Legal Needs Assessment Process

Legal Services of Northern Michigan* - 030095

Abstract Number: 030095

May 2003

The critical legal needs assessment process of Legal Services of Northern Michigan (LSNM) consists of four parts: 1) consideration of demographic data; 2) review of client needs as identified in The Michigan Plan 2000; 3) analysis of Michigan's Access to Justice for All Task Force needs survey, begun in 1998 and released in 2000; and 4) appraisal of data collected by LSNM during six intensive weeks surveying clients and services providers in the service area. The assessment is also evaluated along with previous extensive assessments.

To identify critical client needs statewide, Michigan's planning process relies on thirteen work groups, comprised of judges, legal services staff, private attorneys, human services providers, and State Court Administrative Office, Michigan Bar and Michigan Bar Foundation personnel, as well as on the expansive provider survey. LSNM focuses on the 36 counties in the service area employing written surveys and interviews to identify critical needs expressed by the region's client-eligible population and those who serve them.

LSNM, in conjunction with Lakeshore Legal Aid, developed a Needs Assessment Survey for Client-Eligible People, and a second Needs Assessment survey for Service Providers. The client-eligible survey asks five demographic questions, including county of residence, number of adults and children in the home, age of the respondent, and whether anyone in the home is disabled. The survey then asks whether, in the past year, the respondent "had trouble in any of the following areas?" Sixty-nine choices follow, categorically arranged by employment, education, family, consumer, housing, health care, public benefits, and miscellaneous. The employment section, for example, asks whether the respondent has experienced trouble finding work, losing work, being discriminated against, getting paid, getting benefits, finding/affording child care, finding/keeping reliable transportation, or obtaining worker's compensation or unemployment benefits. The survey then asks eleven questions about the importance of various legal services, the availability of legal services, and the respondent's pursuit of legal services. It concludes by asking, "What would most improve legal aid services in your community?"

The service provider survey asks respondents what they do and who they serve. It then asks them to rank the importance of employment, education, family, consumer, public benefits, housing, health care, and miscellaneous legal issues to poor people in their communities. The providers are also asked to select the most urgent need from the issues within each category, which corresponds to the sixty-nine issues listed in the client-eligible survey. As in the first survey, the provider assessment asks several questions about the importance and availability of various legal services, and then asks who is most legally underserved and whether low income people have legal needs for which they do not (but should) seek legal help. This survey concludes by asking providers to "Please provide any suggestions on how legal aid services could be tailored to better serve clients" in their community.

Interviews are conducted by telephone and in person with client-eligible people and service providers throughout the region. Survey forms are used to guide the interviews and record the results.

The state planning process elicits survey responses from bar associations, courts, and human service agencies within the service area. LSNM expands the data collecting survey or interview responses from client-eligible people and client, community, and human service representatives within the region. Client-eligible people are comprised of former and current legal aid clients and clients of various social services (all providers are asked to complete the non-client survey or interview, and to gather and return surveys from several of their clients).

The needs of clients with special access challenges are assessed in several ways. First, human service agencies serving client groups with access changes are targeted for survey participation. Then the size and method of LSNM's assessment effort assure inclusion of client-eligible people with access challenges. Finally, issues raised by clients with access challenges are highlighted for evaluative consideration.

Contact Information:

Kenneth Penokie
Legal Services of Northern Michigan, Inc.
1349 S. Otsego Avenue, Unit 7B
Gaylord, MI 49735
Phone: (989) 705-1067
Fax: (989) 705-7178
legsernm@mysgo.com

William R. Knight, Jr.
Lakeshore Legal Aid
21885 Dunham Road, Suite 4
Clinton Twp., MI 48036
Phone: (586) 469-5185
Fax: (586) 469-6523
wknight@mlan.net

*This abstract describes the client needs appraisal process of Legal Services of Northern Michigan. However, the process was designed as a joint venture with Lakeshore Legal Aid. Therefore, equal credit is given to William Knight of Lakeshore Legal Aid for the design of the process

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