CLS logo, header reading The Clean Slate Screening Project: A Case Study in Scaling Up Record Clearing & Advocacy

The Clean Slate Screening Project: A Case Study

Legal services providers are frequently presented with the challenge of communicating complicated and evolving legal advice to large numbers of constituents. The Clean Slate Screening Project (CSSP), developed by Philadelphia-based Community Legal Services (CLS) in partnership with the Pennsylvania Bar Association (PBA), was conceived as a solution to that predicament when in 2018, the state…

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CLS Supports New Effort to Work with Funeral Homes to Prevent Tangled Titles

On December 2, 2021, Michael Froehlich, Managing Attorney of the Homeownership and Consumer Rights Unit, provided the following brief testimony before City Council in support of Councilmember Gilmore Richardson’s bill to require funeral homes to share information about probating estates and avoiding tangled titles. The bill passed unanimously out of Council.   Good morning.  My name…

ID.me presents barriers to unemployment insurance and other government benefits

During the pandemic, ID.me, a company providing digital identity credentials that promised to screen out fraudulent claims but “leave no identity behind,” emerged as a potential savior against rampant unemployment benefit fraud.  Since then, ID.me’s influence has increased, as numerous federal departments and scores of states have signed on for its services, including in the…

Testimony in Support of the Philadelphia Neighborhood Preservation Initiative

Today, October 14, City Council unanimously passed the 2021-2022 Neighborhood Preservation Initiative Program Statement and Budget to provide significant new funding for affordable housing, first time home buyers, home repair programs, small businesses, rental assistance, eviction prevention, and tangled title representation.  Community Legal Services strongly supports this new funding.  Michael Froehlich, Managing Attorney of CLS’s Homeownership and Consumer…

Green background with black text reading: How the Pandemic Response Has Failed Young People & What We Need to Thrive

Report: How the Pandemic Response Has Failed Young People & What We Need to Thrive

This report was written by Youth Justice Project inaugural Youth Action Board members, Deja Morgan, Alexi Chacon, and Madison Nardy.  When the coronavirus was declared a global pandemic in March 2020, young people across the country became unemployed, had to adjust to a virtual learning environment, experienced loss, housing insecurity, and more with no clear…