Access to Justice Coalition urges more state funding as eviction and immigration legal needs rise

Justice Carroll, chair of the Access to Justice Coalition and a justice on the Vermont Supreme Court, told the House Judiciary Committee on Feb. 8 that the coalition — created by the Supreme Court in 2004 — is asking for state support to expand civil legal services statewide.

"For every dollar invested in Vermont low income legal services, the state and Vermonters see a return of $11," Justice Carroll said, citing an independent economic impact study commissioned by the Vermont Bar Foundation and completed in fall 2019. She described civil cases — evictions, small claims, relief-from-abuse and stalking matters — as "life changing" and said many litigants appear without counsel and are at a severe disadvantage.

Sam Abel Palmer, executive director of Legal Services Vermont, told the committee the organization fields roughly 100 to 120 requests for help per working day and manages the statewide legal helpline and the btlawhelp.org site. "It's housing. It's housing followed by family and health, but it's housing," Palmer said, summarizing intake data. He said the coalition's most recent needs assessment (completed December 2024) showed an overall increase in requests for assistance of about 20–25 percent compared with the previous five-year study, and roughly a 40 percent increase in housing-related requests; within housing, nonpayment and no-cause eviction calls rose sharply.

Palmer described online and…