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Court Navigator Programs: Building and Sustaining Court-Community Bridges
Thursday October 22, 2026 10:45am - 12:15pm EDT
Cincinnati Convention Center
Court navigator programs are one of the most promising models for closing the justice gap — trained non-lawyer community members stationed in courthouses who help people understand processes, complete forms, and navigate a system designed by lawyers for lawyers. The concept is simple. The execution is not. Where do you find navigators — volunteers, AmeriCorps members, paid staff, law students? How do you train someone to help with legal processes without crossing into legal advice? How do you integrate a new role into a courthouse culture that may not want it? How do you keep a program alive when the grant runs out, the champion judge retires, or your best navigator takes a better-paying job? This session is about the operational reality of building these programs — not the vision, but the plumbing. 
This panel will discuss a long-running court navigator program in Illinois that leverages AmeriCorps fellows embedded in courthouses statewide, a newly launched navigator program in two counties in Kansas, and an exciting new national partnership between Legal Link and the National Center for State Courts bringing Legal First Aid® training (currently used for frontline community workers already embedded in people's lives to recognize legal issues, provide basic orientation, and connect people to help before a problem becomes a crisis) directly into court navigator programs across the country. 
Panelists will discuss how each program is structured, how it came to be, and what it takes to build and sustain it — including the funding models and partnerships that keep these programs running. From there, the conversation will turn to training: how do you prepare non-lawyers to do this work well, and what does quality look like across different program models? Panelists will share honest lessons learned, and close with what's energizing them right now — all so you can think through a navigator program for your own jurisdiction, that can deal with realities on the ground. 
By participating in this session, attendees will gain insight into practical approaches for building and sustaining court and community navigator programs, while also learning how you can leverage national resources to develop and enhance navigator programs in your jurisdiction.

Speakers
SH

Sarah Hoskinson

Kansas State Courts
avatar for Kate Crowley Richardson

Kate Crowley Richardson

Executive Director, Legal Link
Kate Crowley Richardson (she/her) is Executive Director of Legal Link, a California-based nonprofit whose Legal First Aid® curriculum has certified more than 4,000 community legal workers across seven states. She previously served as Legal Director at Swords to Plowshares, where... Read More →
avatar for Abigail Lessman

Abigail Lessman

Eviction Resolution Program Manager, Kate Richardson
CF

Casey Forsythe

Illinois Justice Corps
SJ

Stacey Jonas Weiler

Program Operations Director, Illinois Bar Foundation
JR

Jill Roberts

National Center for State Courts
Jill Roberts, JD, is a Principal Court Management Consultant at the National Center for
State Courts. Her work is focused on expanding access to state courts with a focus on
people without lawyers, people with disabilities, and people with limited English
proficiency. Prior to jo... Read More →
Thursday October 22, 2026 10:45am - 12:15pm EDT
Cincinnati Convention Center 537 Elm St, Cincinnati, OH 45202
  Court Admin

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