Filling the civil justice gap with a new business model.

• Author: Abadin, Ramon A.
• Position: Florida Bar - President's page

Maxing out credit cards to get professional advice on child custody arrangements during a divorce.

Standing before the judge without counsel in 80 percent of divorces in Florida.

Fighting to keep their homes from foreclosure, while struggling to understand confusing court rules and procedures and feeling overpowered by professional lenders' lawyers.

The list of Floridians with legal problems who can't foot the bill for lawyers goes on and on: veterans, the elderly, the working middle-class, college students.

The system is broken if only 14 percent of persons with civil legal problems attain legal help. Low-income citizens reach out to dedicated legal services attorneys who are stretched to the limit, and only about 20 percent of the needs of indigent civil litigants are being met. When confronted with a civil legal problem, 30 percent of low-income Americans give up and seek no legal redress. Many working-class Floridians earn too much to qualify for legal aid, but not enough to hire an attorney.

We are failing our citizens, and that is what we euphemistically call the "civil justice gap."

Our Florida Constitution states:

"The court shall be open to every person for redress of any injury, and justice shall be administered without sale, denial, or delay."

We have a justice crisis in Florida that makes the fundamental principle that justice should be accessible to everyone--regardless of economic status or disadvantage--nothing more than a theory. We must work with all deliberate speed to address this crisis.

The Florida Commission on Access to Civil Justice, created by Chief Justice Jorge Labarga less than a year ago, is working at a fevered pitch to fill the civil justice gap and to make access to civil justice a reality.

The commission's work so far makes it clear that in order to solve the civil access problem, we will have to consider altering the way we define the practice of law. We will have to consider altering the way we regulate the practice of law. We will have to consider altering the way we partner with nonlawyers. We will have to consider altering the way we think.

Our profession alone cannot resolve the access to civil justice gap. It is a societal issue, and we as a profession should get businesses to take proactive initiatives, along with lawyers, so all Floridians can have 100 percent access to civil justice.

We need to look at technology and artificial intelligence platforms for solutions. We need to examine every obstacle...