{"id":312802,"date":"2026-08-03T20:16:10","date_gmt":"2026-08-03T20:16:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/312802\/"},"modified":"2026-08-03T20:16:10","modified_gmt":"2026-08-03T20:16:10","slug":"nycla-introduces-new-taskforce-to-activate-non-lawyer-workers-for-unrepresented-litigants","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/312802\/","title":{"rendered":"NYCLA introduces new taskforce to activate non-lawyer workers for unrepresented litigants"},"content":{"rendered":"

The New York County Lawyers Association<\/a> (NYCLA) is looking to expand access to legal services by activating non-attorney legal staff and using emerging technology like AI<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Manhattan-based bar association recently established a new task force to explore new ways non-lawyer staff at legal services non-profits and potentially private firms can help self-represented litigants.<\/p>\n

The new Technology and Community Justice Taskforce is in the process of drafting a formal charter to examine the ways that legal navigators, paralegals, community advocates, technology solutions, and licensed legal technicians can expand legal access as widely as possible.<\/p>\n

\u201cAdvancing access to justice requires looking beyond traditional legal models and empowering the community advocates, navigators, and technicians who are already on the front lines,\u201d wrote taskforce chair Sateesh Nori, a former legal services lawyer and access to justice researcher.<\/p>\n

The main focus of the taskforce will be staff who are already employed by different legal services providers, who represent clients who cannot afford attorneys in the city\u2019s justice system, but Minkoff said that is also considering how this model could apply to for-profit law firms too.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe idea is to be able to train people who are not lawyers to do some certain legal services just like nurses and nurse practitioners are trained to do certain medical services,\u201d\u00a0 NYCLA President Ron Minkoff said.<\/p>\n

After it decides on its scope, among the taskforce\u2019s first order of business will be to outline the legislative changes that would be necessary to make it possible. Minkoff said that the legislature would be likely to have to pass a practice rule like the ones that allow law students to take on legal work under the supervision of lawyers. This rule would clarify what qualifications staff need to have and what kind of training is needed.<\/p>\n

Minkoff suggested that the use of artificial intelligence will play a major part of the technology. In its set of starting goals, the taskforce listed \u201cbuilding technology tools and non-lawyer pilots.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt absolutely has to explore how much AI can help people who can\u2019t afford lawyers to be able to do the work that could contribute without swamping the court system without a bunch of meritless motions,\u201d Minkoff said. \u201cThere\u2019s a tension with AI because it has the potential to make good things happen but it could be easily abused or misused.\u201d<\/p>\n

The other goal that the taskforce hopes to make some progress on before the end of the year is educational programming. NYCLA intends to organize a conference or Continuing Legal Education (CLE) program with the aim of pushing it forward.<\/p>\n

The members of the taskforce are Minkoff, Sateesh Nori, Seymour James, James Kobak, Khasim Lockhart, Barry Temkin, Michael Miller, Randall Tesser, Janet Sabel, Tara Herman, Jessica Breuer, Amanda Lipman and David Udell.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The group\u2019s leadership intends to recruit other voices to that specifically targets practitioners, members of the judiciary, legal academics, funders and the non-lawyer justice workers themselves.<\/p>\n

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