Our 2024 Annual Report

Strategic Framework

Engage All Stakeholders in the Work  

DCBF will work with existing and identify new partners to support the civil legal aid network by providing data, identifying needs, sharing observations, serving as a sounding board, and developing solutions to meet the community’s civil legal aid needs.

Last year, when faced with a 67% cut to the Access to Justice Initiative budget, DCBF and the civil legal aid community worked collaboratively to secure level funding for FY25. Together, we implemented an advocacy campaign that included amplifying community members’ voices, developing messaging to the DC Council, and sharing stories of impact on social platforms.

In the same spirit of collaboration, the DC Social Justice Transformations Network (DCSJTN), which was formerly the DC Legal Aid Transformations Network, continued to work with stakeholders across all sectors, including legal aid, social services, health services, education, advocacy, and the DC Government, to discuss ways to transform the delivery of civil legal aid in the District. Through quarterly Convenings, which average approximately 80 attendees per meeting, participants built new and deepened previous relationships. One Network member said: “Participating in DCSJTN has been my greatest reward because I feel excited when meeting new people outside my usual legal and social services circles.”

Finally, the DC Bar Foundation continued to manage two Loan Repayment Assistance Programs, which provide student loan assistance for legal aid attorneys who work in DC. In FY24, 35 legal aid organizations participated in the program, and more than 100 attorneys—combined between both programs—received the LRAP benefit. LRAP enables organizations to retain more staff, increase their client capacity, and reach more residents in need.

Infuse Racial Justice and Racial Equity in Our Work  

DCBF will evolve its practices and culture to learn, reflect, unlearn, and change its practices to pursue justice. Initially, DCBF will study best practices to learn about racial justice and equity initiatives. DCBF will also explore local partnerships where there are opportunities to align efforts to develop a plan to integrate racial justice and equity initiatives.

In FY24, DCBF surveyed grantee partners to learn what would be most beneficial for them in their efforts to advance racial equity to better work with and respond to the communities they serve. Findings showed they are seeking practical tools and individualized approaches. In response, and with the help of a consultant, we will launch a Community of Practice, which will include 1-on-1 coaching for participants and larger group discussions. The Foundation is also working on developing a resource bank of racial equity tools, trainings, and resources to support the broader community.

Internally, DCBF continued to prioritize anti-racism. This year, the DC Bar Foundation sponsored and attended Leadership Greater Washington’s Anti-Racist Leadership Series. The six-month training program allowed nearly 100 individuals from different industries to learn more about race, conscious and unconscious biases, advocacy, allyship, and what it takes to be an anti-racist leader. We also continued to use racial equity recruiting efforts to hire staff and recruit board and committee members to ensure diverse representation across the organization.

Identify the Unmet Civil Legal Needs  

The civil legal aid needs of District residents are vast. DCBF will identify barriers to accessing services by those who need them most and support the development and launch of a Coordinated Intake and Referral System to improve access to civil legal aid services. DCBF will also work with its stakeholders to use data generated by this System and engage the larger community to identify community priorities.

DCBF hit significant milestones with Coordinated Intake and Referral (CIR)—a single phone line system and website that will connect residents to a legal aid provider. In FY24, we remained committed to collaboration and community engagement. This included (1) working with the CIR pilot working group—comprised of individuals from the legal aid community—to make decisions and prepare for the CIR pilot launch; (2) hosting an Intake Town Hall with the Intake Network to discuss plans for the CIR System; and (3) hiring a new marketing firm to help with branding and ongoing community engagement.

These efforts helped us launch the CIR System pilot in June 2024. The pilot, which was hosted by Neighborhood Legal Services Program, included nine legal aid organizations and focused solely on family law. The pilot tested the CIR System’s workflows and technology, with the aim of supporting the full-scale launch in 2025.

Finally, we worked with our marketing partner to survey over 400 DC residents to get their perspectives on potential names for the CIR System, ensuring the final choice reflects the needs and perspectives of those most likely to benefit from the System.

Fund With Intention  

DCBF will identify and articulate what it wants to achieve through its grantmaking. By working with its stakeholders and piloting a few interventions that address the most significant needs, DCBF will better understand effective strategies and make more strategic grantmaking decisions. DCBF will adapt its investments as additional data and feedback are gathered, and experience dictates what can and should be scaled.

The Foundation continues to prioritize our investments in the availability and reach of legal services for DC residents in Wards 5, 7, and 8. The latest semiannual grantee reports show that for FY24, over 8,300 DC residents in these Wards received free legal aid.

Additionally, expanding on our existing work to support our legal services provider community beyond grantmaking, the Foundation developed a roadmap for a capacity-building program to address organizational sustainability and resilience. The roadmap resulted from an extensive outreach process to our grantee partners to understand the challenges and goals a capacity-building program should address. The roadmap centers around supporting leaders, investing in the talent pipeline, understanding and promoting nonprofit best practices, and fostering trust and connections within the community. As the program evolves, we will continue to listen to the needs and priorities expressed by the legal services community.

Demonstrate How People Who Need Services Are Getting Them  

By integrating evaluation into every aspect of its work, DCBF will position itself to describe how it is changing and improving the lives of District residents and identify areas in need of improvement. DCBF will generate data on program delivery, measure the effectiveness of services, study outcomes, determine the level of impact, and share those findings with our partners and stakeholders.

This year, in partnership with our grantee partners, we embarked on a project to standardize the metrics (outcomes data) for our largest grant program, Access to Justice. Through an evaluation process with select grantee partners, we learned about key challenges and their willingness to engage in this process. This multi-phase project will continue to work with grantee partners in each area of law to refine metrics and better understand the capacity of their existing systems to collect and submit new data. This ambitious project will ultimately provide the Foundation and our grantee partners with an important tool that will reflect and demonstrate the impact of their work.

We also continued to evaluate our programs to gauge their impact and effectiveness. As part of that, we released the biannual Civil Legal Counsel Projects Program evaluation report, which compiles data about the work on housing and eviction cases. Remarkably, from January through June 2024, partners closed 30% (2,241) more cases than the same period in 2023.

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