Ill. website offers COVID-19-related legal help

CARTERVILLE, Ill. (KFVS) - The pandemic is affecting more than people’s health, it is affecting the health of their finances.

A new legal website is targeting individuals that have had legal issues during the pandemic.

Pat Wrona, director of legal services at CARPLS in Chicago, understands the need people are facing. So they created Covid Help Illinois.

“Not only find good and reliable legal information, but to provide an on ramp to to the legal aid community throughout Illinois,” said Wrona.

Wrona said the website is available at all times.

“You can go to the 24/7, it’s free, you have access to really what is the knowledge of many legal aid attorneys around the state who have created these legal virtual assistance to really help you understand: are you on the right path, are you understanding the key issues that you are involved in and the problem that you are facing,” explained Wrona.

Hanna Kaufman, counsel for Innovation & Technology at the Lawyers Trust Fund of Illinois, said the online tool has many different ways to help.

“There’s more than 200 different pathways that people can go down from issues ranging from employment issues, unemployment issues, foreclosure, eviction, difficulty paying bills all of those types of issues,” said Kaufman.

Kaufman said this is what makes the free service difficult on the legal side.

“The biggest challenge is not only making sure that it’s easy for people to understand, because it’s convoluted sometimes, but also making sure that it’s up to date and reliable,” explained Kaufman.

Pat Wrona also said it was easier to act faster, rather than wait.

“When it comes to legal problems, the sooner you act the better. One of our greatest problems that we have in legal aid is so many people come to us way to late,” said Wrona.

According to Wrona, the website was launched seven weeks ago.

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