LTF Announces 2010 Project Grants
On December 18, 2009 the Board of Directors of the Lawyer Trust Fund approved project grants totaling $600,000. The grants will support legal services projects at 11 non-profit organizations during 2010. A list of the 11 grants is here.
The project grants are in addition to $7.7 million in general operating support and case management software grants for FY2010, which were approved earlier in 2009. LTF received more than $1 million in requests for project grants during its fall grant cycle.
Illinois Supreme Court Revises Rule 1.15 to Boost Interest Rates on IOLTA Accounts
The Illinois Supreme Court has announced changes to Rule 1.15 of the Illinois Rules of Professional Conduct that are designed to increase the rate of interest paid by financial institutions on lawyers' pooled client trust accounts (hereinafter "IOLTA" accounts).
The revised rule requires that to be eligible to participate in IOLTA, a financial institution must pay the same interest rates on IOLTA accounts as they pay on other accounts with similar balances and requirements.
Currently, the interest rate paid on most IOLTA accounts is substantially less than what customers with similar balances receive on other accounts. For example, the average interest rate paid on IOLTA accounts with balances of $100,000 or more is .5%, when other customers could expect rates of between 2.5% and 4%.
Illinois is the 11th state to adopt such a "comparability" provision for its IOLTA rule, following Florida, Ohio, Michigan, Minnesota, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Alabama, Mississippi and Texas. Similar rule changes are under consideration in other states, and we expect that it will become the national standard in the next three to five years.
The rule is likely to result in a significant increase in revenue for the Lawyers Trust Fund, which will use the additional money to support the state's woefully under-funded legal aid system. The 2005 Legal Aid Safety Net study, co-sponsored by the Illinois State and Chicago Bar Associations, determined that there was only one legal aid staff attorney for every 4,758 civil legal problems faced by low-income Illinois households. Federal funding for legal services was cut in 1996 and has been essentially flat for the past decade. Downstate, there are more counties than legal aid staff attorneys, and last year legal aid offices were shuttered in Decatur, Mattoon and Mt. Vernon.
The new rule becomes effective on June 1, 2007.
LTF Announces Grants for FY 10
LTF Celebrates 25th Anniversary with Record Grants for FY 09
LTF Approves Record Grants for FY 08
LTF Announces Record Grants for FY 07 - Funds Targeted to Shore up Infrastructure
New Board Members and Officers for LTF
Susan Kaplan Receives LTF's Rothstein Award for 2006
LTF Invests in Statewide Justice Initiative
U.S. Supreme Court Affirms Washington State IOLTA Program
Supreme Court of Illinois Raises ARDC Fee to Support Legal Aid
State of Illinois Increases Funding for Legal Aid - Again!
Illinois Legal Needs Study II Released
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