Technology

ABA Launches First Ever National Disaster Relief Pro Bono Portal

Justice technology firm Paladin partnered with the ABA groups to give lawyers ready access to pro bono opportunities.

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As the coronavirus outbreak continues to spread devastation both directly and indirectly across the country, attorneys are already expressing their interest in offering their services to help those impacted. Paul Weiss is clocking tremendous pro bono time right now. But one of the challenges of pro bono work that no one ever talks about is the difficulty of finding a pro bono cause to take up.

Part of the lack of resources to hire counsel is the lack of resources to get noticed by counsel. And while the need is always great, that’s also part of the problem — there are often too many voices calling out for attorneys to find the right cause for their skill set.

The American Bar Association Young Lawyers Division’s Disaster Legal Services Program — and, yes, they officially abbreviated themselves as the mouthful “ABA YLD DLS” — is a joint project from the Young Lawyers Division with justice-focused technology firm Paladin to create an online portal to connect attorneys with those who need help.

Before now, the DLS program’s efforts to connect pro bono lawyers with disaster-related pro bono opportunities were ad-hoc and manual, as referrals were run through online forms, spreadsheets, and phone calls across jurisdictions. Through the Disaster Relief Portal, volunteer attorneys will be able to filter opportunities by practice area, communities to serve, type of engagement, and the ability to work remotely. State hotline hosts and legal services organizations will be able to post opportunities to the DLS program’s portal as they come in to increase their volunteer pools. By creating consistency in opportunity intake, the ABA and Paladin will be able to gather important data around needs, volunteer interests, and ultimately, pro bono connections to inform better volunteer matching.

The effort is sponsored by Clio and LegalZoom and will be working with Legal Services Corporation to populate the portal with pro bono opportunities.

“The COVID-19 public health crisis has made the need for a nationwide Disaster Legal Services pro bono portal more apparent than ever,” said ABA President Judy Perry Martinez. “Streamlining our volunteer recruitment and referral process means connecting those in need following a disaster to volunteer attorneys as quickly as possible.” Lawyers who are willing to provide pro bono legal services can sign up and view cases at https://aba.joinpaladin.com/. Individuals who are looking for disaster-related legal assistance can connect to their state hotlines by calling the DLS Program’s national toll-free hotline at 888-743-5749.

If you or your firm have been looking for opportunities to contribute to the relief effort but couldn’t figure out where to begin, this is exactly the easy-to-navigate portal you need. Take some time to consider your own practice skills and how they can best translate to help someone in need and take a look at the portal. Lawyers spend too much of their lives on the receiving end of jokes about being societal leeches; this crisis is a good opportunity to showcase what the profession can do to help.

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HeadshotJoe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.

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