Maryland Volunteer Lawyers Service Inc

The judicare project is a reduced-fee program designed to provide free legal services to clients who otherwise would be unable to afford representation in contested family law cases. Mvls operates this project in 15 maryland counties and baltimore city. Experienced volunteer lawyers are paid $120/hour for up to 35 hours to resolve these difficult cases. For the year ended june 30, 2024. Our judicare panel attorneys closed 160 cases, primarily involving contested custody that directly benefited 503 family members.

Housing stability is a core focus at mvls, with a particular emphasis on older adults to ensure they can age in place and successfully pass on their assets to their next generation the advanced planning project educates marylanders about the need to do estate planning so they can pass their most important asset, their home, to their family. This program combats generations of wealth extraction from communities of color, many of whom had not engaged in estate planning and had lost their homes to tax sale or foreclosure. The my home, my deed, my legacy project builds upon this work and provides pro bono legal services for estate planning and deed disentanglement to clients who were traditionally denied access to justice. In fy24, mvls handled 348 estates and deeds cases.