Goals.

Firefighters and police officers making $40,000 a year can't afford to hire a lawyer when their homes are in foreclosure. Some court employees, who haven't had cost-of-living raises in more than seven years, had to resort to food stamps.

Jorge Labarga gives those examples when he describes his two major projects during his two-year term as chief justice.

Access to Justice

Working with Florida Bar President Greg Coleman, Labarga will head a summit to address the crisis that only 20 percent of indigent people are able to receive legal counsel and about 60 percent of working-class Floridians can't afford to hire a lawyer and don't qualify for legal aid.

They will engage CEOs at major corporations for help.

"We can't just rely on the taxpayers. And we can't just rely on the Bar to help with this. This is a general societal problem," Labarga said. "We're not just talking about access to justice by the poor. We're talking about the middle class. The firefighter who puts in long hours. The police officer who puts in long hours. And they're making $40,000 to $45,000 a year trying to raise a family. If they get involved in some kind of legal matter, they can't afford to pay a lawyer $200, $300, $400 an hour"

The business community should want to get involved in solving the crisis, Labarga said, because "it's in their best interest to have the people who work for them, and the people who make their products for them to make money, to also have access to justice, so they can live a happy life and they are productive workers.

"Imagine going through a horrendous divorce, or your home is in foreclosure, and you can somehow get out of it if you can hire a lawyer to help you. If you can just take that weight off their shoulders and have them concentrate on the job they are supposed to be doing, one would think the business community would want that," Labarga said.

"It is also the right thing to do in Florida."

Labarga said other states have "ventured into this area with the private sector and have been successful at it. We're going to look into those models, as well, and see how we can implement them here in Florida."

Cost of Living Raises for Court Employees

The other major project during Labarga's two years as chief justice is the same one his predecessors had: Making sure that the legislature properly funds the judicial branch of government .

"We basically have been doing it on the cheap for a long time because the economy has been so bad. And Florida's...