Each day  hundreds of individuals devote their time and effort  to protecting the rights of Louisiana's poor citizens. They work in state offices, non-profit organizations, law schools, small and large law firms. They are private practitioners, law school educators, pro bono coordinators and many others. The one thing they have in common is that they work tirelessly to ensure that the poor have access to the courts, access to an attorney, and  basically, access to justice.  These individuals, their work and spirit constitute what we call

THE LOUISIANA JUSTICE COMMUNITY

PURPOSE OF OUR WEB SITE

This site is designed to help coordinate the efforts of the Access to Justice Subcommittees in addressing issues related to delivering and improving quality legal services to the poor in Louisiana.  Documents and references related to the goal of strengthening the Louisiana Justice Community will be posted on this site to keep all those interested in equal justice informed of our progress.

This website is maintained by the Access to Justice Program, which was created in 1996 as a joint endeavor of the Louisiana Bar Foundation, the Louisiana State Bar Association and Louisiana's legal services programs.  The program helps to coordinate the work of Louisiana's legal service providers on various statewide issues and provides staff support for the Access to Justice Committee, which provides a forum for legal service providers to network and share limited resources.  

HISTORY OF JUSTICE COMMUNITY PLANNING

On March 26-27, 2004, approximately 30 advocates from accross the state gathered in Baton Rouge for the first Louisiana State Justice Community Planning Conference.  This conference provided an opportunity for advocates to discuss ways to coordinate planning to the challenges they all face: funding cuts, the general public's negative perceptions of people who are poor, the institutions and agencies being called upon to do more intervention with less resources available to them.

None of these challenges lend themselves to short-term or simple solutions; rather, they call upon each organization to develop new ways of harnessing collective resources to achieve together what none can accomplish alone.

These pages will tell the story of how the members of Louisiana's  Justice Community are facing these challenges together.