Justice Coordinator Hillary Warner has turned the Onondaga County court system based in Syracuse into a thriving hub for sharing essential resources.
Walking into the family court’s lactation room, mothers can find bags of diapers. In drug treatment court, boxes of Narcan, the medicine that can reverse an opioid overdose, hang in wall-mounted boxes.
Warner, who came to the court system in 2024 from a career in community health at Planned Parenthood and ACR Health, found the court system to be an intuitive place to offer these services.
In transitioning into the role of justice coordinator for the court system’s 5th Judicial District, she took on a role that is geared to making the court system easier to navigate for everyday people but is subject to interpretation of the individual needs of the judicial district. Naturally, she called on her extended network of community connections for the task.
For her efforts to help meet the needs of litigants, Warner was honored on Oct. 6 as one of Central New York’s 40 Under 40 awards, a distinction that highlights young professionals across Central New York for leadership and community impact.
“It’s not really necessarily about any work that I do alone. I think it’s just about connecting people who are doing great work in the community and in the courts to one another, making sure that the community knows what’s out there,” Warner said. “A lot of times I think we all tend to work in sort of these like silos, and we’re all doing great work, but that work could be enhanced through partnership.”
Warner’s role is an extension of access to justice initiative helmed by the court system’s state court system’s Office for Justice Initiatives, a department tasked with lifting barriers to litigants. Each of New York’s judicial districts typically designates a justice coordinator like Warner to manage local outreach, town halls, and committee services.
“That could look like operational improvements. That could look like bringing resources and partners into the courts or seeing if we can get them embedded in the courts,” Warner said. “Working with schools, community-based organizations and new programs to educate the community about the courts and also have their voices at the table when we’re looking for ways to, to make our courts more accessible and equitable.”
Using a community background to bring change
Warner’s background in community health taught her about how to identify areas where big institutional systems can do more to meet the needs of their users. Coming into the court system involved a mixture of learning the priorities of the 5th District’s head Administrative Judge Deborah Karalunas and bringing her own network of connections from her community organizing experiences.
One of the first projects that Warner worked on was a free supervised visitation program, in which she partnered with non-profit Reach CNY, who had secured federal Office on Violence Against Women grant.
The program offers free supervised visitation in family court cases involving domestic violence, custody or neglect issues. Warner expanded it from one family court to all family courts across the district. It provides parents in difficult circumstances a structured way to visit with their child.
There is usually a staff member monitoring the visit, making sure that everyone is safe, implementing some education and making recommendations back to the courts based on what they observe.
Another project that Warner took one involved giving the courts a friendlier paint job. She Worked with CNY Arts and the Community Folk Art Center to give a chance to local high school students to design and install a youth mural in the Onondaga Family Court waiting room.
The diaper sharing initiative came as part of a plan to enhance the services the problem-solving court offered in its lactation room. From her time at Planned Parenthood, Warner had established a connection with the CNY Diaper Bank to establish the progam. She has plans to expand it further into a comprehensive Family Resource Room.
The addition of Narcan boxes came from Warner leveraging her background in harm reduction to collaborate with Onondaga County Health Department peer specialists to embed peer support in drug treatment courts. When she previously worked in harm reduction, Warner said that she found herself reversing an overdose in the parking lot.
“I feel pretty passionate about getting Narcan just into everybody’s hands that I could possibly get them to, and also just kind of addressing stigma in the courthouse,” Warner said, “Maybe someone’s visiting court because they have like a substance-related charge, or they are going to family court and they think that their substance use history will be automatically used against them. I think that when you increase visibility and have the harm reduction resources visible in the courts, you’re saying, ‘We’re here with you.’”
She started with courts in Onondaga County, but then through her research found a statewide program that would help her reach courthouses in the other counties across the judicial district. Warner said that she’s in the process of working with the Prevention Network to place Narcan boxes in local town and village courts as well.
When asked about moments that indicate that these efforts are having an impact, Warner said it’s little gestures — such as seeing the parents’ eyes light up on the street as they see her taking in piles of diapers.
Other times she’s been there in the family court office to hand off a book to a child who’s in court with a parent who is struggling or confused. When she sees parents look relieved, that’s a sign that the narrative of the courts as a place where people go to get punished might be changing. It can be a place where people can go to get resources and help.
“Most people who decide to work at the courts are working here because they want to help, and they want to serve their community and go above and beyond,” Warner said. “It’s been a blessing to work here and see how far people will go to try to make this an easier or just a better experience for for the communities we serve.”
From left, Warner and Joelle Dougherty, Deputy District Executive of the 5th Judicial District