New Program Will Provide Residents in Northern Alberta with Access to Family Law Advice

The Edmonton Community Legal Centre (ECLC) is a non-profit organization that has been providing legal assistance to individuals living with low income for the past 17 years. Volunteer lawyers provide free legal advice and staff lawyers provide free legal representation.  ECLC’s services have gradually expanded over the years to meet community needs. From 2002 – 2008 the ECLC focused exclusively on civil law matters, expanding to include immigration in 2009, and family law in 2012.  In 2011, the ECLC expanded to include administration of Grande Prairie Legal Guidance, a summary legal advice clinic with advice by Grande Prairie volunteer lawyers.

In 2019 the ECLC plans to expand again—to offer family law legal advice to low income residents of northern Alberta who do not live close enough to Edmonton to receive in-person advice at our evening and daytime clinics. 

Most of the advice will be offered using some form of technology—some of it as low tech as telephone—ranging to Skype, Facetime, and other forms of audio/video technology.  ECLC is excited that they will be able to offer an opportunity to lawyers in various parts of Edmonton—and throughout northern Alberta—to participate as ECLC volunteer lawyers to provide access to justice and free family law legal advice to a larger segment of low income Albertans.  This new project will be done on a trial basis in specific areas of northern Alberta, which are yet to be determined.  Please stay tuned!
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The ECLC is pleased that 10% of the lawyers practising in Greater Edmonton volunteer with it each year.  They have room for more lawyers to volunteer to assist in their access to justice mandate!  Many needy clients are turned away every day due to a lack of clinic advice capacity.  ECLC’s volunteer lawyers say that the time they spend in our clinics giving free legal advice to the less fortunate is some of the most rewarding work they do—and that it reminds them why they went to law school in the first place!  Please contact Giselle at [email protected] for more information about becoming an ECLC volunteer lawyer.  ECLC would love to have you as part of their team.