For someone confronting a legal problem in a rural community, one of the first challenges may be finding a lawyer at all.
According to a report from the State Justice Institute, 54 counties, or county equivalents, in the United States have no resident lawyer. Nebraska accounts for 12 of those, and another 22 Nebraska counties have three or fewer attorneys.
These areas are often referred to as legal deserts. Increasing the number of attorneys is one piece of the puzzle, but rural communities also need a pipeline of future lawyers, support for attorneys already serving those communities, direct legal services, and collaboration among legal institutions.
The consequences extend throughout the justice system. During the National Rural Access to Justice Convening at Nebraska Law, Nebraska Chief Justice Jeffrey Funke, ’94, described courts struggling to find public defenders and court-appointed counsel, shortages of attorneys to represent parents and children in juvenile cases, and counties incurring significant costs to bring attorneys in from elsewhere. Attorney shortages can even affect the pool of candidates available to become judges.
“There is no one simple answer,” Justice Funke said.
That challenge brought more than 160 legal leaders representing 38 states and Canadian provinces to the National Rural Access to Justice Convening, organized by the Law School Admission Council in collaboration with the Association of American Law Schools and hosted by the University of Nebraska College of Law. Law school leaders, judges, legal aid leaders, bar association representatives, and other partners spent two days identifying ways to address the challenge.
For Nebraska Law, hosting the national conversation reflects work already underway.
As Nebraska’s public law school and part of a land-grant institution, Nebraska Law is working across the legal pipeline, from encouraging students from rural communities to pursue law to preparing attorneys for practice and bringing legal services directly to communities.
The Rural Law Opportunities Program, known as RLOP and as KLOP at the University of Nebraska at Kearney, encourages students from rural Nebraska counties to attend one of four participating Nebraska colleges or universities, attend Nebraska Law, and ultimately practice in rural communities. Participants receive undergraduate scholarships and begin building connections with Nebraska Law as early as their freshman year.
For Sam Schroeder, ’29, the program provided more than a pathway to law school.
“Applying for the KLOP is easily one of the best decisions that I have ever made,” Schroeder said. He credits the program with helping him understand what it means to be a law student and rural attorney while providing “a built-in community.”
A need for connection presents another challenge: attracting lawyers to rural communities is not enough. Mentorship, professional support, and community connections can be important to keeping them there.
The Nebraska Children’s Justice and Legal Advocacy Center addresses shortages in the juvenile court system by providing education, mentorship, and support to law students and practicing attorneys serving children and families. Its Children’s Justice Attorney Education Fellowship prepares attorneys to represent children, parents, and the state, particularly in rural areas. Through its programs, the Center has trained attorneys in more than 80 of Nebraska’s 93 counties.
Other programs take legal services directly into rural communities. Through the Rural Estate Planning Clinic, student attorneys prepare wills, powers of attorney, health care directives, and other documents for rural senior citizens in need before traveling to communities to meet with clients. The Schuyler Project connects Nebraska Law students and faculty with residents of Schuyler to provide immigration education and legal resources.
Greater Nebraska Connections, meanwhile, brings together students interested in practicing outside the Lincoln and Omaha metro areas. The organization partners with the Nebraska State Bar Association’s Rural Practice Initiative to help connect law clerks and graduates with opportunities throughout the state.
The convening also addressed assumptions about the financial and professional opportunities available in rural practice. Dean Richard Moberly pointed to the opportunity for lawyers to become deeply involved in their communities and potentially take over established practices as older attorneys retire.
“People make a great living in rural communities, have a great quality of life,” Moberly said. “They are on the school board. They are involved in businesses.”
Together, Nebraska Law’s work and the conversations at the convening reinforce a basic reality that there is no single solution to rural access to justice.
“We don’t need to be in competition in this space,” said Sudha Setty, president and chief executive officer of the Law School Admission Council. “We need to be in collaboration, better communication, better sharing of ideas.”
