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D.C. Convenes
'Action
Commission'
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D.C. Court of Appeals
Chief Judge Annice M. Wagner
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On
the heels of a District of Columbia Bar Foundation report on the
scant availability of civil legal services in the nation’s
capital, Chief Judge Annice M. Wagner of the D.C. Court of
Appeals established the District of Columbia Access to Justice
Commission. The Commission will address the report’s findings
that only 10 percent of D.C. residents living in poverty have
access to civil legal services.
“Equal
access to justice is a fundamental principle in America. In
spite of the continuing efforts of many in our legal community,
we still have to work to make that principle a full reality in
the District,” Wagner says. “We have to do more, and the
Commission
will lay out a path to get us there.”
The
17-member commission will be made up of judges, leaders from the
D.C. Bar and D.C. Bar Foundation, legal services attorneys, and
other advocates. It will be chaired by Peter B. Edelman, a law
professor at Georgetown University who has advocated on behalf
of the poor throughout his career. “This is an action
commission,” he says. “We are not simply going to make
recommendations. We are going to make things happen.”
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