As the family court project of the Indiana Supreme Court’s Division of State Court Administration enters a new year, courts that participate in the program have learned they will continue to operate with about the same amount of funding they have had in recent years.

Bar associations and pro bono districts are working together to encourage attorneys to sign up to participate in the annual statewide Talk to a Lawyer Today event taking place Jan. 17, 2011. Free CLE, which is offered in December and January to lawyers who volunteer their time with TTALT but is not required to participate in the event, is a video replay of a CLE that originally took place in Indianapolis in October.

While many attorneys may want to do pro bono work, not all of them are comfortable taking on what could end up being a lengthy and possibly complicated family law case, which is the majority of cases the pro bono districts around the state tend to handle.

All that is known about funding for Indiana’s 14 pro bono districts is that no one yet knows exactly how much the districts will receive in October for their 2011 budgets.

The statewide Talk to a Lawyer Today event that annually takes place on Martin Luther King Jr. Day has been hailed as the best yet by organizers. All 14 pro bono districts had at least one walk-in and/or call-in site for lawyers to answer questions from members of their communities for free.

While the official numbers are not yet available from Monday's statewide Talk to a Lawyer Today event that annually takes place on the Martin Luther King Jr. Day, all 14 pro bono districts participated.