EVERETT – The first-floor courthouse corridor suddenly resembled a busy emergency room, complete with triage to attend to the more urgent cases first.

As clients filtered in, it truly became triage. It was legal triage.

People who could not afford attorneys and were about to get booted from their homes started gathering on a Wednesday morning outside a Snohomish County Superior Court commissioner’s courtroom ready to face their landlord – or, more likely, their landlord’s attorney.

Greeting them were people who could give them a bit of legal advice before the confrontation in a courtroom.

Gathering on Tuesday and Wednesday mornings are a handful of volunteer attorneys and staff from Snohomish County Legal Services – a free legal aid program serving poor Snohomish County people.

The lawyers and staff members were there on that day as part of the Housing Justice Project, one of several programs operated by Legal Services in which up to 230 county lawyers participate over the year.

Volunteers also staff a weekly family law clinic to give advice on the legal process, explain clients’ rights and work to solve problems such as divorcing a violent spouse.

Legal Services also has a monthly clinic to help people decide whether or not to file for bankruptcy, and in some cases volunteers will agree to represent clients through an entire case.

Legal Services represented some 700 poor people in 2005, said director Threesa Milligan. It’s part of her job to match the clients with the fields of practice and experience of the volunteer lawyers.

Another part is finding grants to fund Legal Services, which has a $240,000 budget this year. Grants come from city, county, state and private sources. The Snohomish County Bar Association raised $54,000 for Legal Services at a recent auction.

“We pinch pennies,” Milligan said. “We run a very tight ship.”

For those who go to court without a lawyer, “it’s not a level playing field,” Milligan said. Many do, however.

“The cost (of hiring a lawyer) is so far out of reach for the people we see that it might not even exist,” Milligan said.

In that courthouse corridor on that Wednesday, lawyer Scott Peterson walked across the hall from the Snohomish County Law Library, where he had been doing some research. He practices law in Seattle but lives in Snohomish County.

He just popped over to help.

Some volunteer because they think it’s the right thing to do.

Peterson also says his presence makes the landlords’ attorneys do things the proper way. Two statewide legal programs, Columbia Legal Services and Northwest Justice Project, also send attorneys to help Housing Justice, Milligan said.

Among the cases that morning, many landlords already had started evictions of people who don’t pay their rent.

By the time such a case gets to court, the die has already been cast.

“There’s often not much we can do,” about eviction, said Diane Weyrick, Housing Justice coordinator. “If you owe rent, you owe rent.”

There are some things that can be done, however.

For example, a lawyer can negotiate additional time for the renter to find another place to move. In some cases, the renter has withheld rent because of terrible living conditions, something that the Housing Justice volunteers might be able to use to get things fixed.

On this day, a woman with three children was about to be evicted. Marjorie High, Legal Services staff attorney, worked a deal with the landlord’s attorney to hold off a bit. The renter might be able to borrow money from friends and family to repay rent and other costs.

“Who knows if she will be able to pay it or not,” High said, “but at least it gives her a chance.”

Reporter Jim Haley: 425-339-3447 or haley@heraldnet.com.

For more information

To learn more about Snohomish County Legal Services, go to www.snocolegal.org or call Threesa Milligan, 425-9283, ext. 11. Potential clients should call 888-201-1014.