If you would like to volunteer to take a family law case, please contact Rachel Biscardi.

Started by a small group of WBA members in 1995, the Family Law Project (FLP) continues to be the largest pro bono program at the Women’s Bar Foundation, drawing over 100 new attorneys each year. The FLP recruits, trains, and mentors attorneys and collaborates with legal and social services to provide high quality representation and assistance to victims of domestic violence. In the past 12 months, the FLP has fielded nearly 1,500 phone calls from victims of domestic violence, and has conducted more than 200 interviews and evaluations.

The FLP has two primary missions. The first is to empower domestic violence victims by giving them a voice in their abuse prevention order and family law cases. As such, we seek to prevent further abuse, homelessness, loss of child custody, and to decrease repeated court hearings. The FLP's second mission is to engage lawyers in pro bono service and, thus, make them stakeholders on issues involving low-income domestic violence victims. The FLP meets both of its missions by referring clients to volunteer attorneys trained and mentored by the FLP on issues related to family law and domestic violence. For cases that cannot be immediately referred, the FLP staff will provide ongoing legal support including drafting pleadings, preparing a client for court, and informing clients as to their legal rights and recourses. The FLP is a unique organization because it is designed to meet the legal needs of the underserved in the legal services community who have already been denied representation by a legal services agency and who mights otherwise 'fall through the cracks.' About half of the individuals served by the FLP are indigent, according to federal poverty guidelines; the remaining individuals we serve are low income and, thus, make too much money for legal services eligiblity but earn too little to be able to afford to retain an attorney.

1995, the FLP won the R.O.S.E. Fund’s Distinguished Service Award.

In 2003, the Women’s Bar Foundation received a Supreme Judicial Court Adams Pro Bono Publico Award for distinguished service and outstanding commitment.

In 2004, the FLP received the Public Service Award from the National Conference of Women’s Bar Associations. We are very grateful for the continued support of the bench and bar.

"It does not matter that you have never set foot inside a Probate and Family Court.  It does not matter that you will need to call your FLP mentor twenty times before you file your client’s financial statement.  It does not matter that you have never looked at the Rules of Domestic Relations Procedure.  What matters is that you will give your client a gift, not just of your time and not just of your firm’s resources.  The gift you give to your client is the ability to start sentences with 'My lawyer…'"  -- Amy Egloff, Associate, Witmer, Karp, Warner & Ryan LLP.