THE HISTORY OF THE ACCESS TO JUSTICE INITIATIVE

INTRODUCTION

When the Commission was created in 2005, the District was in a small minority of jurisdictions that did not provide public funds to address the civil legal needs of low-income residents. The Commission made its first priority the creation of a public funding stream for legal services, and in 2006 persuaded the D.C. Council to establish a landmark annual appropriation of public funds entitled the Access to Justice Initiative. Since that time, that program has infused over $200 million of urgently needed funds into the legal services network. Those funds support lawyers who provide direct services to residents with acute legal issues. The program has enabled several legal services providers to establish or expand offices in the most underserved areas of the city, and more than doubled the number of attorneys working east of the Anacostia River.

 
 

PAST FUNDING EFFORTS

While the Initiative has generally received broad support since its inception in fiscal year 2007 (at funding of $3.2M – which was repeated in FY 2008 and grew to $3.6M in FY 2009), there have been moments when the District’s financial challenges have imperiled these vital funds. In 2010, the program was twice slotted for severe funding cuts that would have undermined the important progress made in closing the justice gap. Mayor Fenty’s proposed budget for fiscal year 2011 slashed the program to 50% of its fiscal year 2009 level. In response, the Commission mounted a community–wide campaign to preserve the funding. Because of these efforts, the Chief Judges of the D.C. Court of Appeals and the Superior Court, the President of the District of Columbia Bar, and twenty–five former Presidents of the District of Columbia Bar submitted letters urging the Council to preserve the funds. Group and individual letters were also submitted by nearly sixty different legal and non–legal organizations. In addition, the Litigation Section of the Bar, joined by nine other Bar sections, issued a public statement urging the Council to protect the program. Under the Commission’s leadership, the District’s legal community demonstrated its broad support for equal access to justice. This led the Committee on Public Safety and the Judiciary to take the unprecedented step of issuing a separate Committee Report on the importance of the Access to Justice Initiative. Most important, the Council restored the funding level to $3.5 million.

The Access to Justice Initiative was again threatened with drastic cuts in December 2010 when Mayor Fenty’s Budget Gap Closing Plan proposed to cut the already–appropriated funding by more than 50%. The Commission again mobilized the legal community, persuading leaders in many legal spheres—including Stephen Zack, the President of the American Bar Association—to urge the Council to restore the funding. Again, as a result of these efforts, the Council restored most of the funding, to a level of $3.1 million for fiscal year 2011.

In 2011, the Commission’s targeted advocacy with the Executive Branch helped to ensure level funding for the Access to Justice Initiative for fiscal year 2012. At the Commission’s request, both Chief Judges of the District of Columbia Courts, the D.C. Bar President, and members of the Mayor’s Transition Team sent letters to Mayor Gray urging him to preserve funding for the program. During Council budget negotiations, Councilmember Phil Mendelson, a longtime champion of the Access to Justice Initiative, succeeded in restoring funding to $3.2 million—the level at which the program was funded at its inception. In 2012, targeted advocacy with the Executive Branch again ensured level funding for the program for fiscal year 2013. During Council budget negotiations, Councilmember Mendelson again championed the program resulting in an increase in funding to $3.5 million.

Mayor Gray’s fiscal year 2014 budget funded the program at $3.575 million and again Chairman Mendelson was again able to secure additional funds for the program, funding it at $3.75 million.

For FY 2015 targeted advocacy with the Executive Branch led to Mayor Gray proposing an increase in funding to $4.278 million. Councilmember Tommy Wells, then the Chair of the Committee on Public Safety and the Judiciary, and Chairman Mendelson, maintained that level which represents more than a half million dollar increase in funding. For FY 2016, Councilmember Kenyan McDuffie, chair of the Committee on the Judiciary, and Council Chairman Phil Mendelson increased funding level by $750,000 to $5.028 million, a funding level that was repeated in FY 2017.

The FY 2018 budget included a slight increase of slightly over $270,000 to $5.3 million in the core Access to Justice program, as well as an additional $4.5 million in funding for a new Civil Legal Counsel program to support the legal representation of low-income tenants facing eviction – with the strong support of Chairman Charles Allen of the Committee on the Judiciary and Public Safety.

Through continued efforts and leadership, the Initiative has enjoyed increases in each subsequent year: FY 2019 funding was over $10M; FY 2020 funding was over $11M; and FY 2021 funding (even as the District faced the impact of the COVID-19 crisis) was over $12M. In FY22, $22.589M was appropriated for the Initiative, bolstered by Federal funding through the American Rescue Plan. The Council maintained and grew funding again in FY 2023 at $31.6M. The Council has been able to maintain that level of funding in FY 2024 and FY 2025, but not without reversing significant proposed cuts. In July 2024, the Mayor returned a budget proposed by the D.C. Council that included $31.668M for the Access to Justice Initiative after the D.C. Council reversed a proposed 67% cut to the program from FY24 levels. Read the Commission’s statement on the Council’s budget vote HERE. This followed a similar situation in fiscal year 2024, where the D.C. Council reversed a proposed 60% cut to the program. Read the Commission’s statement on the FY24 proposed budget HERE. Eventually, the Council passed and the Mayor signed a budget that included $31.67M for the Access to Justice Initiative. Read a Commission Statement of the D.C. Council budget vote HERE.

The Commission is now advocating for stable funding in the FY26 budget.

WHY DOES THE COMMISSION ADVOCATE FOR PUBLIC FUNDING?

Each year, the D.C. Access to Justice Commission asks the Mayor and the D.C. Council to support and expand the funding available to the Access to Justice Initiative to address the civil justice crisis in our community. The District has long faced a civil justice crisis, with staggeringly high rates of litigants (75-97%+) forced to handle their legal problems without legal help. Limited resources left gaps in available services in critical areas of human need. Investment in civil legal aid is a sound, public investment that benefits the District community. Meeting legal needs promotes public safety, community well-being and economic stability, and delivers cost savings to District residents, businesses, and the government.

To learn more about civil legal needs in the District, read the Commission’s Delivering Justice report.

Each year since 2006, the Commission has advocated for and secured a local public funding stream—the Access to Justice Initiative —to support the provision of civil legal services. The funds are granted by the city to the DC Bar Foundation, which developed and administers the Access to Justice Grants Initiative. The Initiative was established with the explicit goals of increasing representation in housing–related cases and expanding services to underserved communities. Grants awarded by the D.C. Bar Foundation through this program have greatly advanced these goals. Access to Justice funds pay for dozens of lawyers who serve low–income and underserved residents in some of the poorest parts of the city. The funds have also dramatically expanded geographic access to services, more than doubling the number of attorneys working east of the Anacostia River.

The Access to Justice grants have greatly enhanced the provision of services to indigent residents facing loss of their homes. They support a variety of court-based legal services projects, through which lawyers from different legal services providers provide same day representation to litigants in a variety of legal matters.

The Access to Justice grants also support a nationally acclaimed Community Legal Interpreter Bank that provides free interpretation services to legal services clients who are not proficient in English or who are deaf or hearing impaired. Although these residents are entitled to interpretation services in court, without this crucial language access resource they would not be able to communicate effectively with legal services attorneys to solicit help and to prepare their cases.

The Loan Repayment Assistance Program, administered by the D.C. Bar Foundation, is also supported by the grants. The program helps legal services lawyers who live and work in the District to repay crushing law school debts. A parallel poverty lawyer loan repayment program funded and run by the Bar Foundation also reaches poverty lawyers to work in the District, but live in nearby Maryland or Virginia. Without these programs, many passionate and dedicated advocates would be unable to sustain public interest careers. They also ensure that legal services providers can attract and retain diverse and talented staff.

In fiscal year 2018 a new publicly funded program was created through the appropriation of an additional $4.5 million in public funding to support a landmark program to support the legal representation of low-income tenants facing eviction. The Civil Legal Counsel Program, administered by the District of Columbia Bar Foundation, supports both limited and extended representation in eviction matters, brief advice and other legal services, and enables legal services providers to leverage their resources to support the efforts of pro bono lawyers in private practice assisting in these cases. The program builds on the Housing Initiative, an effort launched by the Commission and the D.C. Bar Pro Bono Center in 2015 to bring together legal services organizations and the private bar in addressing the growing housing crisis in our District. The additional resources have vastly expanded the number of attorneys doing eviction defense and present to assist clients through court-based programs.

The District of Columbia government has truly become a national leader in the public support of civil legal services. In fiscal year 2023-2025, the District appropriated a record level $31.6 million to support the Access to Justice Initiative. The Commission is proud of its role in encouraging this strong partnership of support to low-income District residents in need of legal services.

For more information on Access to Justice Initiative programs, visit https://dcbarfoundation.org/our-grantees/.

REFERENCE MATERIALS