Legal community

Wisconsin’s legal community has long demonstrated a strong sense of responsibility for access to justice.

Unsurprisingly the State Bar of Wisconsin, as the community’s statewide membership association, meaningfully partners with WisTAF on this shared mission. Currently, State Bar members annually contribute more than $1.3 million to the Public Interest Legal Services Fund, as well as thousands of pro bono hours through volunteership with WisTAF grant recipients and local free legal clinics around the state.

It was the Wisconsin Supreme Court that first established WisTAF in 1986, to "to aid the courts in carrying on and improving the administration of justice and to facilitate the improved delivery of legal services to persons of limited means in non-criminal matters." By order of the Court, 12 of the 15 members of our Board of Directors are appointed by the Bar (nine attorneys, three non-attorneys) while the other three (all judges) are appointed by the Court itself.

The Supreme Court has noted that our state’s attorneys and judges are citizens with a special responsibility for justice and fairness in our legal system. The legal community’s overwhelming embrace of this charge makes us — on behalf of the clients served by our grant recipients — profoundly grateful.