PINE TREE LEGAL ASSISTANCE INC

Pine Tree is committed to reducing the impact of poverty in Maine while upholding our nation's vision of liberty and justice for all. To achieve this vision, we provide free high-quality civil legal assistance to people in Maine with low incomes in cases where it can make a difference in meeting basic human needs or enforcing basic human rights. Our mission is to ensure that state and federal laws affecting poor people are enforced while also addressing the systemic barriers to justice that low-income Mainers face.

More specifically, Pine Tree's goals are as follow:
• Maintaining, enhancing, and protecting income and economic security;
• Preserving housing and related needs;
• Promoting the safety, stability, and well-being of low-income Mainers;
• Improving outcomes for children;
• Meeting the legal needs of populations with special vulnerabilities; and
• Improving the delivery of legal services and access to justice.

Pine Tree has three effective strategies for increasing access to justice. The first strategy is to maintain an extensive network of free resources that are accessible to Mainers throughout the state. To this end, Pine Tree manages four websites: ptla.org, kidslegal.org, statesidelegal.org, and helpmelaw.org. These websites offer the public both general legal information and more specialized legal resources that make individuals more capable of advocating for their own rights. Interactive forms and modules on these sites allow website visitors to access individualized information from wherever they are located geographically, which is a clear benefit in a rural state such as Maine.

Pine Tree's second strategy is to provide direct services to individuals and families through high quality and personalized legal assistance. With six neighborhood offices, Pine Tree is accessible to low-income Mainers throughout the state, regardless of geography, language, or disability. Pine Tree prioritizes cases that help clients secure basic human needs, including access to housing, food, income, safety, education, and well-being. Pine Tree also has several innovative projects that focus on specific legal issues or targeted populations; these programs include a Native American Unit, a children's law project, a fair housing unit, and a foreclosure prevention program.

Finally, Pine Tree is dedicated to community education about legal issues and solutions. Pine Tree conducts regular outreach to the public, service providers, and special client populations, including migrant farmworkers who come to Maine for seasonal work, homeless individuals and families, current and veteran service members, and Native Americans. Much of this outreach is conducted in person, but Pine Tree is on the cutting edge of new technologies, such as live video-conference, that can connect individuals in rural areas to relevant and personalized legal information and advice. Through the combination of these strategies, Pine Tree is making great strides towards its goal of providing justice for all.

Pine Tree has been helping Mainers with low incomes access justice since 1967. Pine Tree is one of Maine's largest firms, employing 31 attorneys in a network of six local offices and providing representation and assistance in all 41 of Maine's District Courts. As the state's oldest and largest statewide legal aid provider, Pine Tree is uniquely situated to continue to address the civil legal needs of residents of Maine. Pine Tree's attorneys average 17 years of legal experience and 14 years of experience at Pine Tree, which represents a cadre of unparalleled expertise in and dedication to the pursuit of justice for all. Pine Tree handles more full representation cases than any other civil legal aid provider in Maine, and over 96% of cases that involve representation at a court or administrative hearing are closed with a favorable outcome for the client. Pine Tree also specializes in a wide breadth of casework, which means the organization is well-situated to advocate for the rights of low-income Mainers for years to come.

In 2019, Pine Tree Legal Assistance worked on 6,878 cases, providing direct legal assistance on a wide range of legal issues. The following data highlight some of Pine Tree’s most significant outcomes. In 2019, Pine Tree’s advocacy:
• Saved Maine consumers $$504,830 in unlawful and excessive debt by enforcing consumer protections.
• Prevented homelessness for 217 families (a total of 532 people) though eviction dismissals alone. Many of those involved subsidized housing, an important stabilizer for many low income and vulnerable families. If a tenant with a housing subsidy is evicted, the tenant may become ineligible for other subsidized housing programs for up to five years. Losing access to this subsidy can drastically affect a tenant’s ability to afford housing in the future and poses particular hardships for the elderly and families with children. Pine Tree preserved $19,507 in monthly housing subsidies in 2019. The annual value of these subsidies is $234,084.
• Resulted in 397 new protection orders for victims of domestic violence, sexual assault, stalking, and dating violence.
• Secured educational services for 101 low income children, helped 35 children return to school, and kept 27 children in school.
• The total direct financial benefit to our clients, as a result of our advocacy in 2019 is $4,246,237.

Pine Tree's advocacy catalyzes systemic changes that increase equality. In 2010, Pine Tree's uncovered abuses in the handling of foreclosure proceedings that prompted a nationwide halt in those cases by several national servicers. Earlier program victories struck down Maine's vagrancy statute, established the right to court-appointed counsel in cases involving more than six months of jail time, abolished debtors' prison, defended the right to home school one's children, and established the eligibility of military families to receive welfare benefits when a parent is deployed.

That said, justice continues to elude many of our state's low-income families. According to a 2007 report by Maine's Justice Action Group, households with low incomes experience an average of one to two legal problems a year. Pine Tree, which is often both the first and last resort for low-income Mainers facing legal problems, can only serve one fifth of eligible families. Program limitations, changing laws, and challenging economic pressures (such as recent rises in foreclosures and debt issues), ensure that there will always be individuals who could benefit from legal assistance.