From evictions to high demand: the 8 biggest problems SC civil court faces, statewide study shows

South Carolinians need legal help — lots of it.

But there’s far too few resources to go around.

That was the overarching theme of the first comprehensive, statewide assessment of the South Carolina civil court system. The main goal of the 18-month, 300-page mixed-method study was to “learn about the life experiences of low and moderate-income South Carolinians, the legal problems they encounter and the gaps between their legal needs and resources available.”

The study incorporates multiple data sources, including in-depth interviews with lawyers, administrators, community leaders, educators, legislators and judges; roundtable discussions with everyday South Carolinians; surveys of residents and lawyers; data from legal service providers; and data from the U.S. Census and other public sources.

The study was launched by the South Carolina Access to Justice Commission and the Center for Housing and Community Studies of the University of North Carolina Greensboro, the South Carolina Bar and the NMRS Center on Professionalism of the University of South Carolina School of Law.

“The Bar is honored to be a funding-partner in this first-ever study surrounding the legal needs and resources for the people of South Carolina,” Rusty Infinger, president-elect of the Bar, said in a press release. “The attorneys of this state are committed leaders in this process – asking the important questions for meaningful solutions benefiting the justice system moving forward.”

Here are the top eight problems with the civil court system that the study identified, followed by suggested solutions in the report.

High demand and low supply

The study shows that there is a dire need for legal help in the civil court system, but too few resources. This was the most reoccurring topic in roundtable discussions and focus groups in urban, small-town and rural communities. It was also a point of consensus for both the attorneys and the members of the public responding to the surveys.

The data provided by the six leading legal services providers indicate they had a total of nearly 19,000 intakes in 2021, but yet are staffed by only 66.5 lawyers and 71 support staff, the report states.

House and family law need

Housing and family law are the areas of greatest need in the state for legal services, the report states. These areas were consistently identified by lawyers and residents as being of need and were at the top of the list in regards to resource shortfalls.

Eviction defense is the most pressing area of need in relation to housing. Private law firms rarely take these cases and legal service providers cannot handle them all, the report states. As a result, many tenants are unrepresented in court or don’t appear in court at all.

Divorce, child custody and child support are big areas of need and custody battles in the state can be difficult and protracted.

Debt collection, access to public benefits, immigration and domestic violence were also identified as areas of need.

And legal needs were not shared equally by all racial and ethnic groups, the study shows.

Lives in crisis

For many low income residents, even a minor event can set off a chain reaction in their lives. “A looming eviction or other legal problem can be merely a symptom of a deeper crisis having to do with employment, health, or family instability,” the report states.

The report suggests that legal service lawyers must act like social workers or partner with some and move toward a case management approach.

Cost worries

Fear of the costs of legal services keeps many from seeking legal aid — with many low-income residents not knowing about free legal services. Still others may be just outside the income eligibility limits.

Not enough pro bono

Private lawyers in South Carolina do not offer enough pro bono service, the report found. One reason given is that resource-rich law firms are less common in South Carolina than the nearby states of North Carolina and Georgia. Also, fear of being pulled into protracted litigation keeps some lawyers in the state from doing more. In addition, a mismatch between the skills lawyers have and those needed to handle low-income clients’ cases keeps many from volunteering, the report states.

Lack of reform consensus

Of the South Carolina lawyers who responded to the a survey as part of the study, 57% said they would be somewhat likely or very likely to support expanding the authority of paralegals to handle specified matters without the oversight of an attorney. Meanwhile, 43% said they would not be at all likely to support those measures.

Where you live can hurt

South Carolina lawyers are concentrated in larger cities and towns. And while some may offer services in other parts of the state, residents who live farther from population centers find it harder to connect, the report states.

Charleston stands out for its relative abundance of legal service resources — it is the only city in the state with four legal service providers.

Scarcity of resources also has a racial dimension, the report found. Counties with larger Black populations are generally poorer and some of those counties have almost no access to legal services.

Civil court caseload heavy in more poor counties

When number of cases were measured per thousand of population, the counties with the heaviest caseloads tended to be those ranking lower in median household income, with higher rates of unemployment and larger Black populations. This trend mostly holds when case rates were measured for specific kinds of cases, including child support, child custody, debt collection, divorce and separation and domestic violence, the report states.

Possible solutions

Many lawyers and experts questioned for the study said the main, obvious solution to South Carolina’s civil court system woes was more funding, more lawyers and more resources.

“I do think, obviously, better funding for the South Carolina Legal Services or any of the legal services corporations. I know it’s not that they don’t want to serve more people, it’s that they’re unable to serve more people because they just don’t have the funding or the staff to do it,” one person surveyed said.

Other proposed solutions addressed issues of cost. Referring to South Carolina’s only “sliding scale” law office, one lawyer said, “They are the only office of its kind that I know of, and really, we need stuff like that all over the state to meet many of these needs.”

Another lawyer suggested expanding the income limitations for legal services to 400% of the federal poverty level, instead of cutting it off at 200%.

Other suggestions included having retired lawyers who still wanted to help pitch in during certain situations; and offering an expanded victim advocate model in use in other states.

“A model where the advocates assist with the protection paperwork, they’re in the courthouse, and then they have pro bono attorneys that come and represent the litigants in the actions,” the report states.

To reduce the number of evictions, one lawyer suggested doubling the fee for filing an eviction.

“It’s probably one of the lowest in the country,” he said. “And it’s just, you can just file over and over again, you know, make it $300, and so it’d be kind of twofold. If you were to increase it, you could use all that money for whatever potential you want to use it for.”