Not everyone in the Harris County courts gets a lawyer. A new hub could help those in need.

One of Harris County’s 16 justice courts is now home to a unique information hub that could help individuals without legal representation better navigate their cases in multiple languages and at no cost.

At the Legal Resource Center, which is hosted by Harris County Justice of the Peace Court Precinct 1, Place 2, visitors can peruse the Tenants Rights Handbook . They can rifle through paper handouts with titles like “Your Debt Collection Rights” and “Filing a Small Claims Case,” in Spanish and in English, and even use a computer kiosk to conference with pro bono lawyers .

Individuals who come through Harris County’s justice courts — which handle evictions, small claims and low-level misdemeanors — are not entitled to a lawyer. For Judge Steve Duble, who presides over the host court and who applied for the grant funding the Center, that makes the initiative “essential.”

“You need information,” he said. “There’s nobody filling that gap. There’s no lawyer that’s gonna take that case. Legal aid doesn’t have enough staffing to cover it all.”

Supported by a $25,000 grant from the Texas Bar Foundation, the Center “soft-launched” in April, according to Jimmy Wynn, the court’s community engagement director. Since then, it has served more than 250 people.

“One of our initiatives is providing opportunities to access justice,” said Baillie Milliken, executive director of the Texas Bar Foundation. “We thought this was a fabulous thought.”

The Center celebrated its formal launch on Wednesday. Legal services professionals who attended the hub’s grand opening said it will help to fill a vast and unmet need for information and representation in Harris County.

“People talk about the justice gap,” said Andre Davison, director of the Harris County Law Library, which curated the materials available at the Legal Resource Center. “It’s more of a justice crisis.”

Compounding the problem: the vast majority of litigants who pass through Harris County’s justice courts are there for reasons related to poverty, said Jeremy Brown, a former Harris County justice of the peace who attended the grand opening.

Brown, who now works as chief regulatory officer for Harris County Universal Services, briefly hosted a legal resource center in his own court that served as Duble’s inspiration.

“I’m glad Judge Duble was able to do this, because as judges you can’t speak out,” he said. “What part can you play in this complicated system to help folks just a little? This is one of those things.”

Currently, the Legal Resource Center is the only hub of its kind in Harris County — but it may not be for long. Dolores Lozano, presiding judge in Harris County Justice of the Peace Court Precinct 2, Place 2, said she plans to apply for a grant to support a legal resource center in her own court.

Filling a need

The Center’s mission is particularly important in Duble’s precinct, which serves some of Houston’s poorest neighborhoods. In fact, Precinct 1 covers a quarter of the city’s neighborhoods of persistent poverty , said Wynn, the community engagement director.

These neighborhoods, which include Greater Fifth Ward, Kashmere Gardens, Settegast, Northside, Northline, Eastex-Jensen, Independence Heights, Acres Home, and Greenspoint, have experienced high poverty rates for decades, and Duble said their residents are rarely able to afford a private lawyer.

“They’re the people that need this help the most,” he said.

Duble says he has prioritized access to justice initiatives since he took office in January 2023. That year, he was one of two Harris County justices of the peace to set up eviction diversion programs, which connect tenants with a full-time eviction diversion facilitator when they come to court. Then, last month, he made the unusual decision to recall all 12,500 outstanding arrest warrants issued by his court on constitutional grounds.

The recall exclusively impacted those charged with Class C misdemeanors — the lowest-level criminal offenses in Texas. The vast majority were traffic offenses, like speeding, running a red light or failure to yield. But Duble was concerned that the arrest warrants would result in jail time for offenses that are only punishable by fine and ineligible for free legal representation.

“I found one (case) where the person was brought into jail on nothing but an arrest warrant out of this court, and it was all parking tickets,” said Duble, who worried there could be more such cases.

A similar principle — Duble’s desire to ensure fair treatment under the law for all litigants before his court — informed the creation of the Legal Resource Center.

“Everything I’ve done since I’ve come in (to the court) is trying to improve and increase access to justice,” he said. “It all stems from that.”