Wheels of Justice

• Author: Stephanie Francis Ward
• Pages: 66-67

Wheels of Justice

Kentucky pro bono organization meets clients

on the road By Stephanie Francis Ward

they will leave it to someone else

to step up and pitch in,” Martinez

says. “Within minutes of a request

going out from SOLACE via email,

the o ers of help start rolling in,

and the feeling that you are part of

a community of caring individuals

overwhelms.”

Zainey says he is hopeful for stron-

ger ties between SOLACE and the

ABA moving forward. He credits

the ABA with being instrumental in

aiding the expansion of another pro-

gram he started, Project H.E.L.P.—

Homeless Experience Legal

Protection, which launched in New

Orleans in 2004.

Through Project H.E.L.P., which

is now in dozens of cities across the

country, attorneys volunteer to pro-

vide regularly scheduled pro bono

legal clinics for the homeless.

Surprenant says Zainey’s work with

Project H.E.L.P. and SOLACE high-

light the judge’s consistent willing-

ness to give his time and energy to

help others in need.

Zainey’s charitable e orts have

earned him numerous honors,

including the St. John Paul II Award

from the Catholic Foundation of the

Archdiocese of New Orleans.

“I think it’s just in his DNA to be

a loving, caring person,” Surprenant

says. Q

If you are interested in starting a

SOLACE program in your area,

contact U.S. District Judge Jay C.

Zainey at jayzainey@lasolace.org

or contact Mark Surprenant at mark.

surprenant@arlaw.com. For more

information about Project H.E.L.P.,

visit homelesslegalprotection.org.

A fancy outfi tted rig can get you

a lot of attention, even in legal

services.

Kentucky’s Legal Aid of the

Bluegrass recently learned this

fi rst-hand after equipping a 2017

Mercedes-Benz Sprinter van with

a mobile law o ce, including

bench seating for six, as well as a

desk, multiple computers, video-

conferencing equipment, a printer

and Wi-Fi. A sky-blue autowrap

with the words Justice Bus in white

runs along its sides. You don’t have

to have a special license to operate

the vehicle, so sta and volunteer

lawyers do the driving.

The van was purchased with a

$50,000 opportunity grant from

the American Bar Endowment

awarded in 2017. The Justice Bus

hit the road over the summer, and

its trips include 10 rural northern

Kentucky counties, says Joshua

Crabtree, the Legal Aid of the

Bluegrass’ executive director.

According to Crabtree, those 10

counties together have 102,541

residents, and 24 percent of them

are eligible for legal aid services.

He says the area only has 88 active

attorneys.

The service area includes Camp-

bell County, which is near the

agency’s Covington o ce. During

one test run at the Campbell

County courthouse, they met a

woman in the parking lot headed

to a domestic violence hearing

without an attorney. “She said:

‘What is this, what do you do?’ ”

Crabtree says. A summer intern

explained that they represent peo-

ple who can’t a ord lawyers.

“You could kind of see a light

bulb go o in her head, like ‘That’s

my situation,’ ” Crabtree says.

They then did an intake screen-

ing aboard the bus and took her on

as a client. During the screening,

they determined she had custody

issues that had to be addressed.

“She was able to go directly into

court that day and get a contin-

uance on her hearing,” he says.

“Even with all the connections we

have with domestic violence shel-

ters and centers, she wouldn’t have

found us had we not been there.”

FINDING OPPORTUNITIES

The Justice Bus was one of the

fi rst 15 groups to get an ABE

opportunity grant. The Opportuni-

ty Grant Program, established in

2017, provides seed money for new

projects that address the needs

of unrepresented or underrepre-

sented communities.

“Usually you have to have an

established program, then you

go into the funding world to fi nd

money. We’re trying to provide

seed money for innovative ideas,”

says Joanne Martin, the ABE’s

executive director. “It’s a way of

giving synergy to new ideas that

combine the needs of the commu-

nity with the supply of pro bono

lawyers and the knowledge of legal

services needed.”

The ABE, a nonprofi t corporate

public charity, sponsors insurance

plans for ABA members. Approxi-

mately 83 percent of lawyers with

those plans agree to donate avail-

able generated dividends to the

ABE, and those are used to fund

the organization’s annual grants.

The two major recipients of

those grants are the American Bar

Foundation, a research institute

for the empirical and interdisci-

plinary study of law, and the ABA

Fund for Justice and Education,

which supports the organization’s

public service and educational

programs.

According to Martin, of those

groups, each will receive more than

$3.5 million this fi scal year. But

the Opportunity Grant Program

is a newer, separate set of grants.

This year, another 12 programs

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