By Jacqueline Gilvard Landry
Voice correspondent

“Equality before the law in a true democracy is a matter of right,” Judge Yolanda Northridge told about 200 attendees at the November kickoff dinner for the new Legal Justice Center at the Oakland Cathedral of Christ the Light. “It cannot be a matter of charity, or of favor, or of grace or discretion,” she said.

Northridge, the presiding judge of the Alameda County Superior Court, said the LJC’s services will help protect that right to equality, providing free legal assistance at the cathedral for low-income clients from Alameda and Contra Costa counties. It opened Dec. 2.

Equal access to justice is a weighty concern for California courts, Northridge said, as they struggle to accommodate a record 4.3 million court users who have chosen to represent themselves.

Many of these parties cannot afford an attorney, she said, and they often suffer the consequences of their inability to understand legal forms and navigate court processes.

Although California court services are supplemented by online and in-person legal self-help centers—five are in Alameda County—even more legal aid is needed, Northridge said.

“For many people, the only chance they have of regaining their self-esteem or righting what has gone wrong is through the services the LJC will be providing,” she said.

On Dec. 2, the LJC began free, weekly legal clinics at the cathedral, allowing clients to meet with an attorney about immigration, domestic violence, housing and public benefits matters, according to LJC director and Reed Smith attorney Jayne Fleming. The center also will hold legal seminars and events.

“We have so many groups in our community that so desperately need our help. That’s what the Legal Justice Center is going to try and do — to provide that help, to provide that hand, that bridge, that compassion so that we can become a better community,” Fleming said.

Northridge praised the new cathedral for housing the LJC, and for including in its strategic plan, adopted in September, a commitment to serve vulnerable groups in the diocese.

Bishop Allen Vigneron had his own praise for the legal profession, saying, “Part of what the Church stands for is the sense of the nobility of the law, and how the development of the law, its mechanisms and its life raises us up to be a free people.”

The Reed Smith law firm sponsored the Breaking Bread for Social Justice dinner at the cathedral’s conference center on Nov. 17. It was open to the public, and a handful of community members dined alongside representatives of the diocese and the legal community.

Other speakers included Oakland City Attorney John Russo and John McDonnell, project director of the Cathedral.

About 20 legal service providers were on hand with information.

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