North Carolina lawyers give back to the community, state and profession by providing many pro-bono or low-cost legal services to people. Here are a few of them that offer free or cost-efficient venues to ask for direction on important legal matters:

  1. Our friend Ask SAMof the Winston-Salem Journal is very good at spotting purely legal questions and asking a local lawyer to provide some helpful free direction to people in his much-read column. (Email ASKSAM@wsjournal.com.)
  2. N.C. Bar Association’s Lawyer Referral Line:Sometimes a lawyer can refer a person to a nonprofit agency that can help at little or no cost, such as with some debt-related issues. Sometimes the problem requires helping someone find the most appropriate lawyer, or the lawyer making a quick but clarifying call. It is the lawyer’s experienced judgment in any of these circumstances that can help frame the issues so the person has a solid solution, which may avoid the necessity of hiring a lawyer at all.

To reach the Lawyer Referral Service by phone, call 800-662-7660 or 919-677-8574, or go to www.ncbar.org/public-resources.

If you use the referral service, the cost is $50 for an initial 30-minute consultation with the lawyer.

The referral service’s website also has a link allowing you to conduct a free search for a lawyer.

 

  1. Lawyer on the Linepairs people with volunteers who provide legal advice and brief service over the phone. Private-practice lawyers partner with Legal Aid of North Carolina to provide free legal services for limited legal matters for financially qualified clients.
  2. The Volunteer Lawyer Program,another Legal Aid service, assigns volunteer lawyers to Legal Aid clients who need extended service, such as representation in court or at administrative hearings and more.

If you need help from either of these programs call Legal Aid’s help line at 866-219-5262 or go to its website at www.legalaidnc.org.

  1. N.C. Free LegalAnswers:This is a bar association program that increases the reach of important legal advice by providing financially eligible people with online access to lawyers in North Carolina.

This web-based portal (https://nc.freelegalanswers.org) allows financially eligible North Carolinians to ask volunteer lawyers civil legal questions about many common areas of the law, such as family law, veteran issues, wills and inheritance, and more.

  1. North Carolina Lawyers for Entrepreneurs Assistance Program (NC LEAP):In this state bar association program, also known as NC LEAP, volunteer lawyers provide free intellectual property and business-related legal assistance to low-wealth entrepreneurs and inventors. (NC LEAP does not provide assistance with litigation matters, however.) To apply for free legal services through NC LEAP, go to www.ncbarfoundation.org/our-work/nc-leap.
  2. Legal Clinic for theElderly:Under the supervision of a lawyer, law students at the Wake Forest University School of Law in Winston-Salem provide free legal services to the community in Forsyth County and surrounding counties.

To be a client of the Elder Law Clinic, a person must be at least 60 years old, and have an income of less than $2,000 a month for a household of one or less than $2,700 per month for a household of two.

For more information go to http://elder-clinic.law.wfu.edu; do a web or search for “WFU Legal Clinic Elderly”; or call 336-758-5061.

  1. Some lawyersfeel that their clients should be able to contact them with brief and routine questions that the lawyer can answer over the telephone or by email as a courtesy to the clients, much like doctors and physician assistants answer some medical questions the same way as a courtesy.

Just a little experienced direction can be of enormous help to people. Ask your lawyer to consider this, too.

  1. Look before you leap:The best legal problem is the one you never have. Call your lawyer before you act if you can.

Remember: An informed choice is a smart choice.

 

This article was originally posted by the Winston-Salem Journal. To read the original article, click here.