Celebrating its sixteenth year of existence, the Students’ Legal Assistance, located in the lower level of the Holmes Student Center, still is unknown by some NIU students, Director Donald Henderson said.

Although the SLA’s two lawyers make more than 10,000 contacts yearly, it takes time before transfer students and new students learn of the services available to them, Henderson said.

The SLA “was born of the idea that it was vitally important to make available legal information and advice to … students who, because of economic incapacity, were otherwise unable to participate in the due process system,” states an SLA information guide.

Attorneys Henderson and Lynn Richards offer direct services in cases including landlord-tenant, criminal misdemeanor, consumer, personal injury, property damage, employer-employee, domestic relations and traffic.

The 1986-87 statistics show the greatest number of problems brought to the SLA concerned housing questions and problems followed by criminal/ordinance (misdemeanors and traffic violations) and consumer/employment (comsumers claims and wage and employment claims) cases.

Because of the great demand on the office, SLA has found it necessary to develop methods of prevention in order for students to make sound decisions before entering into legal obligations, Henderson said. This “preventative-law” program includes handout materials for students’ education.

The SLA assisted the Student Association Tenant Union in preparing a Tenant/Landlord Handbook III and a landlord complaint/evaluation system available to apartment-hunting students.

enderson said the issue of landlord-tenant relations is particularly important to the SLA. “Considering the amount of rents and contracts in DeKalb, (housing rental) is a multimillion-dollar industry,” Henderson said.

Another prevention tool the SLA offers is the “If Arrested” card, which offers students information about their legal rights if arrested. The Traffic Ticket Handbook also educates students about the various forms of tickets and how they can be dealt with.

enderson said having only two lawyers in the office limits the amount of projects the SLA can pursue. He said if funds were available to hire another attorney, the SLA would be able to offer more assistance to students.

The SLA is unable to handle cases regarding matters between clients or cases involving NIU. Also, persons financially able to procure private counsel are not eligible for litigational representation.