Context for board training

Legal aid providers work in increasingly complex environments. The central issues they address – housing and homelessness, intake and case triage, employment and training, outreach to the client community, access to health care, creation of new delivery mechanisms for providing legal services – are themselves subject to innumerable forces. 

As stewards of the organization, legal aid boards are responsible for overseeing their organizations' performance, accountability, fiscal integrity and regulatory compliance.  They are also responsible for working with programs to develop strategic and long-range plans and ensure that program resources and services are responsive to evolving community needs and “accomplish lasting results” for clients...  In doing so, they must also recognize the various regional, statewide and even national systems and partnerships within which providers operate and ensure that the providers’ operations and services are aligned with and take these into account. Together, these various dimensions of governance call for an active, engaged and forward-looking board that works in a leadership partnership with senior management to govern the organization.