Spotlight on pro bono

Now in its 25th year, the Peoria County Pro Bono Program was established in 1982 as a joint venture of the Peoria County Bar Association and Prairie State Legal Services.

An oversight committee was established, and its appointed members were given the responsibility of overseeing administration of the program.

The intake of prospective clients is conducted by the staff at Prairie State. They review applicants for financial eligibility and other criteria.

Once the intake is completed and the staff at Prairie State has established that a person is eligible for assistance, a pro bono coordinator, employed by Prairie State, refers the client to one of the members of the Peoria County panel.

During 2005, 93 attorneys participated in the program and 91 accepted new referrals. Two hundred cases were opened and 109 were closed.

Currently, pro bono attorneys represent clients in divorce, child custody, collection, foreclosure, guardianship, bankruptcy, estate, and contract cases.

For the last five years, the pro bono committee has worked hard on increasing the number of attorneys who participate in the program.

We have expanded the pro bono program beyond family law, so 40 to 50 percent of the cases handled by pro bono attorneys are non-family law matters.

Since 2002, the committee has begun each year with a project of wiping out the waiting list of pro bono clients and has successfully accomplished this goal by setting up law clinics for clients, increasing training for pro bono attorneys, establishing a special call in family court with the judiciary for pro bono cases, and conducting a pledge drive to obtain new attorneys and firms for participation.

Each year during the Peoria County Bar Association's Law Day luncheon, the committee honors a Pro Bono Attorney of the Year and a Pro Bono Firm of the Year to for outstanding commitment to legal services for the poor.

Last year's Pro Bono Attorney of the Year was Marci Shoff, who devoted 179 hours to representing a client in a custody case.

The Pro Bono Firm of the Year was Quinn, Johnston, Henderson & Pretorius, which has supported the program since its inception. Last year, its attorneys contributed 153 hours of representation to pro bono clients.

Those of us who are advocates of legal services for the poor are extremely grateful to have such a generous, supportive and committed bar association in Peoria.

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We The People Media, a Chicago-based agency that assists residents of public housing in low-income communities, has received a $5,000 grant from the Illinois Bar Foundation.

The funds will support research and publication of investigative reports in its Residents' Journal to protect the rights of residents who need relocation because of the demolition of housing projects.

The bimonthly Journal is just one of We The People Media's grassroots programs that seek solutions to entrenched poverty, weak educational systems, high crime rates and poor delivery of social services in marginalized communities.

The majority of its readers are low-income black women who head households with young children on annual incomes of less that $15,000. Among others are Latinos, Mandarin Chinese, Russian and Korean immigrants.

Residents' Journal is distributed door-to-door at no charge to more than 100,000 people in 35,000 subsidized households, including youths, single mothers, people with disabilities and seniors.

This award-winning publication is a watchdog over the Chicago Housing Authority Plan for Transformation, a 10-year, $1.6 billion effort “to relocate tens of thousands of public housing families and replace their high-rise buildings with mixed-income communities,” said executive director Ethan Michaeli.

We the People Media also operate an Urban Youth International Journalism Program that trains young people in media skills, and an Advocacy and Outreach Initiative that empowers residents to intervene in the process of neighborhood change.

For more information, call (312) 745-2681 or access the Web site, www.wethepeoplemedia.org.