Released by the State Bar of California earlier this year, the 2024 Justice Gap Study found that the civil legal needs of California residents are growing, yet few seek and receive legal help, especially low-income residents and families.
These needs are compounded by lack of education, lack of access, cost prohibition and more.
As a civil legal aid provider that serves residents who couldn’t otherwise afford an attorney, Inland Counties Legal Services understands these challenges well because our clients face them every day. Oftentimes, these civil legal issues can compound and cause issues like homelessness, hunger, lack of health care, and more that affect our entire communities.
Community needs and access to attorneys
Californians currently seek legal help for just 18% of their problems overall and 29% of problems that substantially impact them. Regardless of income level, most Californians do not seek legal help for their civil legal problems, even those that substantially impact them.
Additionally, more California households are experiencing civil legal problems compared with five years ago. Low-income households specifically face an average of eight legal problems, with the majority being related to consumer, health care, and housing – like debt collection lawsuits and evictions. One in five California households experienced a health care problem where their health insurance did not cover medically necessary services.
Still, Californians rarely seek help for civil legal problems.
One of the contributing factors is the lack of access to attorneys; just 25% of attorneys in California’s legal market serve individual clients – the rest serve corporations, government, or businesses. Access to attorneys in rural areas is even more sparce; 16 counties in California are attorney deserts, and most are at risk of becoming one. An attorney desert is an area with fewer than one active attorney per 1,000 residents.
Barriers
Two of the largest barriers for residents to receive civil legal help are knowledge barriers and cost barriers.
Especially when it comes to civil legal issues, there is a lack of understanding among the general public as to what a civil legal problem is. Many people are used to looking at the legal system through the criminal lens, without fully grasping that debt collection lawsuits, housing habitability, health insurance denials, special education plans, estate planning, and more are issues that play out in the civil legal system.
With that, 41% of low-income residents don’t believe a lawyer could help with their problem. This may also be impacted by negative perceptions that persist among low-income residents of the legal system. Only 3 in 10 low-income residents believe the justice system will treat them fairly.
Lastly, costs are certainly a barrier. About half of low-income households feel confident they’d be able to find a lawyer they could afford. Californians report that for most of their legal problems, they would only have been willing to go to a lawyer if they didn’t have to pay up front.
Pro Bono Volunteerism
Legal aid organizations like ICLS are the largest provider of civil legal services to low-income Californians, but the demand for services is too high. Pro bono volunteers are an essential support for legal aid organizations to help more clients, provide extended services, and improve offerings for specialized groups like small businesses.
However, more than half of California attorneys did not provide pro bono services in 2022. Just 23% met the State Bar’s goal of providing 50 or more hours of pro bono services.
Attorneys who offered pro bono services in 2022 averaged 116 hours, a 47 percent increase from 79 hours in 2016. Based on these findings, an estimated 88,000 active California attorneys provided pro bono services in 2022, contributing nearly 10 million hours — the equivalent of over 4,700 full-time attorneys.
This goes to show that pro bono involvement in the civil legal system is essential in promoting justice for low-income residents.
The most common ways that employers supported pro bono work were allowing pro bono work during business hours and providing internal resources. Nearly half of non-participating attorneys said their employers don’t permit pro bono during work hours. Addressing barriers to providing pro bono service could expand pro bono participation and enhance access to justice.
To view the full study, head to: 2024-CA-Justice-Gap-Study.pdf