The Legal Clinic for the Disabled (LCD) is a Philadelphia-based nonprofit that provides free legal aid to those with disabilities who are in or near poverty. Focusing on civil issues such as countering evictions, making wills, and ensuring access to healthcare, LCD serves over a thousand clients each year.
In this project, the Legal Clinic sought to understand the impact of utility insecurity and food insecurity on their clients. In addition to speaking to leading researchers in the field, Dale conducted regression and distribution analyses in order to lay bare the connections between food insecurity, utility insecurity, and legal need. The project found that these issues lead to a heavy triple burden on some of Philadelphia’s most vulnerable citizens. However, the project also found that LCD’s work in providing legal aid to its clients can help relieve the financial burdens that lead to utility and food insecurity.
In addition, Dale’s geospatial analysis located areas of high unmet legal need - in other words, areas where there are a high number of people who would benefit from LCD’s work, but few actual LCD clients. The LCD will be able to use this work to target their future outreach efforts and better serve Philadelphia.
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