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Chicago Bar Foundation
Report
A Year of Impact That You Made Possible
By Angelika Labno
CBF Administrative and Communications Coordinator
T
hanks to your generous support
of the CBF, 2014 saw impressive
progress in the fight to make the
justice system more fair and accessible
for everyone in our community. You can
be proud of the impact you are making
through your Foundation. Below are just
a few highlights, and you can learn more
about this important work and how you
can get more involved by visiting chica-
gobarfoundation.org. Thank you again
for coming together with your colleagues
from throughout the legal community to
make a difference.
JEP Takes Flight
The CBF’s Justice Entrepreneurs Project is
an incubator program for recent law school
graduates to start innovative law practices
providing affordable legal services to low-
and moderate-income people. Thanks to
your support, JEP already has become a
national model and received significant
local and national media attention over the
course of 2014. The year ended with the
first 10 JEP lawyers completing the pro-
gram and continuing their practices as the
first alumni members of the JEP network.
Twenty-Eight more dedicated and entre-
preneurial lawyers are now in the program,
building innovative law practices to provide
much-needed legal help to a large segment
of our community who too often do not
have meaningful access to affordable help
in the traditional legal market.
To learn more about the JEP or to con-
nect with a JEP lawyer, visit jepchicago.org.
New Resource Center in Daley
Center
Amajor undertaking last year was working
with the Circuit Court and other part-
ners to open the Circuit Court of Cook
County’s Resource Center for People
Without Lawyers in the Daley Center.
The center fully opened in April 2014 and
is a major milestone in the longer-term
effort to make the court systemmore user-
friendly and accessible for people without
lawyers, a key goal of both the CBF and
the Circuit Court.
Justice Starts with a Solid
Foundation. Keep Yours
Strong.
You can make more of this great work possible
through a donation to the CBF. A gift today or
a recurring gift of any size will go a long way
toward making the justice system more ac-
cessible for people in need. More information
about the different ways you can contribute
and continue to ensure that our legal system is
more fair and efficient for everyone is available
at chicagobarfoundation.org/support. Thank
you for your continued generous support in
making the CBF’s work possible.
JEP participants collaborate in the program’s office space at 208 S. Jefferson. Working in a shared
location encourages peer mentoring, collaboration and collective innovation.
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JANUARY 2015