Sometimes, medical providers are in the best position to spot a legal issue that is causing a health condition. For example, a medical provider may discover that a child’s asthma is being exacerbated by household mold, which a landlord is required by law to remove.
To address legal needs uncovered by medical findings, especially for individuals and families with low income, the University of Minnesota Law School created the Community Legal Partnership for Health Clinic.
The clinic partners with two legal-aid organizations—Mid-Minnesota Legal Services (MMLS) and Southern Minnesota Regional Legal Services (SMRLS)— to host a Healthcare Legal Partnership (HLP) at Children’s Hospital. Under the supervision of staff attorneys at MMLS’ six legal clinic sites and at SMRLS’ office in St. Paul, students conduct intake, assist with casework, and represent clients.
The six legal clinics provide walk-in services to low-income clients, and the connection to the healthcare legal partnership with Children’s Hospital adds a referral source from medical providers who suspect patients’ health issues may have legal implications.
Assistant MMLS supervising attorney Taryn Trujillo Risom says her office has conducted training sessions with medical providers to help them screen for social determinants of health.
“The idea is that 80% of a person’s health is determined by what happens outside of the medical care they’re receiving,” she says. “So, they’re asking people about their home situations, their work situations, their school situations, and if they flag an issue that they feel we can address, they will usually send a referral over. Then we screen them and figure out if we can help this person.”
This latest clinic partnership went into effect during the 2023-24 school year. Previously, the clinic operated on campus, taking referrals from a health clinic.
“The Law School wanted to continue the clinic, and they were looking for a new home for the legal support and the clients,” says Matthew Hulstein, the community clinics supervising attorney at MMLS. “We stepped up and said we’d love to do that.”
The result, he says, has been a resounding success. Over the course of the 2023-24 school year, students helped 115 clients with various legal issues.
“Students worked on immigration, housing, consumer, and family law matters,” says Hulstein. “They expunged criminal and eviction records, navigated opaque government agencies, and helped numerous community members better their rights and options.”
In addition, he says the students also wrote an exhaustive memo on a possible legal regime to combat mold in rental housing. With the assistance of the Legal Services Advocacy Project, MMLS hopes to pursue legislation on this issue at the state legislature.
Student participants gave their experience high marks.
San Diego native Frank De Jong ‘25 came to U of M Law interested in environmental law, but he says his experience working in the MMLS’ Harrison Neighborhood Association clinic might influence him to consider working in legal aid organizations instead. “They provide good services and I think it’s a good place for young lawyers to get some good experience,” he says.
DeJong especially enjoyed being tasked with researching and giving presentations on a transfer on death deed, a low-cost estate planning tool. “It expanded what I thought of as a lawyer’s job,” he says.
Justin Stang ‘25, from Inver Grove Heights, worked in the Phillips neighborhood’s African Community Services clinic, which primarily serves the Somali/East African community in Hennepin County. Last summer, Stang worked in the Cass County Attorney’s office in northern Minnesota, an experience he loved. He intends to pursue something similar after he graduates and considers his experience in the MMLS clinic valuable no matter the path his career may take.
“For me, the big value of this clinic is that it allowed me to have a lot of client contact and even a court appearance,” he says. “I think the experience of relating to people in some of their hardest moments is invaluable, not only to my career but to my life.”
The supervising attorneys at MMLS benefited from the students as well.
“I’ve been very impressed by how eager the students are to learn such a broad range of issues,” Risom says. “It’s been really nice having these enthusiastic students who just have a real zest for wanting to get out there and do some social justice work.”
Hulstein notes that the students work hard and are very thorough. “Sometimes it caught me off my guard how seriously they’re taking a lot of this stuff, so, I’ve learned a lot along the way myself,” he says. “It was really great last year, and I think it’s going to be even better this year.”