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Indiana Legal Services, Inc. (ILS) is the successor organization to the Legal Services Organization of Indiana, Inc., Legal Services Program of Northern Indiana, Inc., and Legal Services of Northwest Indiana, Inc. These organizations were founded in 1966, during the civil rights struggle and the creation of the federal anti-poverty programs, to provide free legal services to poor people in Indiana. The founders believed that poor people, without access to the legal system, were being denied equal justice in a country that promises "equal justice for all". They had an abiding faith in our system of justice and simply wanted to give people, unable to afford legal counsel, an opportunity to have their grievances aired within the system and not the streets. It is now the fortieth anniversary of that initiative. In 2001, the programs were unified into one comprehensive, integrated delivery system. ILS is now a statewide program offering legal assistance to eligible clients in all of Indiana's 92 counties. ILS has eight major branch offices in Bloomington, Evansville, Fort Wayne, Gary, Indianapolis, Lafayette, New Albany and South Bend and outreach offices in Columbus, East Chicago, Hammond, Richmond, Terre Haute and Yorktown. The ILS mission statement mandates the use of our resources to provide poor people with "legal services which will effectively help them to gain equal access to the courts; empower them to control their lives; and impact on the major causes and effects of poverty".The existence of poverty in Indiana has proven to be intractable. Poverty in Indiana has increased from 9.5% in 2003 to 10.8% in 2004, a 1.3% increase. There are now a total of 657,000 Hoosiers living in poverty with 125,000 of that number being children under the age of 18. With the advent of welfare reform, the number of working poor has increased concurrently. ILS has seen homeownership increase from 10% to almost 40% with its clients. Legal problems common to the middle-class are now visited upon the poor - bankruptcy, mortgage foreclosures and credit card indebtedness. To further complicate the situation, persons with limited English proficiency now compose approximately 6.5% of the Hoosier population. To address these new legal concerns, ILS has created the Consumer Law Center in New Albany, the Housing Law Center in Bloomington and the Hispanic Law Center in South Bend. To give all people better access to our services, ILS created the website www.indianajustice.org.
Norman P. Metzger
Executive Director
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This web site was made possible by generous support
of the Legal Services Corporation.
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