Interview (Illinois)
Claire Bushey
Crain’s Chicago Business
January 20, 2017
READ THE FULL STORY HERE
Tags: Funding: Federal
Organizations mentioned/involved: Legal Aid Chicago, Legal Services Corporation (LSC), Land of Lincoln Legal Assistance Foundation (LOLLAF) (Illinois), Prairie State Legal Services (northern Illinois)
DETAILS
What does Legal Services Corporation do, for people who may not have ever heard of it?
The Legal Services Corporation was founded in the Nixon administration over 40 years ago as a rule of law initiative to oversee the federal grant to civil legal aid clinics in every state and every congressional district and territory of the United States. In Chicago, our grantee is LAF (formerly the Legal Assistance Foundation). LSC provides about 50 percent of its funding. The other two grantees in Illinois are Prairie State Legal Services and Land of Lincoln Legal Assistance Foundation. In some states we’re as much as 85 percent of the funding for civil legal aid clinics. Housing court, personal bankruptcy, domestic violence, custody, family law matters, elder abuse, veterans seeking benefits—these are the kinds of things that our grantees are dealing with every day.