A grant from an anonymous donor through the Maine Community Foundation helped the Immigrant
Legal Advocacy Project (ILAP) in Portland provide direct legal services to nearly 1,900 low-income Mainers in 2004.
Additionally, over 1,300 individuals attended ILAP educational workshops, and the organization’s impact work improved aspects of the environment for immigrants in Maine statewide. The individuals assisted came from 108 countries, with all 16 Maine counties represented.
ILAP serves indigent and low-income non-citizens and their U.S. citizen family members. Its services include outreach to immigrant communities and to service providers regarding immigration law and policy. ILAP also runs an immigration clinic offering attorney consultations and application assistance.
Its pro bono Immigration Project provides brief intervention for persons with slight immigration complications. Full legal representation is also available for persons with complicated immigration problems. Last year 21 volunteer attorneys augmented ILAP’s capacity by working on 47 full representation cases, donating over 950 hours of their time, worth over $140,000.
The MaineCF donor has been especially impressed by ILAP’s Impact Project, which involves policy work. She applauds the way in which the organization has made the move from providing services to individuals to “asking the crucial question, ‘What do we have to do to prevent so many individuals from needing our services?”
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