last post

Just finished the last workshop - on Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF). The big problem is the continued push for caseload reduction. The speakers proposed shifting the debate and reframing the discussion towards how do we improve the economy of each state by better training and educating workers to meet the demands of the economy. This can help maintain folks in 4 year colleges, etc., to pull out of the TANF cycle.

Overall, a good conference, lots of new ideas, some decent networking, and I am looking forward to bringing back what I've learned to LAN.

Dave

last day

Today is the last day of the conference.

There are going to be two sets of workshops this morning, and the conference ends around Noon. Spoke with Jon Baird from the statewide non-LSC program in New Hampshire at breakfast about advocacy issues.

I am right now in a workshop called "Representing low-wage workers in employment law cases."

Sharon Dietrich from Community Legal Services in Philadelphia spoke first. They have an excellent employment law program. Interestingly, the majority of their referrals come from the criminal records division in Phila. These involve former prisoners who have been denied employment opportunities because of their criminal records. They are also handling a lot of occupational license cases, Family Medical Leave Act cases, and so on.

She does very few employment discrimination cases, as they tend to demand a lot of resources and the results are usually very limited. They did handle one case in which a person involved in a welfare-to-work program had a worker say to her, "if you don't sleep with me, I will get you sanctioned from welfare." They got a good settlement on this case.

Wireless is pretty sketchy in this room, so I'll quickly post this and get out.

Dave

yesterday's last session

Attended an informal workshop on policy advocacy yesterday afternoon. Nice mix of LSC and non-LSC programs. We agreed to set up a listserv to share strategies. I think Don Saunders of NLADA has volunteered me to help do it.

One thought I had about something that should be done in NE: Texas recently got their workers compensation laws changed to include farmworkers. New Mexico is now doing the same thing. In many states, farmworkers are excluded from comp , and this list includes Nebraska. May be an area for advocacy in the future.

Dave

guaranteed right to counsel in civil cases, 2

One thought I had was to make an economic argument to the legislature in the context of federal benefits: guarantee a right to counsel where the loss of the federal benefit (e.g. SSI cessation) would impact the state treasury (e.g. beneficiary will now be more dependent on state funds, etc.) and there's no private bar that would have an economic incentive to take the case (e.g. in SSI cessation cases, when the beneficiary maintains continuing benefits pending appeal, there's no retroactive underpayment from which to withhold attorneys fees...)

Dave

guaranteed right to counsel in civil cases

I am now at a panel about the guaranteed right to counsel in civil cases. Also known as "Civil Gideon", this movement:

"urges federal, state, and territorial governments to provide legal counsel as a matter of right at public expense to low income persons in those catergories of adversarial proceedings where basic human needs are at stake, such as those involving shelter, sustenance, safety, health or child custody, as determined by each jurisdiction." (From the American Bar Association Resolution on the matter passed August 7, 2006.)

Interesting to think how this may be applied in Nebraska.

Dave

lunch panel on the political situation

During lunch (at which I drank too much caffeine) there was a panel of policy folks on what's likely to happen in 2009. Things are looking good on the non-federal, non-LSC funding restrictions front for that year. Other hopeful signs are in agency regulations and implementation. Things are not looking good for comprehensive immigration reform.

TANF reauthorization will be up in 2010, and a lot good can occur there.

An attorney from North Carolina said we should all get behind a manifesto stating our opposition to poverty which would involve simultaneous press conferences in all 50 states. Folks were into that.

Dave

education

Now they are discussing how South Carolina passed a law preventing illegal immigrants from accessing any post-secondary education.

There's a push to have this occur in other states as well...

Dave