Chapter 2

Staffing

A. Paid vs. Volunteer Staff

While the majority of the programs surveyed rely primarily on paid staff, at least 30% use volunteers to perform some hotline functions. For instance, North Central West Virginia Legal Aid Society, the Legal Hotline for Older Texans, the Legal Aid Society of Hawaii (LASH), and many others use both paid and volunteer staff. LASH reported using volunteers as an integral part of their staff. They use law students and other legal volunteers to staff the hotline as well as lay volunteers for clerical assistance. North Central West Virginia Legal Aid Society also uses volunteer law students for legal research, letter drafting, and client communications.

The Senior Legal Hotline of Northern California not only uses volunteers to follow up with hotline clients, the program also uses volunteers to recruit and train new volunteers, write manuals, assist with training events, and represent the hotline at meetings with other service providers. The volunteers can also engage in lobbying activities forbidden to regular staff.

The Lawyer Referral for the Elderly Program (LREP) of the New Mexico Bar uses volunteers for client follow-up. The Legal Helpline for Older Kentuckians uses volunteers to follow-up with clients after they have spoken with a hotline attorney. They also plan to use law students from the University of Kentucky Law School’s Elder Law clinic to do research and help with intake.

Some programs have an all volunteer staff, such as the Legal Services of Northern Indiana. They have the equivalent of five full-time staff members who handle 3,000 cases per year. Many Virginia legal-aid offices also use volunteer lawyers to answer questions by phone for a few hours each week. The Georgia Senior Hotline uses volunteers extensively and has made an effort to match volunteers with the sort of project that interests them. CARPLS and CLEAR are in the midst of developing volunteer programs to help staff the hotline.

A number of programs voiced their need for more volunteers and better strategies for using volunteer assistance. Some programs have found it difficult to get volunteers to commit sufficient time to make it worthwhile to train them. One partial solution for some hotlines is to use retired attorneys. However, retired attorneys also have other demands on their time and tend to be away often.

Another source of volunteers may be attorneys who are currently unemployed. For instance, parents who have left the work force to care for children may welcome the opportunity to do volunteer work for a few hours a week. Or hotlines that have evening and weekend hours may be able to attract lawyers whose daytime job gives them little client contact or minimal job satisfaction. Whatever the source of volunteers, it is important that they be given meaningful tasks and a great deal of positive feedback, as well as sufficient supervision to ensure that their services are of the same standard expected of regular staff. It is very important that the attitude of paid staff to volunteers be one of respect. One organization that makes very effective use of volunteers has as its motto “staff is staff” meaning it makes no distinction between the paid and unpaid workforce.

B. Lawyers vs. Non-Lawyers

Not only do most hotlines use paid staff, they also primarily use lawyers to provide their hotline services. The senior hotlines, in particular, use lawyers to answer client calls. However, a majority of hotlines also use paralegals for at least some tasks. Only a handful of the programs surveyed rely exclusively on lawyers. Additionally, some hotlines use law students. For instance, LASH uses both paralegals and law students to staff the hotline. The Kansas program uses lawyers to assist its elderly clients, but uses non-lawyers in its domestic relations unit. The West Virginia program uses attorneys, law students, and a legal assistant. Southern Arizona Legal Aid primarily uses attorneys, however, non-lawyers perform some interview screening tasks and assist in gathering facts on selected cases.

The key to effective use of law students and paralegals is meaningful, on-site supervision. Hotlines accomplish this goal in different ways. At LAFLB and LACM students handle all calls but they work under the close supervision of a staff attorney. The student answering the call first takes down the appropriate demographic and eligibility information and then interviews the client using a prepared script developed for the case type. Then the caller is put on hold while the student consults with the supervising attorney concerning the correct advice and disposition of the matter. Other hotlines take care that an experienced attorney is present at all times. Some rely on prompt review of case notes. Many hotlines limit the type of advice and information that can be given by a non-lawyer.

C. Full-time vs. Part-time

According to the programs surveyed, part-time employees are used most often on the hotline. The intensity of hotline work often leads to burnout making part-time staffing a smart practice. In addition, when the part time attorneys also have a private practice they can bring aspects of their private practice experience to the table. Staff can learn from each other and use this knowledge in their own practices. Programs that are staffed with part-time legal staff include CARPLS, LASH, and the elder hotlines in Washington, D.C., Maine, and Texas. The elder hotline in Michigan uses contract attorneys who work approximately 30 hours per week. The AARP Pennsylvania Legal Advice Line also uses part-time contract attorneys.

A number of the programs surveyed have full-time employees. SALA has a full-time managing attorney who staffs the hotline and part-time staff who are responsible for specific topic areas. The programs in Kansas and Puerto Rico use full-time employees to staff their hotlines. Sometimes the hotline portion of the program is staffed part-time. For example, both CLEAR and the West Virginia programs have full-time hotline employees, but the hotlines only operate three and a half hours per day. The hotline staff have other duties the remainder of the workday. Some hotlines report that it is difficult to motivate hotline attorneys during the down time, particularly if they are new hotline attorneys. Some suggestions for ways to occupy the attorneys’ time are to update hotline reference materials, design new self-help publications, write answers to frequently asked questions, or do research. Occupying down time is usually a problem only for hotlines that do not do callbacks.

D. Effectiveness of Staffing Pattern

All the programs surveyed believe that their staffing pattern is effective, but several mentioned that additional part-time staff would be helpful. The program in Puerto Rico believes its staffing pattern has improved since it added a social worker to assist the attorneys in cases that involve significant social service issues. The holistic approach to delivery of legal and other services is currently being implemented at a number of legal services programs, but the use of social workers to assist the hotline is less common.

Based on a review of the information contained in the Directory, there appears to be no discernible correlation between the number of cases a hotline handles in a year (per each full-time equivalent) and whether those hotlines are staffed by attorneys, paralegals or students. However, the AARP Pennsylvania Legal Advice Line has achieved an increase in attorney productivity with a combination of intake workers and contract attorneys. (See Appendix B, article by Wayne Moore).

E. Making Changes

A common problem for organizations attempting to set up a new hotline or change the way an existing one operates is the inherent resistance of present staff to changes in procedure or changes in their job requirements. For instance, staff attorneys who were previously full-time case handlers may be asked to devote some portion of their time to the hotline. Or they may resent a new system in which they have no input into the selection of their clients. There are methods to make the transition to a new system smoother.

The most important step in implementing change is to make clear the need for change. For legal-aid delivery systems this need is frequently the result of loss of funding and the concomitant threat of decreased availability of services. Thus, the decision to create a hotline may be intended to ameliorate the problem by providing a more efficient intake system as well as providing at least some help to a greater number of people. The consequences of not making changes to address the growing need must be made clear. It is unreasonable to expect staff to cooperate in making changes unless they are perceived as necessary

Another important principle is to elicit the help of staff members in the planning process. Involve staff at every stage, solicit ideas and opinions and keep communication channels open. Changes made in secret carry a burden of suspicion. Once a new system or phase is completed, it should be celebrated as a team accomplishment.*