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In the coming months, as we emerge from our pandemic nightmare, thousands of Rhode Islanders – often low-income Rhode Islanders – will be confronted with a variety of legal actions touching on evictions to debt collections. Many, in need of basic legal support, will be left to fend for themselves in a process they often find mystifying.
The sad fact is that the existing legal services organizations are already overtaxed and there is no other mechanism in place to meet the needs of low-income Rhode Islanders. As some may know, for the past several years I have been a proponent of an Access To Justice Commission to determine which legal services would be necessary to serve the needs of underserved low-income Rhode Islanders, and how to actually do so.