CITY OF SEATTLE
RESOLUTION __________________
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A RESOLUTION regarding a civil legal aid project with the King County Department of Public Defense and its scope of work for representation services.
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WHEREAS, civil legal aid has been a critical means for vulnerable populations in safeguarding their basic legal rights, navigating the intricacies of the justice system, and avoiding unanticipated collateral consequences to benefits, employment, housing, and other impacts to quality of life; and
WHEREAS, clients and public defenders may not fully understand the civil consequences of criminal convictions and plea agreements on housing, child and family issues, licensure, employment, public benefits, and other issues; and
WHEREAS, research studies by the Connecticut Bar Foundation, Chicago Bar Association, Illinois Bar Foundation, State Bar of Wisconsin, and other organizations show that public investments in civil legal aid result in substantially reduced costs for other civic services such as emergency shelter, foster care, and legal assistance related to domestic violence, and curtails declines in workplace productivity and lost wages; and
WHEREAS, President Donald Trump sought to impose a dramatic cut in federal funding for civil legal aid in his 2018 proposed budget from $385 million in 2017 to $33 million, and again seeks to eliminate nearly all federal funding for civil legal aid in 2019; and
WHEREAS, nearly 58 million people in the United States met income eligibility for federally-funded legal aid at 125 percent of the federal poverty guideline last year, and according to the Legal Services Corporation's 2017 "Justice Gap Report," 71 percent of low income households nationwide experienced a civil legal problem in 2016; and
WHEREAS, the Revised Code of Washington (RCW 2.53.005) states that "[t]he provision of civil legal aid services to indigent persons is an important component of the state's responsibility to provide for the proper and effective admi...
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