Access to Justice Network Conference 2026

Access to Justice Network Conference 2026

12:30pm EDT

Accessible Justice: Breaking Down Barriers for People with Disabilities in Courts and Legal Services

Wednesday October 21, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT

Cincinnati Convention Center

Speakers

Katherine Hunt Thomas

The Ability Center

Rebecca Steinhauser

Managing Attorney, Advocates for Basic Legal Equality

Katie Hunt Thomas is the Director of Advocacy and Disability Rights Attorney for the Ability Center of Greater Toledo, a Center for Independent Living in northwest Ohio with the mission to assist people with disabilities to live, work, and socialize within a fully accessible community... Read More →

Shannon Baldwin

Disability Rights Ohio

Julie Keys

Disability Rights Ohio

Wednesday October 21, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT
Cincinnati Convention Center 537 Elm St, Cincinnati, OH 45202

Conversation Hour

12:30pm EDT

Beyond Direct Services Funding

Wednesday October 21, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT

Cincinnati Convention Center

Speakers

Claire Solot

Bigglesworth Family Foundation

Wednesday October 21, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT
Cincinnati Convention Center 537 Elm St, Cincinnati, OH 45202

Conversation Hour

12:30pm EDT

Bringing a Fair Housing Lens to Housing and Community Development

Wednesday October 21, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT

Cincinnati Convention Center

Speakers

George Thomas

The Fair Housing Center

George Thomas is a 2007 graduate of the University of Toledo's College of Law. George's law practice focuses on nonprofit legal services in the areas of fair housing, landlord-tenant, community development, and nonprofit governance. For his work in the Toledo community, George received... Read More →

Christina Rodriguez

The Fair Housing Center

Christina Rodriguez, Esq. is a Toledo native who received two bachelors degrees and her Juris Doctor from the University of Toledo. She joined the Fair Housing Center as a legal intern in 2014, was hired as a Fair Housing Specialist in 2015, became a Staff Attorney after passing the... Read More →

Noah Woods

The Fair Housing Center

Noah Woods is a staff attorney with The Fair Housing Center in Toledo, where he focuses on advancing housing justice through both individual representation and systemic advocacy. Since joining in 2024 after graduating from the University of Toledo College of Law, he has represented... Read More →

Wednesday October 21, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT
Cincinnati Convention Center 537 Elm St, Cincinnati, OH 45202

Conversation Hour

12:30pm EDT

Crayons in the Case File: Ethics in Lawyer-Child Interactions

Wednesday October 21, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT

Cincinnati Convention Center

Lawyers frequently encounter children in a variety of contexts—whether as clients, witnesses, or parties affected by litigation. These interactions raise unique ethical and professional responsibility issues. This program will explore the ethical rules, professional guidelines, and best practices governing how lawyers should communicate with and advocate for children. Using real-world examples and hypotheticals, participants will learn how to safeguard children's welfare while ensuring the highest quality representation.

Through a combination of rule-based analysis and applied hypotheticals, this session will help participants:

Identify the key ethics rules and professional guidelines that govern lawyer-child interactions, including issues of confidentiality, capacity, and client communication
Recognize the developmental and trauma-informed considerations that shape how children process and communicate information in legal settings
Apply practical strategies for engaging children in age-appropriate, trauma-responsive ways that minimize retraumatization
Navigate common ethical dilemmas—such as determining a child's capacity to direct representation, balancing a child's stated wishes against their best interests, and managing boundaries in informal interactions—through guided hypotheticals

Speakers

Nick Caprino

Attorney, Children's Law Center KY

Jennifer Brinkman

Northern Kentucky University, Chase College of Law

Jennifer Brinkman is an Assistant Professor of Law and Director of the Children’s Law Center Clinic at NKU Salmon P. Chase College of Law. She teaches and writes in the areas of child and family law, juvenile justice, and trauma-informed legal practice. Before entering academia... Read More →

Wednesday October 21, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT
Cincinnati Convention Center 537 Elm St, Cincinnati, OH 45202

Conversation Hour

12:30pm EDT

Designing Federal Court Modernization with Access in Mind

Wednesday October 21, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT

Cincinnati Convention Center

Speakers

Jamie Giani

Third Branch Solutions

Jamie Giani is the founder of Third Branch Solutions, a boutique consultancy whose mission is to support courts and judiciary-adjacent organizations. A former law clerk, Assistant Federal Public Defender (Capital Habeas Unit), and Clerk of Court, Jamie brings a rare dual perspective... Read More →

Wednesday October 21, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT
Cincinnati Convention Center 537 Elm St, Cincinnati, OH 45202

Conversation Hour

12:30pm EDT

Home, Wealth, and Legacy: Wholistic Representation for Homeowners

Wednesday October 21, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT

Cincinnati Convention Center

Speakers

Stacy Purcell

Legal Aid Society of Southwest Ohio

Stacy Purcell is a Senior Supervising Attorney at Legal Aid Society of Southwest Ohio, LLC. She provides holistic legal representation to low-income homeowners who are at risk of losing their homes due to mortgage foreclosure, property taxes, and tangled title or heirs property. She... Read More →

Wednesday October 21, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT
Cincinnati Convention Center 537 Elm St, Cincinnati, OH 45202

Conversation Hour

12:30pm EDT

Meeting People Where They Are: Reaching People in Custody with Civil Legal Help

Wednesday October 21, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT

Cincinnati Convention Center

Speakers

Halle Eichert

Director, Kane County Law Library & Self Help Center

Halle Eichert is the Director of the Kane County Law Library & Self Help Legal Center. She is a member of the Standardized State Court Forms Committee and the Expungement/Sealing Subcommittee of the IL Supreme Court Access to Justice Commission, and is serving on a statewide Steering... Read More →

Jenna Kearns

Illinois JusticeCorps Program Director, Illinois Justice Corps

Jenna is the Program Director for Illinois JusticeCorps, where she leads a statewide AmeriCorps initiative dedicated to helping court users navigate civil legal systems with dignity and clarity. She builds equitable, human‑centered processes and strengthens partnerships across courts... Read More →

Mary Sellmyer

Law Librarian, McLean County Law Library Coordinator

Wednesday October 21, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT
Cincinnati Convention Center 537 Elm St, Cincinnati, OH 45202

Conversation Hour

12:30pm EDT

Redesigning Legal Help Teams: Hybrid Roles, Non-Attorney Staff, and New Staffing Models

Wednesday October 21, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT

Cincinnati Convention Center

Speakers

Michael Massmann

Neighborhood Legal Services of Los Angeles County

Lindsay Bramble

Deputy Director for Remote Services, Maryland Center for Legal Assistance

Graham Bennie, Esq.

Supervising Attorney for Training & Pro Bono, Maryland Center for Legal Assistance

Graham is the Supervising Attorney for Training & Pro Bono for the Maryland Center for Legal Assistance, LLC (MCLA). Graham is responsible for developing and administering the internal training curriculum for MCLA staff (including onboarding and continuing legal education), as well... Read More →

Taylor Thomas, MSW

Volunteer Lawyers Program Social Worker, Legal Services of Eastern Missouri

Wednesday October 21, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT
Cincinnati Convention Center 537 Elm St, Cincinnati, OH 45202

Conversation Hour

12:30pm EDT

Supervising in a Remote World: Strategies for Connection and Quality

Wednesday October 21, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT

Cincinnati Convention Center

Speakers

Sreoshi Datta

Associate Supervising Attorney, Neighborhood Legal Services of Los Angeles County

Sreoshi Datta is the Associate Supervising Attorney for the Self-Help team at Neighborhood Legal Services of Los Angeles County (NLSLA). Self-Help legal aid staff works in partnership with Los Angeles Superior Court staff to provide in-person and remote services to litigants across... Read More →

Wednesday October 21, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT
Cincinnati Convention Center 537 Elm St, Cincinnati, OH 45202

Conversation Hour

12:30pm EDT

Training Social Workers as Legal Service Providers: Lessons from Utah's Community Justice Advocates

Wednesday October 21, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT

Cincinnati Convention Center

Speakers

Jayme Walters

Assistant Professor of Social Work, Utah State University

Dr. Jayme Walters is an Associate Professor in the Department of Social Work and the Executive Director of the Transforming Communities Institute (TCI) at Utah State University (USU). With two decades of experience, Dr. Walters’s research and solution-building efforts center on... Read More →

Lu Lawrence

Utah State University

Kamri Webster

Nonprofit Legal Services of Utah

Judge Richard Mrazik

Utah State Courts, Third District Court

Judge Richard E. Mrazik was appointed to the Third District Court in April 2018 by Governor Gary R. Herbert. He took the bench in June 2018 and serves Salt Lake, Summit, and Tooele counties. Judge Mrazik received a Bachelor's Degree in sociology and biology from Bowdoin College in... Read More →

Nathanael Player

Justice-by-Design

Nathanael Player is an assistant professor of professional practice at Utah State University, where he teaches social workers and allied professionals to practice law as Community Justice Advocates. Previously he served as vice chair of Utah's Regulatory Sandbox oversight board and... Read More →

Wednesday October 21, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT
Cincinnati Convention Center 537 Elm St, Cincinnati, OH 45202

Conversation Hour

12:30pm EDT

Using Community Economic Development (CED) Strategies to Impact Community Change

Wednesday October 21, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT

Cincinnati Convention Center

Speakers

Robert Southers

Ohio Access to Justice Foundation

Michael Loudenslager

Staff Attorney, Advocates for Basic Legal Equality, Inc.

Michael Loudenslager is a staff attorney with Advocates for Basic Legal Equality, Inc. (ABLE), a non-profit law firm that serves people with low incomes in Western Ohio. Michael works in ABLE’s Housing and Economic Development group out of its Dayton, Ohio office. His practice focuses... Read More →

Mary Asbury

Executive Director, Legal Aid Society of Greater Cincinnati

Mary Asbury is the Executive Director of the Legal Aid Society of Greater Cincinnati. Her responsibilities include developing and implementing a strategic plan for delivering civil legal aid services to clients in seven southwest Ohio counties. She is also Executive Vice President... Read More →

Angie Lloyd

Ohio Access to Justice Foundation

Angie Lloyd has served as the Executive Director of the Ohio Access to Justice Foundation for over a decade. She is actively engaged in both the state and national justice community. Ms. Lloyd serves on various Ohio State Bar Association committees and task forces, as well as on... Read More →

Wednesday October 21, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT
Cincinnati Convention Center 537 Elm St, Cincinnati, OH 45202

Conversation Hour

12:30pm EDT

Best Practices for Online Court Forms

Thursday October 22, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT

Cincinnati Convention Center

Speakers

Sam Glover

Clinical Fellow, Suffolk LIT Lab

Sam works with courts, orgs, and the Suffolk LIT Lab team to build online tools that make legal processes more accessible.

Early in his legal career Sam defended consumers from abusive debt collectors and landlords. He also founded Lawyerist, where he focused on legal innovation, access to justice, technology competence, and community building. Sam has been recognized as a legal innovator by the American... Read More →

Lisa Colpoys

Senior Consultant, AI Initiative, Lawyers Trust Fund of Illinois

Lisa Colpoys is a public service leader with over three decades of experience creating new ways to help people solve legal problems. She is passionate about designing user-centric systems, simplifying processes, and transforming legal aid organizations, courts, and the practice of... Read More →

Jessica Frank

User Researcher and Project Manager, Free Law Project

Jessica Frank is an attorney, legal technologist, and Director of Justice Initiatives at Free Law Project, a nonprofit building open legal data infrastructure. She works at the intersection of access to justice, generative AI, and public-interest technology, and speaks regularly at... Read More →

Thursday October 22, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT
Cincinnati Convention Center 537 Elm St, Cincinnati, OH 45202

Conversation Hour

12:30pm EDT

Getting Our Heads Out of the Sand: AI's Environmental Costs and What the Justice Community Can Do

Thursday October 22, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT

Cincinnati Convention Center

Speakers

Sandy Ambrozy

SRLN Governance Leadership Team, Urban Institute

Sandra Ambrozy is a nonresident fellow for the Center on Nonprofits and Philanthropy at the Urban Institute in D.C. Previously, Ambrozy was a senior fellow and senior program officer at The Kresge Foundation, where she developed strategic and layered investments to address critical... Read More →

Maya Markovich

Justice Tech Alliance

Claudia Johnson

Western Washington University

Eduardo Gonzalez

Executive Director, NuLawLab

Eduardo Gonzalez is a civil justice strategist working at the intersection of access to justice, civic engagement, and public interest technology. He has led national initiatives that connect courts, legal aid organizations, community groups, and academic institutions to improve how... Read More →

Thursday October 22, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT
Cincinnati Convention Center 537 Elm St, Cincinnati, OH 45202

Conversation Hour

12:30pm EDT

Holistic Legal Assistance to Sexual Violence Survivors

Thursday October 22, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT

Cincinnati Convention Center

A sexual assault survivor walks into your office. She needs a protection order — but she also needs help with housing because her landlord is trying to evict her for calling the police. She's lost income and doesn't know about crime victim compensation. Her ex is using the family court system to maintain control. Her school mishandled her Title IX complaint. Her name and address are in public court records. Each of these is a separate legal problem, handled by a separate part of the legal system, and most survivors never get help with more than one — if they get help at all.
The OAESV Legal Clinic has built a model for holistic legal assistance that addresses the full range of civil legal needs arising from sexual violence: protection orders, victims' rights, compensation, Title IX and civil rights claims, housing, family law, and privacy. Caitlyn Benzo will briefly introduce the clinic's model and share data on what they're seeing — which legal needs survivors present with, which ones they don't know they have until someone asks, and where the biggest service gaps are.
One issue the clinic is addressing more often is the application of Marsy's Law now that several years have passed since its passage & implementation. Also included is how victim's representation within the criminal legal process is a vital piece of the holistic framework.
The conversation hour will continue with a group discussion: What barriers do survivors face in accessing legal help in your jurisdiction? How do you handle the intersection of trauma and legal process when a client can barely talk about what happened, let alone navigate a courtroom? What does collaboration look like between legal aid, victim services, prosecutors' offices, and housing providers — and where does it break down? Bring your own experiences serving survivors or your questions about how to start.
This session is for legal aid attorneys, victim advocates, court staff, and anyone whose clients include people whose legal problems started with violence. Leave with a clearer picture of available civil remedies, connections to peers doing this work, and practical ideas for building holistic capacity in your own organization.

Speakers

Caitlyn Benzo

Ohio Alliance to End Sexual Violence Legal Clinic

Caitlyn is an attorney with the Ohio Alliance to End Sexual Violence Legal Clinic, providing trauma-informed legal services across the state. Admitted to the Ohio bar in 2016, Caitlyn has dedicated her career to supporting those impacted by gender- and power-based violence. Caitlyn’s... Read More →

Thursday October 22, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT
Cincinnati Convention Center 537 Elm St, Cincinnati, OH 45202

Conversation Hour

12:30pm EDT

Keeping Legal Documents Current: Project LACI Case Studies

Thursday October 22, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT

Cincinnati Convention Center

Keeping legal information up to date is a constant challenge for legal aid organizations, especially when laws and policies frequently change. Lone Star Legal Aid (LSLA) developed Project LACI (Legal Aid Content Intelligence) to address this issue by using technology to streamline the review and maintenance of self-help materials—web content, brochures, videos, and more. Since launching in May 2024, LACI has helped LSLA modernize its content workflow.
With TIG support, Idaho Legal Aid Services and Texas Legal Services Center are now adapting LACI to manage their statewide legal information. In addition, other organizations in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Indiana, and elsewhere have been using their own funding to evaluate and adopt LACI in their own states. In this session, LSLA will partner with Legal Services State Support, a project of the Minnesota Legal Services Coalition, to share how they each previously maintained materials, what drew them to LACI, and their experiences so far. Participants will gain insight into practical approaches—manual and automated—for keeping public legal information accurate, accessible, and aligned with current law.

Speakers

Luigi Bai

Managing Attorney, Lone Star Legal Aid

Luigi is a managing attorney at Lone Star Legal Aid. Their teams help appeal evictions, publish disaster content, and make legal information accessible to self-representing persons (SRLs) across the state of Texas. SRLs have had access to legal interviews and document assembly, text... Read More →

Amanda Sauber

Legal Technology Project Manager, Legal Services State Support

Amanda Sauber is the Legal Technology Project Manager of Legal Services State Support. She manages developments on LawHelpMN.org and supports statewide LegalServer online intake. She is a 2010 graduate of the Western Michigan University Cooley Law School (FKA Thomas M. Cooley Law... Read More →

Thursday October 22, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT
Cincinnati Convention Center 537 Elm St, Cincinnati, OH 45202

Conversation Hour

12:30pm EDT

Neighborhood Stabilization: Community Land Trusts, Tangled Titles, and the Abandoned Home Crisis

Thursday October 22, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT

Cincinnati Convention Center

Speakers

Kristie Ortiz

Managing Attorney, Advocates for Basic Legal Equality

Kristie Ortiz, Esq, is currently the Managing Attorney with the Housing Community Economic Development Program at Advocates for Basic Legal Equality. We are currently working on the areas of housing, prison reform, legislative advocacy, neighborhood stabilization work and environmental... Read More →

Kara Jennings

Yellow Springs Inc

Kara is an Attorney at Advocates for Basic Legal Equality in Toledo. She is a member of the Housing and Community Economic Development practice group. After graduating from BGSU, Kara worked as a VISTA Volunteer for the Ohio Coalition on Sexual Assault in Wood County. While attending... Read More →

Emily Seibel

One Street at a Time

Charlotte Lawson

Advocates for Basic Legal Equality

I am One Street at A Time, founder and senior leader. I started the organization 3 years ago I needed to become a voice for a divested community. Opposed to complaining I needed to do something.

Athena Bowen

Housing Advocate, Advocates for Basic Legal Equality

Housing Advocate with the Housing and Community Economic Development Practice Group at Advocates for Basic Legal Equality, Inc., working to support equitable housing access and community development.

Michael Loudenslager

Staff Attorney, Advocates for Basic Legal Equality, Inc.

Michael Loudenslager is a staff attorney with Advocates for Basic Legal Equality, Inc. (ABLE), a non-profit law firm that serves people with low incomes in Western Ohio. Michael works in ABLE’s Housing and Economic Development group out of its Dayton, Ohio office. His practice focuses... Read More →

Thursday October 22, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT
Cincinnati Convention Center 537 Elm St, Cincinnati, OH 45202

Conversation Hour

12:30pm EDT

Trauma-Responsive Practice: Building Skills for Sensitive and Effective Advocacy

Thursday October 22, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT

Cincinnati Convention Center

Speakers

Nick Caprino

Attorney, Children's Law Center KY

Sasha Naiman

Executive Director, Children's Law Center KY

Sasha Naiman is the Executive Director of Children’s Law Center, a nonprofit legal organization serving children and young adults across Ohio and Kentucky. She leads the organization's advocacy, strategic growth, and interdisciplinary collaborations to improve outcomes for youth... Read More →

Thursday October 22, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT
Cincinnati Convention Center 537 Elm St, Cincinnati, OH 45202

Conversation Hour

12:30pm EDT

Unlocking the Courthouse: Opening Access to Court Data

Thursday October 22, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT

Cincinnati Convention Center

Sixty-six million cases flow through state courts every year, generating data that could reveal how well the justice system is performing, where it's failing, and who is being underserved. In theory, this is public data. In practice, accessing it requires navigating a gauntlet of technical barriers — robots.txt files with crawl delays measured in days, anti-bot technology designed to block the exact kind of automated analysis that would make the data useful — and legal barriers — terms of service that prohibit machine learning, court policies that actively deter technology use on public documents. The result is that the public's own court data is effectively locked away from the researchers, advocates, journalists, technologists, and even practitioners themselves, who could use it to improve the system.
This conversation hour opens with a live demonstration of what becomes possible when court data is open: a dashboard built from South Carolina probate court records showing how estate processing efficiency varies dramatically by county — visualized through geospatial mapping that makes performance differences impossible to ignore. The demo shows both what the data reveals and what it took to get it. Then the conversation turns to the barriers. A deep dive into the technical and legal obstacles — the specific mechanisms courts use, intentionally or not, to prevent public access to public data — surfaces a problem that most access-to-justice professionals don't know exists until they try to build something that requires court records. A collaborative model involving multiple organizations across criminal and civil court data shows one pathway through the barriers.
This session is for anyone who has tried to work with court data and hit a wall, anyone building tools that depend on court records, and anyone who believes that measuring court performance is a prerequisite for improving it. Bring your own court data access stories — the barriers you've encountered, the workarounds you've found, and the questions you can answer and those you still can't because the data aren’t accessible. Leave with a clearer picture of the landscape and use cases of available data, connections to others working on the problem, and strategies for advocating open data in your jurisdiction.

Speakers

David Caraway

Measures for Justice / Code with the Carolinas (The Social Good Fund)

Dave Caraway is a self-represented litigant and technologist. Dave organizes the OpenCourts project, a volunteer-run project dedicated to making court data accessible. He brings twenty years of experience leading software teams and previously served as a Presidential Innovation Fellow... Read More →

Thursday October 22, 2026 12:30pm - 1:25pm EDT
Cincinnati Convention Center 537 Elm St, Cincinnati, OH 45202

Conversation Hour

Access to Justice Network Conference 2026

From $62.13