Paragraph: (Society_Law_and_Justice/oanc-Few_who_need-1.txt)
Sent 1: California lags far behind comparable states in funding legal services for the poor, a situation so dire that only 28 percent of the civil legal needs of the state's poor and lowerincome residents are being addressed.
Sent 2: That figures translates into 2 million people without the ability to access the justice system, according to a new study by the California Commission on Access to Justice, which also found that despite increased spending, the gap between need and services remains substantial.
Sent 3: "As a practical matter, in most cases there can be no access to justice without access to legal assistance," said Jack Londen, past commission chair and a partner with Morrison & Foerster in San Francisco.
Sent 4: "Whether we like it or not, sometimes landlords illegally evict tenants, children with disabilities are denied proper care, veterans don't get services guaranteed to them, and elderly people need legal assistance to escape the abuse of a caregiver."
Sent 5: California has the highest number of people in poverty in the nation - 6.4 million, including nearly one in five children.
Sent 6: Half the nation's increase in poverty in the 1990s, when the number of poor jumped 30 percent, occurred in California, and nearly 25 percent of the nation's poverty increase occurred in Los Angeles County alone.
Sent 7: Even those with jobs are suffering: 26 percent of California workers earn poverty level wages.
Sent 8: The commission's report, "The Path to Equal Justice: A Five-Year Status Report on Access to Justice in California," examined how the legal needs of the state's poor have changed in the last five years as well as both the shortcomings of the justice system and the improvements during that period.
Sent 9: Despite increases in state funding to meet the legal needs of the poor, low interest rates (which have reduced the IOLTA fund), high unemployment and the present economic downturn have threatened any gains.