MALS: Partnership Makes Us All Stronger

PARTNERSHIP MAKES US ALL STRONGER

By CINDY COLE ETTINGOFF, CEO and General Counsel, Memphis Area Legal Services, Inc.

The pandemic has given a whole new meaning to the phrase, “it takes a village.” Each business that closed and each individual that called frantically seeking help made it clear that we are all partners in the pandemic. While not all of us lost a job, most of us know someone who did or know someone who was unable to work due to lack of child care or for health-related reasons.

It is common knowledge that the pandemic hit poor people harder, particularly poor people of color, who had never been paid enough to be able to accrue savings that they could draw upon to pay rent when their jobs closed. However, the pandemic has impacted more than just those who were poor at the outset of the pandemic. Almost weekly we receive a call from someone who previously had a higher salaried job, who has become jobless. Most of us would find fifteen months with no income difficult. Yet, many in our community have faced and continue to face that reality. Now more than ever, the services offered by Memphis Area Legal Services, Inc. (MALS) are needed and needed by more community members than ever before.

That is where MALS’ partnerships come into play. In an effort to make the dollars we receive go further, to do more good for more people, MALS has focused on partnerships. This year MALS has had the privilege of working with donors and service organizations who share our vision of a better community. One such partnership involves, among others, the City of Memphis, Shelby County, and the University of Memphis School of Law to provide training for pro bono volunteer attorneys and to pair those attorneys with tenants facing evictions. As part of that partnership, MALS’ attorneys also represent tenants in an effort to prevent evictions.

Another partnership in which MALS is involved is the Signature Corporate Pro Bono Initiative, involving International Paper, Baker Donelson, Butler Snow, Bass Berry, Just City, and Amber Floyd, General Counsel for the Airport Authority. Through this initiative trained pro bono attorney volunteers staff expungement and restoration of rights clinics. The goal in obtaining expungements and restoration of rights is to remove roadblocks that can prevent individuals from being employed or obtaining better employment.

MALS also has an ongoing partnership with the University of Memphis School of Law whereby students participate in Alternative Spring Bring and various externship and internship opportunities with MALS. This year, Alternative Spring Break (ASB) offered students the opportunity to work in an area where students have not typically worked in the past. However, given the unusually high level of unemployment and the variety of and confusion about the various types of state and federal unemployment available, a new ASB track was created to address that area of legal need. As a result, supervised students served MALS clients in addressing unemployment claims, appeals, and waivers.

Among our other statewide partnerships this year, MALS works with the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) to conduct pro bono wills clinics staffed with TVA attorneys. As part of a statewide Access to Justice effort fellows placed at MALS assist with the expungement initiative and provide support for the Memphis Child Medical-Legal Partnership between Le Bonheur Children’s Hospital and MALS.

In lieu of the in-person Saturday clinics once held pre-pandemic, MALS has partnered with the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), Community Legal Center (CLC), and the MBA’s Access to Justice Committee to host “First Friday Virtual Clinics” monthly. These clinics are advice-only and cover a different area of law each month. CLE credit and training are provided to the participating volunteer attorneys.

Among our most treasured partners are our grantors, donors and volunteers. All of them serve as allies in the battle against homelessness. However, among MALS' most treasured allies, is the legal community. Led by the capable team of Judge Diane Vescovo (retired) and Mike McLaren for the 2019 and 2020 campaigns, MALS Campaign for Equal Justice donors made available funds needed to provide needed services, many of which we could not have anticipated pre-pandemic. Through the Campaign for Equal Justice and MALS Dining for Justice, donors have stepped forward and allowed MALS the grace to use donations in the areas of greatest unmet need. MALS would not have been able to have the flexibility to address the unforeseen needs absent the support and generosity of all of our donors and we are thankful for and humbled by that support.

We may not be able to foresee the exact needs of our community, but it is clear that the increased need for services will continue. From its inception, MALS has recognized the importance of partnership as well as the need to serve the lower-income and aging community. But the onset of the chaos and devastation the pandemic caused, has also taught us the need for flexibility and innovation. The needs of our community continue and so does MALS’ dedication to serving those needs by means of new and innovative techniques and efforts to make our service dollars go further through partnerships. 

The Tennessee Innocence Project

The Tennessee Innocence Project received a grant from the Memphis Bar Foundation for exonerating the wrongfully convicted. Watch this video to learn more about the Tennessee Innocence Project.