Corporate Counsel
Sue Reisinger
February 18, 2015
“The general counsel of United Technologies Corp. and General Electric Co. have helped start the first program of its kind in the U.S. to widen the availability of free legal services for poor people in Connecticut.
Called LawyerCorps Connecticut, the program will pay the salaries and benefits of three beginner-level attorneys to be trained and to work with legal aid groups. They will represent several hundred clients a year in civil and family courts on such matters as evictions, child custody, foreclosures, domestic violence protection, elder issues and more.
The government-funded Legal Services Corp., the largest provider of legal aid funding in the country, has said offices turn away about half the people seeking free help because of a lack of attorneys. Its funding is near a 40-year low.
LawyerCorps was the brainchild of Connecticut Supreme Court Chief Justice Chase Rogers. More than two years ago she shared her vision of providing more access to justice with UTC general counsel Charles Gill, GE general counsel Brackett Denniston III and Judge William Bright of the Connecticut Superior Court.
The group met with the leaders of the state’s three main legal aid offices: Connecticut Legal Services, Greater Hartford Legal Aid and New Haven Legal Assistance Association Inc.—and LawyerCorps was born.
UTC sent assistant general counsel Charlsa “Sandy” Broadus to become LawyerCorps’ executive director and chief counsel. Broadus did not return messages seeking comment.
‘It’s an opportunity to do social justice,’ Broadus told the Associated Press in a recent article. ‘I think people tend to think of Connecticut as a really wealthy state, but we have a lot of people living without basic needs.’
Hartford-based UTC also provided LawyerCorps with public relations specialist Danielle Smith; while Fairfield-based GE added two labor lawyers, Mark Nordstrom and Paul Lalli, to LawyerCorps’ advisory group, joining the four founding members.
The program raised $225,000 to fund its first year, and is now interviewing lawyers who will start work in the fall, according to the AP. On its website, LawyerCorps says its goals include establishing a sustainable fund to continue hiring and training public-service lawyers in the future by enlisting new partners to invest in the program.”