The Illinois State Bar Association, Illinois Judges Association and Women’s Bar Association of Illinois are teaming up for three times the fun at Chicago Volunteer Legal Services (CVLS) 20^th annual Race Judicata Sprint for Justice 5K Run/Walk. This fundraising event takes place on Sept. 12 at Upper Hutchinson Field in Chicago’s Grant Park.

T-shirts will be provided for team members. All proceeds from Race Judicata go to the general operating costs of CVLS, which works to provide legal services to the poor and working poor of Chicago. The three associations will host a tent that will serve as the main gathering point for ISBA, IJA and WBAI members. Food and water will be available at the tent. The entry fee is $33 through Sept. 6. Register under the team name IJA.WBAI.ISBA at www.cvls.org/judicata

Under the leadership of Chief Justice Thomas L. Kilbride, the Illinois Supreme Court established the Access to Justice Commission in June 2012 with the goal of removing barriers and increasing the ease of interacting with courts by persons who can’t afford lawyers to represent their interests and needs.

Over the next two years, large numbers of Servicemembers will return home from deployment. Coming home from combat can present a difficult reintegration with family, friends and community. Many will face legal issues, increasing the overall demand for military legal assistance.

Help make military legal assistance available for returning Servicemembers.

Waves of returning Servicemembers will strain existing military legal assistance programs. Civilian attorneys can help meet the growing need by becoming a part of The Illinois Bar Association’s statewide effort to increase access to military legal assistance.

Help Servicemembers, Veterans and their Families resolve their legal issues.

More attorneys are needed to assist with:

• Family Law
• Finance/Banking
• Employment
• Health Care
• Immigration
• Elder Law

Learn more about how you can provide critical legal services to our returning Servicemembers.

To sign up please go to – http://militarylegalsupport.com

Follow us on Twitter -  http://twitter.com/militarylegal

The United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Office of the Chief Counsel in Chicago, Illinois, is responsible for providing legal advice, training and services in cases related to the ICE mission in Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Missouri, and Wisconsin.  The office represents the United States in immigration removal proceedings, and provides legal support to ICE components focusing on customs, worksite enforcement, employment law, and administrative law.  Legal externs assist in the representation of the United States government in immigration removal proceedings.

Legal Extern Location: Chicago, Illinois

Application Materials: Resume, transcript, writing sample, and cover letter indicating dates when available.  Applications should be submitted to occ-chi-applications@ice.dhs.gov.  All electronically submitted documents must be in MSWord or Adobe Acrobat format. 

Qualifications: First-year (second semester) and second-year law students.  Previous or concurrent course work in immigration law helpful, but not necessary.  Must be a U.S. citizen.  Will be subject to a background investigation due to the sensitive nature of the work performed.

Application Deadline: For Spring of 2014: Applications will be accepted between August 15, and September 30, 2013.

Minimum Weeks Required: 10 weeks minimum, 15 - 20 hours per week. 

Salary: Volunteer (without compensation).            

ISBA member Adam Whiteman has written and produced a musical drama about an important figure in Chicago's history who helped rescue the traditional music of Ireland. The show is called "MUSIC MAD" and it plays on Sundays in September and October at Chief O'Neills Pub & Restaurant (3471 N. Elston, Chicago). Tickets are only $11 through Goldstar

Help support the arts in Chicago, enjoy a fine Irish meal at Chief O'Neills!

"With the rapid rise and fall of the housing market, Illinois has seen tremendous growth in the number of mortgage rescue services being offered to consumers who are delinquent on their mortgage payments and/or are at risk of foreclosure. Unfortunately, fraudsters have used these services to cheat consumers out of money and ownership and equity in their home," Jennifer D. Franklin of SIU School of Law writes in her excellent article on the Mortgage Rescue Fraud Act. The piece appears in the latest ISBA Commercial Banking, Collections, and Bankruptcy newsletter.

What kind of scams? Well, there's the consultant scam, where "for a large upfront fee the distressed property 'consultant' promises to buy time for the consumer and save the home by negotiating deals with their lenders," Franklin writes. These so-called consultants "often take the consumer’s money and fail to perform any services, thus leaving the consumer worse off then before."

The article offers great advice about how to use the Act to help your consumer clients recover from fraud perpetrators. Read it.

By Sandra Crawford, ISBA Delivery of Legal Services Committee

Under the topic of “what are they doing now”, this month’s Delivery of Legal Services Committee newsletter catches up with past chair, E. Nicole Carrion, known to all as Nikki (Chair 2010-2011). Since terming-off this committee Nikki, in addition to opening her solo practice in Edwardsville, Illinois, has become of-counsel to Chicago Legal Advocacy for Incarcerated Mothers (CLAIM). Nikki is the downstate staff attorney for CLAIM responsible for visiting regional female correctional facilities where she provides advice, education, and legal services on all types of family law and domestic violence matters to incarcerated mothers, their children, and their children’s guardians. In her of-counsel role Nikki collaborates with other agencies and social service organizations to promote and improve the criminal justice system and the response to the issues faced by incarcerated mothers and their children. CLAIM’s mission is to provide legal and educational services which help maintain the bonds between imprisoned mothers and their children. In her work for CLAIM, Nikki advocates for policies and programs that benefit families of imprisoned mother and programs which will reduce future incarceration of women and girls. Additional information about CLAIM and the services it provides can be found at www.claim-il.org.

Some interesting facts which can be found on CLAIM’s website: 

ISBA President Paula H. Holderman invites ISBA members to attend the 9th Annual Solo & Small Firm Conference from Oct. 3-5 at the Westin Northwest Chicago in Itasca. Early registration discounts are available through Sept. 6. Register at www.isba.org/soloconference

Asked and Answered

By John W. Olmstead, MBA, Ph.D, CMC

Q. I am the managing partner of a 17-attorney law firm in downtown Chicago. We are a litigation boutique firm with a majority of our work in insurance defense. We have been in practice for 7 years. While we grew quickly during the early years - we have reached a plateau and growth has stalled. We are planning our first strategic planning retreat and hope to develop a long-range strategic plan. Do you have any suggestions?

A. Where most planning efforts fall short is in the implementation of the plan. The plan lays on the shelf and collects dust. I suggest that the plan be implemented through the firm's existing management structure, i.e., the managing partner, executive committee, the strategic planning committee, and practice area chairs.

Individual partners should be assigned responsibility and held accountable for the satisfactory implementation of each phase of the plan in accordance with an agreed-upon timetable. This should be done during the planning retreat session.

Status reports should be provided to the other partners in each phase of the plan in order to keep them apprised of the planning activities.

Suggest an online project management system (portal) be used to track progress.

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