Justice in the Schools attorney ready to carry on free legal aid services for families

Kathryn Young Galla of Legal Aid of Western Missouri is ready with LINC’s support to provide legal services to families facing housing issues, threat of eviction and other domestic issues through the Justice in the Schools program.

New Justice in the Schools attorney Kathryn Young Galla was making a good run in the corporate legal world when a persistent feeling welling inside her changed her path.

“I was done with the law firm atmosphere,” Young Galla said. “I wanted to get in the role of helping people instead of helping companies make more money.”

She’d be rewarded, first in Philadelphia, where she practiced law for 12 years, when she took her expertise into voting rights and then social justice law for specialized groups.

Along the way she was volunteering as an advocate in court representing children in cases of abuse and neglect.

And she was rewarded again when her husband’s job change brought their young family to Kansas City and Legal Aid of Western Missouri tapped Young Galla to take charge of Justice in the Schools.

Every step of the way on her new path, she said, she got the same good feeling.

“This is right,” she said. “This is what I need to be doing.”

With Justice in the Schools, Young Galla is taking a lawyer job, funded by LINC with Legal Aid of Western Missouri, to be an advocate for qualifying families of students and employees in the Kansas City, Center, Grandview and Hickman Mills school districts.

LINC and Legal Aid have invested in this mission with the school districts to help families fight against the crises that can force families out their homes, or create domestic turmoil that upends their children’s education.

Justice in the Schools, since it began in 2020, has taken on some 650 cases, impacting nearly 1,000 children. Many of the cases involve housing issues and defense against eviction. Other cases have involved guardianships, consumer protection and family law.

The result of the work, said Legal Aid of Western Missouri Executive Director Alicia Johnson, has been more children and parents safe in stabilized homes.

“We stop the mobility,” she said. “We stop the churn between schools. We know that if children can stay in the same school from August to May, students have higher attendance, they are higher performing and have lower discipline issues.”

LINC’s Caring Communities before and after school programs provide an ideal opportunity to reach families who might not otherwise seek or receive legal assistance in moments of hardship, said LINC Chief Operating Officer Jeff Hill.

LINC’s program coordinators nurture trusting relationships with families that can encourage parents to open up and seek help that can avert crises.

LINC is collaborating with Legal Aid to install Young Galla as an attorney dedicated to serving families in schools so that more families will be able to get help, Hill said.

“Legal Aid does great work in the community,” Hill said, “and we are providing access to legal help with housing and other concerns to families who — but for this investment — would not be able to get it.”

The benefits are far-reaching, Hill said. The more that individual children and their families are stabilized, the steadier and more productive their classrooms become. Teachers can be more effective and all children do better.

Young Galla is succeeding former Justice in the Schools attorney Garrett Christensen, who was promoted to an office director position this summer.

Legal Aid was excited for the opportunity to bring Young Galla into the role, Johnson said. The new attorney’s variety of experiences, along with her mission-minded focus, suits her well for the Justice in the Schools work that asks her to handle a wide range of legal cases.

Young Galla plans to draw on that experience.

“I’ve seen what is upstream for families with legal problems that hurt family stability,” she said. “Children and families don’t usually have a voice in the legal system, and I want to make sure that they do.”

She’s ready to be a strong advocate.

Her work as a child advocate and now with Justice in the Schools “puts me in court,” she said. “That’s where fundamental decisions are made.

“It puts me in the room where it happens.”