Pro Bono Settlement Day: Give Back to Your Community and Gain Litigation Skills

It is a Monday morning in Washington, DC, and a group of individuals has gathered for the US Tax Court’s calendar call. In addition to the taxpayers whose cases will be called this morning, attorneys from the IRS Office of Chief Counsel, professors, and students from local law school clinic programs, and my partner, Sheri Dillon, and I are milling outside the courtroom. Sheri and I are here as codirectors of the DC Center for Public Interest Tax Law, a nonprofit organization that matches low-income taxpayers in need of representation with lawyers who will take their cases pro bono. Calendar call is an important part of what we do to serve the taxpayers in Washington, DC. Although these unrepresented taxpayers previously received information about local clinics, many never contacted the clinics. So here we are, with other clinics, available to help in the minutes before the session begins.