Correction: Next Meeting of the Commission Not September 25
Please correct your calendars. Because September 25 is Rosh Hashanah, the Commission will not meet on that day. An alternate date will be announced shortly.
Walk For Justice
With the American Bar Association coming to Boston in early August for its annual convention, Commissioner Sue Marsh had an idea. The new Walk for Justice is the result.
Take a stroll through central Boston, visiting sites associated with our rich access to justice heritage. Brought to you by Rosie’s Place, the first shelter for homeless women in the United States, and by the Massachusetts Access to Justice Commission. The 2.7 mile walk takes about 90 minutes, not including time to contemplate the significance of the events.
The map of the Walk, with descriptions of each site, is attached. It can also be found at the Commission’s website, www.massa2j.org.
Ralph D. Gants Confirmed as Next Chief Justice of the SJC
The Governor’s Council has confirmed SJC Associate Justice Ralph D. Gants to become Chief Justice of the SJC upon the retirement of current Chief Justice Roderick L. Ireland in late July. Justice Gants is the co-chair of the Access to Justice Commission and has had a distinguished career as a lawyer, prosecutor and judge. He is 59 years of age, so he may serve more than ten years before attaining the mandatory retirement age of 70.
Geraldine S. Hines Confirmed as Associate Justice of the Supreme Judicial Court
Appeals Court Justice Geraldine S. Hines has been nominated by Governor Patrick to assume the Supreme Judicial Court seat that will be vacated when Justice Gants becomes Chief Justice. The Governor’s Council confirmed her appointment yesterday. She will be the first black woman to serve on the SJC and will be eligible to serve for more than three years before she reaches age 70.
Excerpts from her biography on the Appeals Court website reveal that, upon graduation from the University of Wisconsin Law School in 1971 she became a staff attorney at the Massachusetts Law Reform Institute, engaging in prisoner’s rights litigation, and then, from 1973 to 1977 practiced criminal law with the Roxbury Defenders’ Committee in positions of progressively greater responsibility culminating as the Director of the Committee.
After an MIT fellowship researching policy initiatives to address the issue of police misconduct in communities of color, she served as co-counsel in Commonwealth v. Willie Sanders, a highly publicized trial of a black man accused of raping eight women. From 1979-1982 she litigated civil rights cases relating to discrimination in education and advised on special education law while a staff attorney at the Center for Law and Education. Justice Hines entered private practice in 1982, appearing in state and federal courts on criminal, administrative, labor and family law matters. Of particular note, she continued to litigate civil rights cases, including employment discrimination and police misconduct claims, as a founding partner in the first law firm of women of color in the New England region. She began her judicial career in 2001 as an associate justice of the Superior Court, and was promoted to the Appeals Court in 2013.
Justice Hines has been extremely active in a number of civic and community organizations, some of the more prominent being the American Civil Liberties Union, the National Lawyers Guild and the National Conference of Black Lawyers. Stemming from her role in these organizations she has observed elections and investigated human rights abuses in both Africa and the Middle East. She also was appointed to both the Judicial Nominating Council and the Judicial Nominating Commission.
Justice Bridge Launch July 15
The University of Massachusetts School of Law has announced the launching of its “law incubator” in Boston’s financial district on July 15. Located at 274 Franklin Street, the Justice Bridge is directed by Len Zandrow. To celebrate the opening, UMass School of Law Dean Mary Lu Bilek invites interested individuals to a cocktail reception with Director Zandrow and Founder Deborah Ramirez on Thursday, July 31 at 5:30 p.m. at the UMass Club, 33rd Floor, 225 Franklin Street. Boston’s new corporation counsel, Eugene O’Flaherty, is a featured speaker at 6:30 p.m. If you plan to attend, RSVP by July 25, to 508.985.1131 or email rjacobson@umassd.edu.
Justice Bridge is designed to address two current challenges: the large number of consumers of modest means who are unable to afford lawyers for their legal problems and the increasing number of law graduates facing shrinking employment opportunities. It brings a group of recent graduates into service to some of these consumers at below market rate fees. For further information about Justice Bridge, see http://www.umassd.edu/justicebridge.
Funding News: Congress and the Massachusetts Legislature
As Congress returns for its summer session, the LSC appropriation is as much up in the air as always. The House has passed the Commerce, Justice and Science (CJS) appropriations bill for FY 2015, allocating $350 million for LSC. That would be a cut of $15 million from the 2014 level is $365 million, but it’s an improvement over last year’s House position at $300 million. In the Senate, the Appropriations Committee slated $400 million for LSC, but the CJS bill was presented with two other appropriations measures and the package got hung up on the floor on issues unrelated to LSC. Whether the CJS bill will come up again, or whether the mid-term elections in November will wrap all appropriations measures into continuing resolutions this fall is unknown.
The news appears better in Massachusetts. MLAC’s allocation in the Legislature’s appropriations bill is $15 million, an increase of $2 million over Fiscal Year 2014. (The House passed $15 million and the Senate, which had approved only $14 million, receded.) The final step belongs to the Governor, who originally proposed just a $1.0 million increase, to $14 million. Whether he will go along with the $15 million is not known at this moment.
MLRI Issues Susan Elsen’s Report on DCF
Mass Law Reform has released a major report with recommendations that call for major changes in the child welfare programs administered by the Department of Children and Families (DCF). “If Not Now, When? A Call to Action for Systemic Child Welfare Reform in Massachusetts” (June 2014) was written by MLRI attorney Susan R. Elsen.
The Executive Summary of the report argues that the recommendations “boil down to the following: We need to invest in front-end services to keep children safely at home and prevent DCF involvement and out-of-home placements whenever possible. DCF cannot do this in isolation. Reforming the child welfare system does not stop at one agency. It involves cross-agency coordination of multiple programs, services and supports that affect family programs, services and supports that affect family and child safety, stability and well being . . . .” To download a copy of the report, visit http://www.mlri.org/systemic-child-welfare-reform-in-ma.pdf.
Medical-Legal Partnership | Boston Relocates
The founding site for the hundreds of medical-legal partnerships that are coming into existence to bring law into the service of health in America has moved. Medical-Legal Partnership | Boston is now located at:
Medical-Legal Partnership | Boston
c/o Nutter McLennen & Fish
155 Seaport Boulevard
Boston, MA 02210
New Main Phone No: 617 336 7500
New Fax No: 617 336 7445
Save the Date: The 5th Annual Regional MLP Conference will be held on Tuesday, October 28, 2014, at the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston. Contact admin@mlpboston.org for more information.
For information on the wide range and innovation of MLP|B a visit to its excellent website is recommended. www.mlpboston.org. There you will find reports on case services bringing law to medical professionals in the service of patient health. Examples include complicated immigration snarls untangled so a pediatrician could get a child essential services, a pro bono lawyer forcing placement of an autistic child in a more appropriate school and obtaining an updated special education plan that is helping the child to thrive, tips to doctors about things they can do to use law in service of health, research on avoiding hospital readmissions by dealing with lurking legal problems in the home environment and finding legal tools to address social determinants of health in the healthcare setting. A recent report of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation features the role of MLPs in building a culture of health.
Housing Court Expansion? Wait Until Next Year
Sponsored by the Commission and the Housing Court, with an ever-growing list of supporters including many members of both houses, two communities (Barnstable and Chelsea), municipal officials, and legal services and community-based advocacy groups, the bill to expand Housing Court jurisdiction statewide nevertheless failed to pass in the legislative session just ended. The good news was that no active opposition surfaced during the campaign and the proposal enjoyed the support of leaders in both houses.
The proposal would bring Housing Court services and expertise to the 31% of the state’s population that is currently without them — there is no Housing Court for all of Barnstable, Dukes and Nantucket Counties, most of Norfolk County, and much of Middlesex
County. In a surprising development during deliberations, the bill was amended to apply only to Barnstable, Dukes and Nantucket Counties in response to support for the expansion from the Town of Barnstable.
The Commission initiative was led by Commissioner Jim Van Buren and Mass Law Reform Executive Director Georgia Katsoulomitis. The implementation of the plan was directed by the inspired efforts of Mass Law Reform attorney Annette Duke. The campaign will continue in the fall.
Errata: Northeast Legal Aid Search Assisted by Gipson
In the last Update, the contact person assisting the Northeast Legal Aid search for an Executive Director was misstated. Interested persons should contact Leanna Hart Gipson at lgipson@mvls.org or 614-905-2145.