Despite the grave potential consequences, nine out of ten low-income New Yorkers who go to Housing Court do so without the benefit of a lawyer.  It is difficult to navigate the courts without assistance.  Filling out the necessary paperwork, requesting repairs, and negotiating with a landlord’s attorney are no simple matters, especially when you are facing the threat of losing your home.

In a perfect world, everyone facing eviction would receive legal representation.  In many cases, the presence of a lawyer can be the difference between keeping your home and getting evicted.  We can and must do more to increase the pool of lawyers available to serve Housing Court litigants.

Like many others, I have worked diligently in recent years to expand state funding for legal services that deal with the “essentials of life” like eviction.  In New York City, Mayor Bill de Blasio and the New York City Council have increased funding for legal assistance programs; the City has also moved to consolidate their administration of legal service funding under the leadership of Steve Banks, the commissioner of the Human Resources Administration.

Another key player has been the Robin Hood Foundation, which focuses exclusively on combatting poverty in New York.  Since 1988, Robin Hood has raised more than $1.95 billion in dollars, goods and services for vulnerable New Yorkers.  This includes a sustained commitment to supporting civil legal service providers, including the Legal Aid Society and New York Legal Assistance Group.

Make no mistake: funding for legal services is fundamental to the ability of courts to perform our constitutional mission.  In these difficult financial times, we often talk about the challenges of keeping the courthouse doors open.  But simply keeping the doors open is not enough.  If what’s happening inside those doors doesn’t amount to equal justice, you might as well close the courts.

Despite the best efforts of the courts, the city and private foundations, there still exists a significant justice gap in New York City, to say nothing about courts around the country. In recent weeks, we have taken a step to address this gap in our city.

The New York court system has joined Robin Hood, the Human Resources Administration, and the Center for Court Innovation to create a new program, Poverty Justice Solutions.  The idea behind it is simple.  Each year, Poverty Justice Solutions will take 20 recent law school graduates and place them in two-year fellowships with civil legal service providers in New York. These attorneys will work at different agencies but they will all be dedicated to the same goal: helping low-income New Yorkers preserve their housing and prevent homelessness.

The first Poverty Justice Solutions attorneys will be selected this spring and will begin work following their graduation in June.  These new attorneys will combat poverty by helping to reduce evictions and improve the financial stability of participating tenants.  They will also help close the justice gap, providing hundreds of low-income New Yorkers with legal assistance that they wouldn’t have had access to otherwise.  In the process, Poverty Justice Solutions will also help address the challenges of a constricted legal job market, providing jobs for 20 new lawyers each year.

The Old Testament tells us: “Justice, justice shall you pursue, rich and poor, high and low alike.”  My judicial philosophy is to make sure that justice is done.  I don’t consider myself an activist judge, but I do consider myself proactive in the pursuit of justice.  That’s the idea behind Poverty Justice Solutions – and behind the quest to improve access to civil legal services in general.  Meeting our responsibilities to the most disadvantaged in society is not a luxury and it isn’t a choice – it is a simple matter of justice.