“Justice for all” is a core American value, and yet access to legal assistance is not guaranteed by our civil legal system. Barriers to civil legal justice disproportionately affect low-income people in the U.S., creating the justice gap—the divide between the civil legal needs and the resources to meet those needs. Many people cannot afford a lawyer and may not even realize they need one. Public libraries are well positioned to be an access point in bridging the justice gap, particularly programming that connects patrons to the civil legal resources and information they need. Presenters will share their experiences with effective and creative civil legal programming that meets their community’s needs. Participants will gain knowledge on how to collaborate with local organizations and explore ways library programming can align with advancing access to justice.

Presented by: Gemma Rose, Librarian II, Volusia County Public Library (FL); Rebecca (Becky) Hass, Programming and Outreach Manager, Anne Arundel County Public Library (MD); and Brooke Doyle, Project Coordinator, WebJunction

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Webinar Attachments

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• Learner Guide (doc) Use alone or with others to extend your learning. 

Related Resources and Links

• Improving Access to Civil Legal Justice through Public Libraries, project page
• Creating Pathways to Civil Legal Justice, a free self-paced course series available in WebJunction’s Course Catalog
• Learning Groups for Creating Pathways for Civil Legal Justice Courses
• Justice Gap Report: Measuring the Unmet Civil Legal Needs of Low-Income Americans, LSC, June 2017
• Volusia County Public Library's Civil Legal LibGuide (doc)
• Library Facebook interview with Volusia County Veterans Services Director, Bob Watson
• Kansas City Public Library’s End of Life Planning Series:
• Navigating the Trajectory of a Life-Altering Illness
• Estate Planning: Be READY
• Caring Conversations
• Avoiding Funeral Bankruptcy
• WebJunction’s Community Partnership and Collaboration Guide
• Cyber Legal Clinics Create Access to Employment at Wicomico Public Libraries, with information on how to help with expungement
• Anne Arundel County Public Library's Lawyer in the Library
• What Is Environmental Justice?, Energy.gov
• Environmental Justice, Wikipedia
  
• Example of Anne Arundel County Public Library event, Environmental Justice  
• Communities of Hope
  
• Also shared in chat
• Rural Libraries Connect Communities to Legal Aid, on remote legal clinics in frontier communities
• PA Supreme Court example of resource to look at attorney's status online
• WebJunction document to help law libraries understand why public libraries are good partners (pdf)