Empowering Individuals with Legal Tune Up

Episode Notes

Transcript

Erica Nelson:

So it’s really sort of an innovation to empower individuals, give them a little bit more agency and democratize the data that’s out there.

Announcer:

Equal access to justice is a core American value. In each episode of Talk Justice an An LSC Podcast, we’ll explore ways to expand access to justice and illustrate why it is important to the legal community, business government, and the General Public Talk. Justice is sponsored by the Leaders Council of the Legal Services Corporation.

Lee Rawles:

Hello and welcome to Talk Justice. I’m Lee Rawles, assistant managing editor at the ABA Journal and your host for this episode. I am a proud resident of the great state of Wisconsin, and today I’m excited to say that we’re talking about an innovative Wisconsin program that is creating web-based self-help tools that enable people to address their civil legal problems. LIFT Wisconsin is an organization dedicated to empowering communities through technology driven assistance that dismantles the legal barriers that keep Wisconsinites from achieving economic stability. Joining us today to talk about their DIY legal tuneup tools are two guests, Erica Nelson, executive director of LIFT Wisconsin, and Jessie Luter Long LIFT Wisconsin’s Justice coordinator. Guys, thank you so much for joining us.

Jessie Lutter-Long:

Thank you for having us.

Erica Nelson:

Yes, thank you for this opportunity.

Lee Rawles:

So before we dig into the legal tuneup tool, could you tell us a bit about LIFT Wisconsin? Erica, I’m going to have you start off.

Erica Nelson:

Sure. Thank you. Yeah, so LIFT Wisconsin stands for legal interventions for transforming Wisconsin, and it was the brainchild of a number of lawyers here in Wisconsin who were seeking alternatives, ways to address the access to justice crisis. And they came up with an around 2020 came up with the legal tuneup tool, which is a tech-based, web-based free tool that someone can use on their phone or their computer that allows them to search whether they have a civil legal issue that they might want to address. And the legal tuneup tool is free. It serves all Wisconsinites, and it is sort of the bridge between the need for more lawyers and the ability of an individual to search and do some of the work around civil legal issues on their own. So it’s really sort of an innovation to empower individuals, give them a little bit more agency and democratize the data that’s out there. So LIFT was built to house the legal tuneup tool, and we currently manage or implement the legal tuneup tool. We also do direct service clinics for a driver’s license and child support in a few counties in the state of Wisconsin. And we’re also sort of at the beginning stages of implementing a community justice worker model where individuals can support those individuals at community-based organizations that are client facing, can use the legal tuneup tool to support individuals and give them more legal resources. So that’s us.

Lee Rawles:

And Jessie, are you involved in that project?

Jessie Lutter-Long:

Yes, I’m a little more involved in the clinics. I go to some of the clinics and resource fairs to provide on the spot legal information and legal assistance were applicable. So that’s the part of the program that I’m a little more involved in.

Lee Rawles:

And Erica, you brought up a driver’s license, child support issues. What kind of civil legal problems can the DIY tune up currently help people address?

Erica Nelson:

Yeah, so legal tuneup currently can help folks remove an eviction record, remove a criminal record, modify their child support order, look to see what their driver’s license issues may be, whether that’s a suspension, and then take measures to reinstate it and answer small claims cases. So those are the five main areas that the legal tuneup tool is currently working on with respect to civil legal issues. And it’s really directed towards low income folks who can use this tool because they can’t otherwise afford an attorney to address their problems or give them the opportunity to discover that they have a civil legal issue. Many people do not even know that they have an issue that could be addressed with some help.

Lee Rawles:

Yeah. You mentioned that some people might not even know they have an issue. In Wisconsin, we have a little bit of a different setup than many other states. There are some unique things about what we have going on in Wisconsin. Jessie, could you outline for people what Wisconsin’s public databases are like and what sort of information is accessible to everyone online?

Jessie Lutter-Long:

Yeah, so CCAP is Wisconsin’s consolidated court access program access database, and it houses all of the non-confidential cases in Wisconsin. All that information. And anybody who has a criminal case, a traffic case, family law cases, small claims, all of that stuff is on ccap and it is available for anyone in the state to look up. It’s free. All you need is someone’s name.

Lee Rawles:

So we usually think about consolidation of databases. Oh, this is streamlining what great news, but what sorts of problems does this easily accessible information cause for people?

Jessie Lutter-Long:

Yeah, it is really easy to use and it’s really nice that all that information is available. It makes things a lot easier for people to find out if they have issues, they can just go to this one place and look themselves up. But it means anybody can. So a lot of people who have passed evictions or past criminal records that shows up on ccap and we tell people that you’re not supposed to discriminate based on someone’s criminal record or based on all these other factors, but with that information available, it is used against people.

Lee Rawles:

So Erica, let’s pick one of the issues that someone might address through the tuneup tool and talk us through what the general step by step would look like. And about how long does it usually take people?

Erica Nelson:

Well, yeah, so we’ll give an example. There’s two quick examples I guess it makes sense to give. One is eviction so that if an individual has an eviction on ccap, that should be removed. So in the case of Wisconsin, after two years, an eviction case that’s either been dismissed or results in no monetary judgment, that should essentially come off the CCAP website after two years. And to sort of build on what Jessie was saying earlier, a landlord or someone who’s screening someone for a potential apartment can just go look them up in ccap and we’ll see an eviction, even though that eviction shouldn’t in theory really be impacting their ability to get housing. So the legal tuneup tool allows someone to submit a motion to the clerk of courts in the relevant jurisdiction and ask that that eviction be removed from the CCAP website. And the person essentially goes through a few simple steps, inputs into the system, their address, the address of the place in which the eviction is listed, and then it automatically populates the court form.

And then through legal tuneup, someone can sign that motion for removal from ccap, and then we will in fact on our end mail it to the clerk for them. So that’s one example. Super simple. Maybe if you have the information at hand could take five to 10 minutes to go through the whole process. So that’s one really good example of how the legal tuneup tool works and can remove barriers. The other one is answering small claims cases in the state of Wisconsin. This is an interesting tool in that we are trying to mitigate the high rate up to 60% of default judgments in small claims courts for Wisconsinites. And you can use the tool and you can answer a complaint by submitting the forms regarding the issue, whether that’s to respond to the plaintiff because most people don’t know that there’s a complaint against them.

They don’t know how to manage it, they don’t know how to respond, and they don’t know in what form to answer that complaint. So in Wisconsin, we have 72 different counties. We’ve created this system where if the person puts in the information, their information, it’ll come up from CA because it aggregates and pulls from CA and says there’s a complaint against you. And then they can go through the process of a few simple steps to answer that complaint. Again, it will fill out the forms for them and they indicate to them where they have to answer in person. If they have to answer in writing or somewhere in between. It’s sometimes very confusing. And then you’re allowed to sign up for text reminders for your hearing and also answer any sort of debt harassment. And this is all through the tool without the need for an attorney. And that might take a little bit longer, probably 10 minutes. And the legal tuneup tool inside, once you’re in and you’ve inputted your information, it will create the forms, but it’ll also tell you what you’re doing at the time. So you are answering for, and you’ll appear before a judge. This is a hearing, this is the definition of a hearing. So it’s really trying to make these often overwhelming and complicated issues more accessible to individuals.

Lee Rawles:

And you’re providing education,

Erica Nelson:

Providing a lot of education in the moment, so it’s less overwhelming and more manageable, and then people can begin the process to address them.

Lee Rawles:

So Jessie, do you have anything to add to that?

Erica Nelson:

Yes.

Jessie Lutter-Long:

So those are the two modules that I think are the most exciting. Those are issues that we see all the time in the community. Eviction records harming people’s ability to get a safe and affordable housing and small claims cases despite the small claims court system being relatively safe, friendly, it’s still a really difficult system for folks to navigate. There are so many different rules that people need to follow. There are local rules, and it’s such a small short turnaround for finding out that you have a problem, seeing if you can afford an attorney, finding out you can afford an attorney, finding out you don’t qualify for civil legal aid, and then researching and trying to figure out how to do all of this on your own. So the legal tuneup tool, just being able to let you know that you have this issue, this is the form you need to fill out, and we will pre-populate as much of the information as possible and send it in for you is such a big deal. And if we can just take that 60% default rate and decrease it just a little bit, it’s such a big success for people, it would be such a big deal.

Lee Rawles:

Well, in full disclosure to our listeners, I entered my name as a Wisconsin resident. I was curious, and I loved finding out that there are no debt claims against me. I’m certainly sure that other people have experienced, oh, I didn’t do a copay for a strep test I had out of town, and suddenly this is on my record and it’s going to impact my credit score. And I had no idea. So personally, I was like, Hey, this is great to just have one stop where I can see what does my record look like. And it did look clean, so that was great. But can you share some stats with us about how many people are using the tool so far and what kind of outcomes they’re achieving?

Erica Nelson:

Yeah, so I’m happy to do that. In 2024 last year, we had over 5,000 people input their information for results into the legal tuneup tool. And similarly, like yourself, Lee, about half didn’t find anything that they could take action on, and the other half found something, one of them, one these issues potentially, and began the process in the tool of resolving it. So we had over 2000 people last year sign in and begin the child support flow and to see if they could modify their child support payments. And then there was at least 300 and plus people who did the eviction process, almost 350 people who started the small claims answers. So people are absolutely visiting the site, they’re running their information through it, they’re addressing the or beginning to address the issues that pop up. And so I think for us giving how relatively new we are, the small claims response is about to hit its year anniversary of implementation late spring.

The child support module is only a year old. So from our perspective, we are getting a lot of people to visit and a lot of people to use it. I think the more we have opportunities like this to share it and that there is more communication, that it’s a trusted tool for individuals, even more people will begin to use it. So it’s a matter of knowing that it’s out there as well as sort of bridging the existence of the legal tuneup and its ability for an individual to go through it on their own with other community-based organizations that are serving people in these spaces, whether it’s around housing or employment issues for driver’s licenses as important in the state of Wisconsin as a high school diploma to get employment. So having folks that are working on those issues also be aware of the legal tuneup tool and then having some knowledge on how it’s being used, I think will actually increase the usage of the tool and people’s level of comfort with it. Even as accessible as we’ve tried to make it, I still think there is room for individuals and pro se folks to be supported with additional legal knowledge and legal resources because it still remains an overwhelming and difficult system to navigate

Lee Rawles:

Well in these tools. They sound like a win-win. I mean, you’re helping people address their problems and taking away some of the traffic from overburdened legal aid attorneys and courts themselves. But I’m just curious, we’ve talked about the individual’s experience. Have any of the government entities that you’re interacting with the Department of Transportation or Department of Justice had feedback or questions?

Erica Nelson:

Well, I don’t know if I’d say that they’d have feedback necessarily, but I think we have a really strong relationship with the Department of Children and Families because in order for people to modify or see their child support orders, they have to actually interface and give the child support online system that’s operated by our Department of Children and Families permission to send their information to the legal tuneup tool. And the only way that would’ve been possible or is possible is because of our relationship with the Department of Children and Families and the sort of agreement. They were very helpful in assisting us in making it possible for us to build this tool. And for them, having these strong, long lasting community partnerships is really important as well. So I don’t know if this as much the feedback from DCF is that they’re getting a lot of people who are interacting with it.

And for them that’s really important. That means people are more interacting with the system itself. So just having strong working relationships has been really valuable. The DOT has allowed us to create a voucher system. So for particular individuals that qualify, we will help pay their reinstatement fee for their driver’s license. And that is because of an agreement we have with the Department of Transportation allowing us to set up this voucher system. So far, I think it’s only been positive, which is really great, and we appreciate the partnerships that we have with the various administrative agencies.

Lee Rawles:

Well, and as you mentioned, a lot of these tools are pretty new. I’m curious, are there other civil legal issues or partnerships that you’re planning to expand on in the near future?

Erica Nelson:

Yeah, so partnerships, we’re always looking for partnerships with community-based organizations and even deeper partnerships with administrative agencies with respect to the legal tuneup tool. And then we have lots of dreams and hopes for how it could expand. We’d like to evolve the small claims module to help folks understand what they can do after a default judgment. So that would sort of be the next scaled up version of the small claims module. There’s thoughts about how to develop a benefit screener that would be incorporated into the legal tuneup tool. And lastly, what is really, I hope we’re on the precipice of implementing and getting up and running is a power of attorney for healthcare directives. There is no default for a power of attorney for healthcare in Wisconsin. So folks need to have that in place in order to avoid the need for legal interventions at a time of family stress and crisis.

And so we’re hoping to create a module where people can fill that out, learn about power of attorney for healthcare, understand it better, set it up so that there could be an email to the potential witnesses, or they can at least have the document and at the end have the entire completed document uploaded to healthcare providers all through the legal tuneup tool. So that’s sort of next where we’re looking because we believe that it’s a really important thing as a preventative measure to not clog up the civil legal system if it’s avoidable. And it helps families during difficult times have the clarity that they need to navigate various situations. So those are what we’re thinking about in terms of upcoming modules.

Lee Rawles:

Any other things on your wishlist, Jessie?

Jessie Lutter-Long:

The big ones that I’m interested in are elaborating on small claims. Like Erica said earlier, 60% of small claims cases result in default. So while we’re hoping to reduce that number a little bit, that’s a lot of people who are still going to have the default judgment and who are going to still feel confused and trapped by the system. So just giving them more information about what they can do during a default, what they can do after a default, what timeframe they’re working in, that would mean the world to a lot of people. I would also love to elaborate on our driver’s license or driver’s license suspension and revocation module and just make it even easier for folks to submit those things like payment plan requests and community service.

Lee Rawles:

So I’m going to get a little philosophical here with you guys based on your past experience, I think that sometimes when people think about helping litigants with civil legal aid, they really think of this one-to-one lawyer to litigant model. And with this tool, you don’t necessarily need to have that. Why do you think it’s important to move beyond that one-to-one module and do more things like this, Jessie?

Jessie Lutter-Long:

Well, it is. You already mentioned this, but it is no surprise to anybody that civil legal aid is underfunded and it’s understaffed. And these programs have some really wonderful, amazing people that are attorneys and staff members, but they can’t help everybody. And whether you get turned away from a civil legal aid firm or a civil legal program because you have too much money, because you don’t meet whatever requirements that they have, they have to draw the line somewhere. And just because you get turned away from a civil legal aid program because you don’t meet their income requirements, that doesn’t mean you can afford an attorney. And the civil problems that we’re focused in, the criminal records, the eviction records, the driver’s licenses, the small claims, a lot of these court systems are in theory designed to be friendly to self-represented litigants. But all of these legal systems are designed for attorneys.

Something can be friendly for a pro se person, but it’s still a legal system and it’s still designed for attorneys. And there are so many people who are going to get turned away from civil legal aid who are not going to be able to afford an attorney, and they need to have something. And education is just so crucial because you can’t meaningfully participate in a system that you don’t understand. And there’s just a lot of nuance and legalese involved in these systems. There’s a lot of confusing, conflicting information that people are receiving. And if you can’t afford an attorney, and if you don’t qualify for a free one, you’re on your own. So there needs to be more. There needs to be more education, there needs to be just more resources available for people. Attorneys can’t fix the problem alone,

Lee Rawles:

And you can’t address a problem you don’t know exists. You can’t

Jessie Lutter-Long:

Exactly

Lee Rawles:

Expunge something if you don’t know it’s on your record.

Jessie Lutter-Long:

That’s huge. The finding out of the problem. A lot of people have these legal problems, but they don’t even realize that they exist. They don’t even realize that they are legal problems. And I see that a lot with driver’s licenses specifically. Someone gets a ticket and they get their driver’s license suspended for whatever reason. That doesn’t necessarily trigger as a legal problem in a lot of people’s minds, but it is a legal problem. And if you can find an attorney to help you, that’s great. But most people don’t have attorneys for those issues. So what are you supposed to be doing? How are you supposed to deal with that?

Lee Rawles:

Yeah. Anything to add, Erica?

Erica Nelson:

To the point of not having enough attorneys to meet the need, which is essentially the access to justice definition, crisis definition, 500,000 wisconsinites have a civil legal issue, and the majority are unlikely to resolve because they’re either overwhelmed, they don’t understand they have a legal issue and they don’t have access to an attorney. And this is especially the case in rural parts of the state. So even if there are lawyers, there’s not enough of them in certain parts of the state to meet the population’s needs for one. And I think yes, it’s a one-to-one sort of conversation that we often have, but I think we also need to expand the conversation outside of the silo of just the legal framework and think about, and I think having this podcast and the Talk Justice podcast does this often in its conversations is the discussion to talk about how civil legal issues are actually economic barrier issues that are preventing people from meeting their basic needs. And too often we silo the legal system from other issues, and they’re absolutely integrated. And I think part of LIFT’s Wisconsin’s goal as a whole, as an organization is to not only have in part a free, easy, accessible tech solution or contribution to this solution, but also to raise awareness and education that it’s a revolving door of issues for low income people in particular. And having some tools to start the process to maneuver your way out of economic instability and closer to economic wellbeing. Civil legal access to justice is part of that process.

Lee Rawles:

Well, do you mention it as a revolving door? It also, it compounds. So let’s say your driver’s license is taken away, and so you lose your job, and so you face eviction, and so you fall behind on child support. So it does seem like being able to interrupt this, I mean, they all can feed into each other. So having one site where you can see all these, what seemed like separate issues together, forming a full picture seems so important.

Erica Nelson:

Yeah, absolutely. I was going to say too, I think that’s, that we didn’t really touch upon because maybe we thought it was obvious, is that the legal tuneup tool aggregates under one umbrella, all these different administrative agencies. So you put in your name, your birthdate, and your gender as it appears on your driver’s license, and the legal tuneup tool will run behind the back door of the software development ccap. It’ll run the Department of Transportation records. It’ll see if you have a criminal record with the Department of Justice, and it’ll see if you have a child support order with the Department of Children and Families. And in that way, an individual is doing it once and not trying to navigate four different complex oftentimes out of date in the sense of out of date from a tech perspective, state websites. And so it really aggregates it’s all under one roof to do what we hope you just described, Lee, as giving folks some agency and some ability to take action to interrupt and mitigate the compounding harm of some of these civil legal issues that prevent people from making progress and increasing their access to opportunities.

Jessie Lutter-Long:

On the topic of lawyers and the access to justice crisis, I do think it’s important to say, and I know that this is not an easy thing for lawyers to hear, but I do think that lawyers are sometimes part of the problem. I think that there are a lot of, I think there are a lot of people in America that don’t trust lawyers, and there are a lot of people who don’t trust the legal system. So because of that, I think it’s really important that there are trusted, reliable resources out there that are not obtained directly through an attorney. We will still provide legal assistance, we can still provide legal information, but if someone has been wronged by the legal system in the past, if someone has had a lot of really bad experiences with lawyers or with judges, sitting down and talking to an attorney is probably not a fun experience. So being able to do this stuff

Lee Rawles:

Becomes laden with a lot. Yeah,

Jessie Lutter-Long:

And we’ve talked a lot internally about trauma-informed care and what we can do to make dealing with these potentially traumatic or triggering processes like how we can make this easier and more comfortable for folks so that they feel safe, that they feel seen. And that doesn’t always happen in an attorney’s office. So how can we provide these resources while still being conscious of people’s experiences and how they’ve been wronged by the legal system?

Lee Rawles:

And Erica, if people wanted to check out LIFT Wisconsin or the legal tuneup tool, where should they go for that?

Erica Nelson:

Yeah, LIFT wisconsin.org and legal tuneup.org. Those are the two sites. Pretty simple.

Lee Rawles:

Well, thank you to Erica and Jessie for joining me today and giving us all a look at your innovative work. And thank you to the listeners for tuning into this episode of Talk Justice. Be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss an episode.

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