The Legal Aid Society of Santa Clara County (LAS) is a non-profit corporation founded in 1960 to provide free, civil legal services for those low-income persons unable to obtain access to the judicial system through other avenues. As Silicon Valley’s economy has grown, the unique diversity of the area has made the needs of families in poverty more complex.

Our representation ensures that our clients have equal access to the justice system and our outreach and education programs provide the community members with needed tools to advocate for themselves and to lead more independent and knowledgeable lives.
To meet this challenge LAS has established the following services:

Family Law - a fully staffed Family Law Unit, with four full time attorneys and two paralegal assistants that provide legal services that include dissolutions, child custody and support, guardianship, conservatorship and juvenile law case work. LAS is the only agency in the county providing comprehensive family law services to the indigent. Our family law unit also provides comprehensive domestic violence victim legal assistance.
Fair Housing - staffed by an attorney and five housing counselors, the unit works to safeguard housing choices for families, children, the disabled and the homeless as well as a community education program.
Landlord/Tenant Rights - provides advice, counseling and representation in all landlord and tenant matters.

Special Education - established in collaboration with the Community Alliance for Special Education (CASE) to provide families with disabled children assistance to obtain special education support from their local schools and to promote greater understanding and cooperation among parents of disabled children, the special education community and the public school system.
Immigration and Naturalization - to help in uniting families by providing assistance through the difficult immigration process, this includes preparation and filing of petitions under the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA).
Conflicts Project – we administer conflicts in indigent criminal defense cases which include Juvenile Court matters , Family Court contempt, mental health issues and criminal appeals.

We are recognized for our unprecedented staff diversity. At our office, Spanish, Vietnamese, and Chinese are all spoken.

Due to the restrictions imposed by Congress on the delivery of legal services and limitations on eligible clients, the LAS board of directors decided in 1995 not to seek continued funding from our major funding source, the Legal Services Corporation (LSC). While a difficult decision, it was agreed by the board to be more beneficial to our client community in order to retain the flexibility to address the emerging critical needs of our client community, unhampered by the LSC and its regulations. Since that decision LAS has engaged in an aggressive drive to seek additional funding sources and has allowed us to take on the greater challenges that face our client community.

In 1997 the County of Santa Clara Board of Supervisors selected LAS to administer a Conflicts Program for the referral of cases to a panel of experienced private attorneys when conflicts arises in criminal and juvenile matters, Family Court contempt matters, mental health issues and criminal appeals. We are responsible for monitoring and administering a $4.3 million dollar annual grant for the defense of indigents charged with crimes in conflict cases. As a result the County has saved over $1million per year in direct costs for legal defense. These savings have instead gone to fund other needed social programs. In addition, our legal staff continues to monitor the implementation of the consent decree in the school desegregation and bilingual education case of Diaz/Vasquez v. San Jose Unified School District filed by LAS.

LAS is guided in policy and fiscal matters by a 15 member Board of Directors which includes members from the legal profession, business and client community.