Don’t let the Spartan look of the state’s first and, so far, only pro se self-help center fool you.

Although modestly furnished, the center, located next to the Lancaster County District Court Clerk’s Office in the Hall of Justice, was inspired by some lofty ideas.

“As a society, we have promised people they will have access to the courts,” said Doug German, executive director of Legal Aid of Nebraska. “We’re failing in that promise.

“ … We see this (self-help center) as a step toward empowerment, as a way to empower people to feel they can get things done.”

The center, a joint pilot project of Legal Aid and the Nebraska State Bar Association and supported by the state Supreme Court, provides limited legal assistance to non-lawyers who are representing themselves in court.

Volunteer lawyers from Legal Aid and from the state Bar staff the center, which is open half-days beginning on Monday and Wednesday mornings and Thursday afternoons. Customers are served on a first-come, first-serve basis. The 18-month pilot project began July 2.

“If it works the way we think it will, we’d like to set up similar operations in other counties,” German said.

The need is clear, he said.

Legal Aid, which offers assistance based on federal poverty guidelines, serves roughly 14 percent of the 270,000 Nebraskans eligible under those guidelines, German said.

Families of four with an annual household income greater than $31,875 would not qualify for Legal Aid, he said. For singles, the cut-off is $15,625.

Other assistance programs, like the ones at the University of Nebraska College of Law and the Creighton University School of Law and at Volunteer Lawyers Project at the state Bar, serve primarily low- to moderate-income people, he said.

But limited staffs can mean backlogs, with demand easily outpacing supply, German said.

“The population that we’d serve is growing at a faster capacity than our (ability) to serve, even though in absolute numbers we’re serving more,” he said.

Then there’s the so-called “gap group,” made up of people who earn too much for Legal Aid but not enough to hire their own lawyers. About one-sixth of Nebraskans fall into this group, German said.

For low- and moderate-income Nebraskans, the economic barriers to the justice system can have consequences beyond their immediate legal concerns, he said.

“People begin to question how well our government is working if they can’t have access to the court system,” he said.

“You begin to live outside the social norm. You can get into a downward spiral.”

Nebraska Appeals Court Judge Richard Sievers said the state is “behind the curve” in pro se self-help centers.

“When you look around the country, virtually all the states are involved in some kind of assistance to pro se litigants,” he said. “As a court system, we have the obligation to make the system available to everyone.”

Sievers is chairman of the state Supreme Court’s pro se litigation  Implementation Committee and of the sub-committee that established the pilot pro se self-help center.

In an article for a state lawyers’ publication this summer, the judge wrote that economics are forcing many low- or middle-income people to ignore their legal problems or take them on by themselves.

“Clearly, justice cannot be equal if meaningful access is only available to people of means,” he wrote.

Pro se centers would go a long way toward giving ordinary citizens access, he said.

It could also ease the burden on judges, who often have to become “advisors” to unprepared pro se litigants.

“Every judge in the state is facing pro se litigants who are unprepared,” Sievers said. “It puts judges in the middle of cases, asking themselves, ‘How much can I help this person?’”

Sievers said self-help centers in most other states give customers some legal advice, rather than mere information about proper legal procedures.

He said he expected Nebraska’s program to follow that trend, although such legal advice, he added, would be limited.

“If the pilot is successful, I would envision we would evolve into giving some brief legal advice,” he said.

Jean Guerrero was one of the pro se desk’s first customers when it opened last month.

“It was such a relief,” Guerrero said. Like many non-lawyers working their way through the legal system, Guerrero’s past attempts to get questions answered were often met with a, “We can’t give legal advice,” she said.

“And rightfully so,” she said. “People can’t give out legal advice. So, you learn by trial and error.”

That the attorneys at the desk are volunteers says a lot, Guerrero said.

“The main thing to me is to be able to communicate with an attorney who cares. You feel like you can trust their answers.”

Reach Clarence Mabin at cmabin@journalstar.com or 473-7234.