Halton Community Legal Services is receiving a sizable financial boost to improve resident access to legal aid assistance.
Legal Aid Ontario (LAO) is allocating $251,000 to Halton’s legal clinic as part of its plan to provide help to low-income people in areas such as housing, income security and disability benefits. This move is part of LAO’s clinic law services expansion strategy that, when fully implemented, will inject $10 million into community legal services.
“Halton Community Legal Services (HCLS) will be able to expand its services and respond to the growing and unmet legal needs of Halton’s most vulnerable residents,” said HCLS executive director Colleen Sym.
In March alone, LAO plans to inject $4.2 million in additional funding to support legal aid clinics in need of greater resources to help low-income populations.
"Community legal clinics play an essential role in delivering legal aid in our province. The grassroots work clinics do make them key players in the communities they serve,” said LAO Chair John McCamus.
The expansion is a follow-up to a provincial investment of $95.7 million to LAO, announced in November, to raise the income eligibility threshold to apply for legal aid. Over the next three years, it will raise by six per cent annually.
“This new investment will build the capacity of community legal clinics to provide high quality, accessible poverty law services to their vulnerable residents,” said Janet Budgell, LAO’s vice president of the Southwest Region.
In addition to LAO’s Halton contribution, Neighbourhood Legal Services in London and Middlesex is receiving $179,000, while Waterloo Region Community Legal Services will be given $86,000.
For more information, visit LAO’s website at http://www.legalaid.on.ca/en/.
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http://www.insidehalton.com/news-story/5516214-halton-community-legal-services-getting-funding-boost/
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