Wisconsin legal services agencies

General civil legal services:

• Centro Legal por Derechos Humanos: Provides bilingual, low-cost legal assistance to low-income residents in the Milwaukee area. (414) 384-7900
  1711 South 11th St.
  Milwaukee, WI 53204
• Community Justice Incorporated: Provides legal assistance to Dane County-area clients up to 300% of the federal poverty level using a sliding scale fee structure.
• Legal Action of Wisconsin: Serving indigent clients in the southern 39 counties in Wisconsin using both staff attorneys and a volunteer lawyers program. Offices in Milwaukee (main), Madison, La Crosse, Green Bay, Oshkosh and Racine.
• Legal Aid Society of Door County: (920) 743-3934
  Legal Aid Society of Door County
  131 S. 3rd Avenue
  Sturgeon Bay, WI 54235
• Legal Aid Society of Milwaukee: Founded in 1916, LASM is one of the oldest continuously operating public interest law firms in the nation. They provide free legal assistance to indigent clients in the Milwaukee area.
• Neighborhood Law Project: From an office on the South Side of Madison, law students from the U.W. Law School, supervised by faculty, provide free legal assistance to low-income clients, community legal education, and other services principally in the areas of housing, workers' rights, and consumer credit.
• Portage County Legal Aid Society: (715) 343-7100
  CAP Services
  1608 W. River Drive
  Stevens Point, WI 54481
• Wisconsin Judicare, Inc.: Serving indigent clients in northern Wisconsin from its office in Wausau, Judicare provides civil legal services to eligible clients through private attorneys who handle cases for low-income people at reduced hourly rates. Judicare additionally provides legal assistance to the 11 federally recognized Wisconsin Indian nations and to eligible American Indian clients through its Indian Law Office. Wisconsin Judicare invites attorneys and tribal court lay advocates to participate in the Judicare program. Judicare's website includes links to Internet legal resources.

Specialty practice and advocacy:

• ABC for Health: A nonprofit public interest law firm dedicated to ensuring health care access for children and families, particularly those with special needs or who are at risk.
• AIDS Network: Since 1985, AIDS Network has provided care, prevention and legal services in South Central Wisconsin.  Legal information and advice is given to people affected by HIV and AIDS or to people with questions about the legal issues surrounding HIV and AIDS.  Potential clients with legal issues are interviewed by telephone or in person to determine the nature of their question or problems and their financial situation.  Eligible clients are helped by the legal staff or matched with a volunteer attorney.
• AIDS Resource Center of Wisconsin: Free representation and counseling to people with HIV/AIDS on a wide array of legal matters, including confidentiality, disability benefits, power of attorney for health care, bankruptcy, wills, and guardianships.
• American Civil Liberties Union of Wisconsin Inc.: Advocates for civil rights and civil liberties of Wisconsin residents through litigation, public education, community activism, public policy analysis, and governmental lobbying.
• Catholic Charities Immigration Project: Provides free legal services to low income people living in the ten counties of the Archdiocese of Milwaukee on issues related to immigration, asylum, self petitions and asylum petitions for immigrant victims of domestic violence.  The office also conducts community outreach in its office and at area jails and immigration detention facilities.  Some telephone support is also provided to criminal defense attorneys who have questions on immigration consequences of criminal convictions.
• Coalition of Wisconsin Aging Groups: Along with the Elder Law Center and its other services, CWAG provides information and advocacy for older Wisconsin residents and their families.
• Consumer Law Litigation Clinic: U.W.-Madison Law School program uses law students supervised by clinical faculty to handle individual and class action lawsuits in state and federal court covering a variety of consumer protection issues, including misrepresentation and fraud, credit scams, bad faith denial of insurance claims, antitrust violations, unfair debt collection practices and "fringe banking" abuses by rent-to-own and payday loan companies.
• Divorce Court Assistance Project: DCAP is a project of the UW Law School's Economic Justice Institute and provides assistance to unrepresented people seeking a divorce in Dane County. Law students are supervised by a clinical law professor. The project does not provide legal representation but does offer information on forms and procedures as well as help organizing information for the divorce. Additional information.
• Immigrant Project of Wisconsin: IPW provides pro-bono services to immigrant victims of domestic violence through project partners in Columbia (Hope House), Dane (Domestic Abuse Intervention Services, UNIDOS and Freedom, Inc.), Dodge (PAVE), Green (Greenhaven), Jefferson (PADA), Sauk (Hope House) and Rock (Beloit Domestic Violence Center) counties in the areas of family and immigration law.
  

  Immigrant Project of Wisconsin

  211 S. Paterson St., Suite 260

  Madison, WI 53703

  Tel (608) 256-1015
• Senior Law project of Legal Action of Wisconsin: Provides information and free legal assistance on public benefits issues to seniors (age 60 and over). There are no income or asset limits for seniors.
• State Public Defender: Provides legal representation at the trial level to indigent persons in adult criminal, civil commitment (including sexually violent persons commitment), probation or parole revocation, contempt of court, and termination of parental rights cases. It also represents juveniles who are the subject of delinquency, commitment, paternity, children in need of protection, and termination of parental rights proceedings.
• Wisconsin Coalition Against Domestic Violence: Provides training and technical advice to advocates and court personnel issues related to domestic violence.
• Wisconsin Coalition for Advocacy: WCA is a private, nonprofit agency chosen by Wisconsin's Governor to provide protection and advocacy for people with disabilities throughout the state. WCA is completely independent of state government and direct service providers.

Funding agencies:

• Wisconsin Equal Justice Fund - is a nonprofit organization that solicits donations from lawyers, law firms and corporations to provide funding for Legal Action of Wisconsin, Wisconsin Judicare and Disability Rights Wisconsin (formerly Wisconsin Coalition for Advocacy).
• Wisconsin Trust Account Foundation - WisTAF was created by order of the Wisconsin Supreme Court to collect the income from interest on lawyers' trust accounts (IOLTA) and distribute those funds to civil legal services organizations serving low income Wisconsin residents.  WisTAF's authority from the Supreme Court also includes distribution to civil legal services agencies of the $50 Public Interest Legal Services Fund (PILSF) assessment that Wisconsin lawyers pay each year.

Related links

• Finding a lawyer
• Pro bono and access to justice in Wisconsin