Bringing Access to Justice in Rural Alberta

By: Central Alberta Community Legal Clinic 

The Central Alberta Community Legal Clinic continues to adapt its operations to fit the ongoing COVID-19 landscape in 2021.

Our core programs, including summary advice Legal Clinics, staff lawyer Follow-Up, Tenant Advocacy, Employment Advocacy and Immigration Advocacy, are currently offered over the phone. The CACLC has been set up for remote services since 2010 and has also been managing satellite Legal Clinics in Fort McMurray, Medicine Hat, and Lloydminster since 2018. 

In addition to remote programming, the Clinic offers some in-person services, with health protocols to ensure the safety of our staff and community. We continue to provide a bi-monthly Photo ID Clinic at our office and various locations in the Red Deer community, offering free photo affidavits to people whose government IDs may have been lost or stolen. These IDs can help replace government IDs and access local support services like food banks and Income Supports.

The CACLC has also partnered with the Student’s Association of Red Deer Polytechnic to provide a monthly Legal Clinic for students on campus.

The organization’s long term goal of increasing access to justice in rural areas will soon be taking another big leap with the development of a Web App that will streamline service to more areas and increase ease of access for staff, volunteers, and clients. With this development in mind, we are looking to offer service in more areas of the province and have lawyers all over Alberta volunteering remotely in their own communities. We encourage any Alberta lawyers interested in remote volunteering to contact us by phone at 403-314-9129 or email at [email protected].