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The Circuit Court’s Resource Center for People Without Lawyers Turns Three
They Can Help You Right Next to the Starbucks
By Kelly Tautges
CBF Director of Pro Bono & Court Advocacy
continued on page 49
Chicago Bar Foundation
Report
“I am writing this letter today to praise
one of your employees…” begins a letter
thanking CARPLS for excellent legal
advice at the Municipal Court Advice
Desk and highlighting the especially kind
and supportive service received from an
Illinois JusticeCorps member as part of the
process. This court patron’s letter highlights
the unique and important services being
provided in The Circuit Court of Cook
County Resource Center for People with-
out Lawyers in the concourse level of the
Daley Center, which indeed is right next
to the Starbucks there.
The Resource Center, and the critical
help it provides, is now so firmly estab-
lished in the court’s ecosystem that it is
hard to believe it has only been open for
three years. Fully operational as of April
2014, the Center is a partnership between
the CBF, the Circuit Court, and two legal
aid organizations: CARPLS and the Chi-
cago Legal Clinic (CLC). There are three
major legal advice desks in the Center—the
Municipal Court Advice Desk, the Chan-
cery Court Advice Desk and the Domestic
Relations Advice Desk. These three desks
are managed and staffed by lawyers from
CARPLS and CLC.
Illinois JusticeCorps plays a central
role as well. JusticeCorps volunteers have
helped more than 160,000 people, and
attorneys at the advice desks have provided
advice and assistance in more than 37,000
cases since the Center opened.
JusticeCorps Volunteers Get People
Where They Need to Go
One of the many advantages in the
Resource Center for both court patrons and
the advice desks is the presence of Illinois
JusticeCorps, an innovative AmeriCorps
program that is dedicated to making the
courthouse more welcoming and less
intimidating for people without lawyers.
JusticeCorps volunteers, who mainly
are undergraduate students and recent
graduates, act as docents and provide other
procedural and navigational assistance to
people without lawyers. The CBF first
launched Illinois JusticeCorps as a pilot
in 2009 and continues to manage the
program in Cook County. JusticeCorps
later was expanded to other parts of the
state as well, and the other partners in the
program’s statewide operations include
People without lawyers receive help at
the Circuit Court of Cook County Resource
Center. JusticeCorps volunteers (right) check
people inoutside the Center andprovide the
navigational help, and help desk staff serve
clients inside (above).
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APRIL/MAY 2017