Paul Saunders‑Chaired Working Group on Regulatory Innovation Publishes Proposals to Improve New York Court System

On December 17, 2020, the Commission to Reimagine the Future of New York’s Courts announced the issuance of two reports containing proposals to enhance court operations and access to justice, the latter compiled by its Working Group on Regulatory Innovation, which is co‑chaired by retired Cravath partner Paul C. Saunders and Dean Michael A. Simons of St. John’s University School of Law.

That report’s recommendations include development and implementation of a program to permit social workers who are trained, certified and properly regulated to offer limited legal services to their clients as appropriate; it also suggests expansion of the scope and substance of the Court System’s Court Navigators program, which trains law students, college students and others to provide general information and assistance to eligible underrepresented litigants in Housing Court and consumer debt collection cases.

“We welcome the Working Group’s recommendations,” said Chief Judge of the Court of Appeals and of the State of New York Janet DiFiore, who created the Commission to Reimagine the Future of New York’s Courts in June 2020, “and look forward to the expanded use of trained and supervised non-lawyer professionals who can appropriately and responsibly provide discrete‑limited‑scope legal services in our high‑volume courts. I want to thank Paul Saunders, Dean Michael Simons and the members of the Working Group for advancing carefully researched and creative solutions that I have no doubt will help us expand access to justice and meet the many short- and long‑term challenges presented by this pandemic.”

Please click here to read the full report.