additional information as to why this would be, however, as she was largely incoherent, probably due to her mental illness. Her husband came into our other office and explained that, against his advice, his wife had deposited an invalid check that was likely part of a scam. Worse, the check-cashing agency, in cooperation with an out-of-state bank that could be accessed only through the agency, deposited the check and honored several checks before realizing that the check was fraudulent. Now the check-cashing agency and bank wanted not only the money they had paid out but also several steep fees imposed for insufficient funds.

The husband sought representation against the out-of-state bank and its charges, but he wanted to be made representative payee for his wife’s benefits. Initially intending to open a case, our staff interviewed him but later told him that his desire to be made representative payee could not be accommodated since we already represented his wife; appointing a representative payee for her would be against her interest. (Our conflict-checking software identified the potential problem, and perhaps the “conflict” identified colored our thinking more than it should have.) The initial response also was that we could have nothing to do with the husband because of that conflict.

However, it soon became clear that the wife’s mental status rendered her incompetent to make decisions or even understand what had happened. One would try to maintain a normal attorney-client relationship with the wife, pursuant to Rule 1.14, but one would rely heavily on the next of kin, the husband, especially since his funds were also affected. Rigid interpretation of the conflict rules not only made that representation impossible; it created a level of distrust between the husband and wife when they clearly had a common interest in undoing the result of the scam and the tactics of the check-cashing agency and out-of-state bank.

What could we have done differently? In this case the problem was that we lost sight of our primary mission and did not identify the couple’s common interests from the beginning. The better course would have been to get the couple together at the first signs of division-to identify their common goal and to avoid a divisive battle about who would control the SSI benefits. (Of course, hindsight is often 20/20. Counseling distraught people in a busy office is always a challenge, and it is easy to second-guess decisions that have to be made quickly and under pressure. Nonetheless, we can all learn from reviewing our actions to see if a different approach might have achieved better results.) Focusing on their common interests rather than what divided them was ethical and would have facilitated the easiest approach to a difficult and legally complicated case. Of course, if the couple could not agree, we would have had to make a difficult choice as to whom to represent and how to do so given the mental impairments present. But with better planning about how to represent couples and what a hit on a conflicts checker means, we could have achieved a better result with a lot less difficulty. We eventually resolved the matter and provided representation, but not as efficiently and smoothly as we might have.

I hope this blog will facilitate discussion of difficult cases and the challenges they present, and of how to ensure that legal services are delivered in a manner that is consistent with the highest professional standards and yet also recognizes the unique challenges of a legal aid practice. Raise other ethical dilemmas that legal aid lawyers face, and offer your own answers to these dilemmas. I look forward to hearing from you.