The Law School Consortium Project was launched in 1997 as a partnership of four law schools (CUNY, Northeastern, St. Mary’s and the University of Maryland). Funded by a grant from the Open Society Institute’s Program on Law & Society, the consortium was envisioned as a way for law schools to experiment with programs that would provide training, mentoring, and other support to solo and small firm practitioners. Member law schools sought to address the following issues:
• Access to quality "low bono" (affordable) legal services for low and moderate-income individuals and communities;
• The dearth of guidance and services for solo and small-firm lawyers to help them provide quality legal services and handle ethical and practice dilemmas; and
• The large number of law school graduates who enter law schools aspiring to work for the public interest, but, upon graduation, find themselves debt-ridden or unable to obtain one of the scarce public service positions.
By 2009, the Consortium had grown to eleven law schools, each with a program that provided support to solo and small firm practitioners:
• CUNY Law School (Founding Member)
• Golden Gate University School of Law
• Northeastern University School of Law (Founding Member)
• Rutgers University School of Law--Newark
• Santa Clara University School of Law
• St. Mary's University School of Law (Founding Member)
• Stanford Law School
• Syracuse University College of Law
• Thomas M. Cooley Law School
• Touro Law Center
• University of California Berkeley School of Law--Boalt Hall
• University of Maryland School of Law (Founding Member)
• University of Michigan School of Law
• University of New Mexico School of Law
• University of San Francisco School of Law
• University of Tennessee College of Law
• University of the Pacific McGeorge School of Law
The Consortium supported each school in its efforts by providing informational resources and technical support for developing programs. According to its website, however, the Consortium Board “went into a state of rest” in 2009, “having achieved its goal of establishing successful practitioner networks to assist solo and small-firm lawyers serving low and moderate-income individuals and communities nationwide.” Consortium members continue to work together and support one another an ad-hoc basis, and the Consortium website, now hosted by the University of Maryland Law School, provides some resources as well.
Website: http://www.law.umaryland.edu/programs/clinic/initiatives/lscp
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Two Specific Law School Programs
CUNY Law School Community Legal Resource Network (CLRN)
Begun in 1998, the principle behind CUNY’s CLRN is that, without mentoring support and additional training, it is easy for new attorneys in solo or small firm practice to founder in isolated, economically precarious, situations. CLRN creates a support and training community for these new lawyers, providing them with discounted subscriptions to online legal research services and volume discounts for office supplies. CLRN also provides access to a technology specialist who helps solo lawyers find affordable equipment, and then installs it and trains them how to make the best use of it. In addition, the network hosts an email listserv where member attorneys can ask questions on substantive areas of law or procedural matters in various local jurisdictions, or find referrals for clients. Finally, CLRN has created practice groups (e.g., Family Law, Immigration Law, Labor and Employment, etc.), utilizing technology to create a virtual law firm, the benefits of which include in-person support groups and tailored CLE courses.
In addition to these resources, CLRN also pays some participants $75 per hour to represent clients in a “low bono” practice in certain areas of the city. These funds generally come from the city and state governments and elected officials from those areas, who contribute to CLRN so that attorneys can provide services for their constituencies.
In late 2007, CLRN also established a new project, the Incubator for Justice, in Manhattan. The Incubator trains CLRN members, over an 18-month period, in basic business issues such as billing, record-keeping, technology, bookkeeping and taxes while, at the same time, facilitating Incubator participants’ involvement in larger justice initiatives and in subject-based training in immigration law, labor and employment, and other topics that will arise continually as these attorneys build their practices. Incubator participants pay $500/month in rent for the first nine months of the program and $600/month for the second nine months. This rent payment covers the cost of their office space and all Incubator services.
Finally, CLRN has recently created an initiative called Launchpad, in which it places recent graduates who have passed the bar exam, but who have not found jobs, in various courts around the city. These graduates are trained, and work in partnership with the court system, to offer legal assistance to pro se litigants. CLRN pays them a stipend of $200/week.
Website: www.law.cuny.edu/clinics/JusticeInitiatives/Community.html
University of Maryland Civil Justice Network (CJN)
The program at the University of Maryland, the Civil Justice Network, supports solo and small firm practitioners by providing mentoring, co-counseling, and networking opportunities; assistance with law practice management; marketing services; client referrals; and law student research assistance. Essentially, the Network acts as a safety net for solo practitioners, small firms and new lawyers.
In exchange for a small annual membership fee (discounted for University of Maryland Law school graduates), members receive assistance in areas such as: financing your own start-up; ethical dilemmas for solo practitioners; marketing your practice; effective networking techniques; client development and relations; education about and support for the use of technology to help make their practices more efficient; billing, setting and collecting fees; office and personnel management; IOLTA compliance; electronic case management and time keeping systems; developing business plans. They can also link to their own websites from the Civil Justice Network’s website, and receive assistance with design and production of brochures, business cards, presentations, and other marketing materials. Finally, they can receive advice, support, and client referrals from a network of other Network members.
One unique characteristic of the CJN is that it is staffed by attorneys and law students, who themselves take on some litigation in-house. On each of these cases, they partner with CJN members who want to learn a new area of substantive law in which CJN attorneys have expertise (primarily predatory lending and landlord-tenant issues). In this way, CJN network attorneys become exposed to new substantive areas of law and can then represent clients in those sorts of cases in their own practice.
Finally, CJN is developing a program similar to CUNY’s, in which Network members are placed in the bankruptcy court to offer assistance to pro se litigants.
Website: www.civiljusticenetwork.org