California's Sargent Shriver Civil Counsel Act Tests Impact of More Assistance for Low-Income Litigants
![handle is hein.journals/clear47 and id is 105 raw text is: CALIFORNIA'S SARGENT SHRIVER CIVIL
COUNSEL ACT TESTS IMPACT OF MORE
ASSISTANCE FOR LOW-INCOME LITIGANTS
[Editor's Note: This article is adapted from a longer article to be published in the University
of the District of Columbia Law Review as part of its symposium issue commemorating the
fiftieth anniversary of Gideon v Wainwright. The author and CLEARINGHOUSE REVIEW thank the
editors of the law review for permission to publish this version.]
By Clare Pastore
Clare Pastore
Professor of the Practice of Law he civil-right-to-counsel movementhas recentlybecome interested inpilot pro-
University of Southern California gram effectiveness and cost of increasing the availability of counsel
Gould School of Law U to low-income civil litigants. Interest in pilot programs also coincides with the
699 Exposition Blvd. civil-right-to-counsel movement's increased strategic focus onmeasuresthat are short
Los Angeles, CA 90089 of an across-the-board rightto counsel andthat instead focus on particularly important
213.821.4410
cpastre8l.4 sce0 areas of law, particularly vulnerable litigants, or types of cases particularly susceptible to
ypower imbalances between the parties.
A privately funded housing counsel pilot in two Boston courts recently concluded (a
follow-up pilot is about to begin), and elsewhere several pilots are ongoing or in late
stages of development. The most ambitious pilot to date is the multiyear, multicounty
pilot project under way in California pursuant to the Sargent Shriver Civil Right to
CounselAct of m s f 9.o
1. The Sargent Shriver Civil Counsel Pilots
California's Shriver Act allocates an estimated $9 million to $ o million per year for
the six-year life of the pilots. Its four central provisions set out legislative findings; a
scheme for development, selection, and operation of the pilots; a mandate for evalu-
ation; and a funding mechanism. The Act's goals are to () provide representation for
low-income persons in specified areas of the law, () establish best practices in court
procedures and practices to ensure meaningful access to justice, (3) gather informa-
tion on the outcomes associated with providing those services, and (4) address the
See, e.g., Russell Engler, Connecting Self-Representation to Civil Gideon: What Existing Data Reveal About When Counsel
Is Most Needed, 37 FOROAM UNIVERSITY LAW JOURNAL 37 (2010), and id, Reflections on a Civil Right to Counsel and Drawing
Lines: When DoesAccess to Justice Mean Full Representation by Counsel, and When Might Less Assistance Suffice?, 9 SEATLE
JOURNAL OF SOCIAL JUSTICE 97(2010). A 2006 American Bar Association (ABA) resolution took a similar targeted approach, urging
provision of counsel in cases involving basic human needs ... such as those involving shelter, sustenance, safety, health or
child custody and was widely endorsed by other state and local bar associations (see American Bar Association, Resolution
11 2A, Report to the House of Selegates: Recommendation (Aug. 7, 2006), http://bit.ly/ 3yGmj9).
2Sargent Shriver Civil Right to Counsel Act of 2009, 2009 Cal. Stat. ch. 457. See Kevin G. Baker & Julia R. wilson,
Stepping Across the Threshold: Assembly Bill 590 Boosts Legislative Strategies for Expanding Access to Civil Counsel, 43
CLEARINGHOUSE REVIEW 550 (March-April 2010).
pSee CAL. GoVT CosE § 6805.1 (c)(1)(E) (nest 2013) (allocating $10 of each of certain postjudgment fees between July 1,
2011, and June 30, 2017, to the pilot program).
Clearinghouse REVIEW Journal of Poverty Law and Policy m July-August 2013
97](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.journals/clear47&div=23&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
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California's Sargent Shriver Civil Counsel Act Tests Impact of More Assistance for Low-Income Litigants
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