Legal Assistant - Client Advocate

About the Legal Aid Justice Center:

The Legal Aid Justice Center is a nationally recognized, non-profit organization that partners with low-income clients and communities of color in Virginia to fight for racial, social, and economic justice. We understand that the harms our clients endure are inextricably linked to overarching systems of injustice. Together we are dismantling those systems through a combination of community organizing, litigation, policy advocacy, public relations, and individual legal services.

Founded in 1967, LAJC has offices in Charlottesville, Richmond, Petersburg, and Falls Church and provides services under six key program areas: Civil Rights & Racial Justice (focuses on the criminal legal system), Housing & Consumer Justice, Youth Justice, Health Justice & Public Benefits, Immigrant Justice, and Worker Justice. As examples of LAJC’s recent work, our lawsuit and organizing against the state forced reform of Virginia’s unemployment insurance system, including advocacy that resulted in the distribution of over $1 billion in illegally withheld payments to over 160,000 Virginians. During the pandemic, we demanded and secured a statewide eviction moratorium and emergency pandemic protections that helped hundreds of families avoid eviction. We reduced incarceration across the state, including reducing the population of a local immigration detention center down to historically low levels through a coordinated effort of organizing paired with impact and individual litigation. Our staff are on the front lines of some of the most important anti-poverty fights happening today.

With a staff of over 90, the past few years have been a time of exciting growth and opportunity for the organization. In addition to the growth of programmatic efforts including increased organizing capacity, LAJC has expanded its operations and administrative capacity, created new opportunities for professional growth and leadership among staff, engaged in ongoing race equity work, and explored changes to organizational structure to deepen its efforts to create long-term, sustainable, community-driven change.

The Legal Aid Justice Center seeks a Legal Assistant-Client Advocate for its office in Richmond, Virginia. This role is essential to the day-to-day operations of LAJC (Legal Aid Justice Center). This individual will-conduct intake, help with case management and document preparation, maintain calendars, organize files, help maintain the reception area, and other administrative tasks as assigned. This position is conducted in person, 8:30am-5:00pm, Monday-Friday, with the potential for one remote workday weekly after onboarding is complete. LAJC's Legal Assistant-Client Advocates communicate with clients to support their understanding of LAJC's advocacy work, assist them in completing their intake process, and ensure they are up to date on what is happening with their case. Our Legal Assistant-Client Advocate roles are members of our Administrative Team, whose mission is to promote justice and reduce poverty across Virginia by acting as a bridge between LAJC's staff members and its client community and managing the details that keep LAJC's office running smoothly. This role is intended to evolve over time to include specialized program intake services and support.

Communicate with clients to define and clarify our mission and services to help create a collaborative environment in which community, staff and volunteers are informed an up to date.

Handle all aspects of community contact in an efficient and professional manner including answering the phone; listening to voicemails; documenting initial contacts; conducting intakes, providing referrals, utilizing our legal database, supporting emergency triage and receiving client documents

Enter all prescreen/intake and relevant client data and documents into Legal Server

Communicate with community members with an equity and social justice lens to assess needs and coordinate essential services.

Conduct intakes with potential clients, which includes initial fact gathering, reviewing eligibility information, ensuring accuracy in databases and files, and gather documents to support building a case.

Demonstrate respectful, professional, and timely written and verbal communication, during all internal and external interactions.

Together with the team: provide referrals and maintain lists of resources for clients in relevant subject areas; supervise and onboard interns and volunteers; track changes and trends in community requests and needs.

Organize and maintain confidential documents and files and perform assigned administrative tasks to support office functions and safeguard compliance with relevant laws and regulations.

Support community and volunteer engagement – be visible, greet and support community members and train admin volunteers; provide customer service by phone and in person; and keep community and volunteers informed and connected with services, organizers, and resources.

A Note to Potential Candidates: Studies have shown that women, trans, non-binary folks, and BIPOC are less likely to apply for jobs unless they believe they meet every single one of the qualifications as described in a job description. We are committed to building a diverse and inclusive organization, and strongly encourage you to apply, even if you don't believe you meet every one of the qualifications described.

Location: This role will be based in our Richmond office. Occasional travel between offices will be required. This role requires a full in-person during the first several months of employment. After that time, and following a discussion with the employee's manager, the employee may be eligible to work remotely one day per week in accordance with LAJC's remote work policy.

The salary scale for this position is $51,500.00 - $66,950.00 based on the LAJC salary scale. To allow for salary growth within the position over time, the anticipated hiring range for this position is between $51,500.00 - $59,225.00.

The Legal Aid Justice Center is an equal opportunity employer, committed to inclusive hiring and dedicated to diversity in our work and staff. We strongly encourage candidates of all identities, experiences, and communities to apply. The Legal Aid Justice Center is committed to strengthening the voices of our low-income clients, working in collaboration with community partners, and rooting out the inequities that keep people in poverty. We strive to take on the issues that have broad impact on our client communities and to be responsive to client input. Recognizing the particular impact of racism on our clients and staff, we devote special attention to dismantling racial injustice. All applicants must be dedicated to working in and sustaining an environment that enables staff and clients to feel empowered, valued, respected, and safe. In reviewing applications, we look for evidence that applicants have experience and/or thoughtfulness in working with traditionally marginalized populations.