WEST SIDE LEADER – Fairlawn law firm, Community Legal Aid partner for Guardianship Project

1/25/2018
By Staff Writer

GREATER AKRON — Buckingham, Doolittle and Burroughs LLC, located at 3800 Embassy Parkway in Fairlawn, has teamed up with Community Legal Aid, located at 50 S. Main St. in Downtown Akron, to provide assistance to families filing for and processing guardianship requests.

According to Legal Aid officials, the Guardianship Project is an expansion of Legal Aid’s medical-legal partnership Health Education Advocacy and Law (HEAL) project and is aimed at helping families with children with disabilities transitioning to adulthood at age 18.

Officials explained once Akron Children’s determines there is a medical need for a guardian, Legal Aid’s intake specialists and paralegals will screen clients and collect basic information. The case will then be sent to Buckingham and assigned to an associate.

“Guardianship is the answer for these families,” said Shelley Walker, director of social work at Akron Children’s Hospital who is coordinating the project. “It legally allows another adult appointed by the court to make decisions for the young adult’s medical, financial and other needs.”

Marie Curry, Legal Aid’s managing attorney for HEAL, said the guardianship process can be especially burdensome for those in lower income brackets, who often are working more than one job and caring for their family outside the hospital while also navigating the medical needs of a sick child.

“Establishing a guardianship for a loved one is always emotional,” added Probate Court Judge Elinore Marsh Stormer. “This innovative program will make a difficult time much easier.”

Buckingham officials said they were in talks for much of 2017 with Legal Aid’s Volunteer Legal Services Program to find an opportunity to help, and this process landed them on the Guardianship Project.

“We knew this would be a great way for our attorneys to gain valuable experience while fulfilling a need within our community,” said John Slagter, managing partner of Buckingham. “More importantly, it’s the right thing to do.”

Law firm officials said they launched the project this month with a training session, and attorneys are being asked to take one to two cases per year. Officials said they will reassess the number of cases and hours dedicated to the program each year.

Jennifer van Dulmen, Legal Aid’s deputy director, worked with Buckingham to identify the project.

“This is what great pro bono partnerships are all about,” said van Dulmen. “We have hundreds of volunteers who take on cases for our clients every year, and their work is so valuable. But when the leadership of a firm backs a project like this from the ground up, it just exponentially increases the impact.”

For details on HEAL, visit www.communitylegalaid.org/HEAL. To learn more about Legal Aid’s volunteer attorney program, visit www.communitylegalaid.org/VLSP.

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