Get Legal Help Data Structures

Organization

Field	Type	Description
ID	Auto-generated number
Name	Short text Required	Name of the organization
Alternate name	Short text	Alias of an organization, if applicable
Description	HTML	Organizational description
Physical address	Address Required	Street address, city, state, zip code
Display address to public users	Yes/No Required	Indicates whether address can be shown when providing a referral
Mailing address	Address Required	Street address, city, state, zip code
Phone number	Telephone Required	Telephone number as (xxx) xxx-xxxx
Contact email address	Email Required	Email address for primary/general contact
Website addresss	URL; Required	Full website url
Facebook	URL	Link to org’s Facebook page
Twitter/X	URL	Link to org’s Twitter/X page
Instagram	URL	Link to org’s instagram feed
Associated email domains	Short text; multiple	Domains associated with organization; users registering with the domain are given legal aid permissions automatically
Public referral	Yes/No Required	Indicates whether organization provides services to the public.
Maximum callbacks per we call you slot	Number	For OTIS orgs, when set, limits callbacks per slot universally

Locations

Every organization must have at least one location.

Field	Type	Description
ID	Auto-generated number
Parent organization	Number; required	ID of the organization
Title	Short text Required	Title/name of the location (main office, Alton office, etc)
Address	Address Required	May be copied from organization; street address, city, state, zip code
Phone number	Telephone Required	May be copied from organizatio
TTY phone number	Telephone	TTY phone number, if applicable
Toll-free number	Telephone	Toll free number, if applicable
Weekly hours	Complex Required if not open at least weekly	First occurence start and end dates Repeat rule baed on RRule format
Hours	Office hours Required if open at least once a week	Up to 4 time slots per day, each with its own start and end times
Holidays	Holiday taxonomy term Unlimited cardinality	Holidays when a location is closed
Serves all of IL	Yes/No; required	Yes for statewide organizations; no for all others
Counties	Term reference to county level of region taxonomy; unlimited cardinality	Counties served by a location
Cities	Term reference to city level of region taxonomy; unlimited cardinality	Cities served by a location
Zip codes	Term reference to county level of region taxonomy; unlimited cardinality	Zip codes served by a location
Income eligibility	Single select Required	Free, Free to eligible persons, sliding scale based on income, flat fee
Income standard	Single select	Required when free to eligible persons. Options are Federal poverty level and area median income
Max. percentage of income standard	Number	Required when free to eligible persons.
Sliding scale description	Long plain text	Required when income eligibility is sliding scale
Flat fee description	Long plain text	Required when income eligibility is flat description

Note

ILAO maintains a taxonomy of holidays, each with an associated date rule. We will also use this taxonomy to create “holidays” when an organization will be closed outside of typical holidays.

Note

The location geographic area could have been implemented better. We eventually moved to a Jurisdiction/Negate Jurisdiction option in other places but have not refined here. With that it is easy to mark an organization as Illinois except for Chicago or Illinois except for Cook County. The current system requires a choice between one of Statewide, 1 or more counties, 1 or more cities or 1 or more zip codes. These are stored i our Region taxonomy.

Services

Every location must have at least one service.

Field	Type	Description
ID	Auto-generated number
Parent organization	Number; required	ID of the organization
Location	Number; required	ID of the location
Is service open?	Yes/No; required	No referrals are made if set to No
Service type	Single select Required	One of: direct representation, legal info and education; self-help center; lawyer referral service;policy, impact litigation support, or other
Phone number	Telephone; required	Can be copied from location; phone number for service.
Income eligibility	Required	Can be copied from location; otherwise, same questions as in location.
Is service limited by population	Yes/No; Required	Indicates if the service is limited to specific groups (seniors, disabled, etc)
Populations	Term reference to intake populations	One or more populations a person must be to qualify for service. Req. if limited
Service area	Required	Can be copied from location; otherwise is statewide, counties, cities, zip codes fields required
Best bet for groups	Term reference to populations	Allows ILAO staff to promote a referral outside of OTIS for specific populations
Best bet for legal issue	Term reference to legal issues taxonomy	Allows ILAO staff to promote a referral outside of OTIS for specific legal issues

Direct representation fields

These fields are unique to services that provide direct representation.

Field	Type	Description
ID	Auto-generated number
Service is hotline	Yes/No; required	Used to indicate if a service is a hotline
Advice desk or walk-in clinic	Yes/No; required	Used to indicate if advice desk or clinic
Level of service	Multi-select required	Extended representation, brief services, advice, mediation/ADR, pro bono placement
Service delivery	Multi-select Required	In-person, phone, online/remote (incuding real-time and asynchronous communication
Practice areas	Multi-select Required	Legal issues taken from ILAOs’ legal issues taxonomy
Average volume	Number	Estimate number of clients/cases per month Used for cold referrals to prioritize
Application process	Multi-select Required	Telephone, walk-in, online, email, online through OTIS
Telephone process	Plain long text	Description of how one applies via phone; used to set expectations
Walk-in process	Plain long text	Description to how one applies via walk-in where process includes walk-in
Online process	Plain long text	Description of the online process where process includes online
Application form	URL	Link to online application form if process includes online
Email process	Plain long text	Description of the email applicaton process when process includes email
Email	Email	Email address for email applications
Program name for Legal Server	Short text	For OTIS partners, their legalserver name for mapping etransfers if on LegalServer
Callback slots per applicant	Number	Number of callback slots a person can choose to schedule a callback
Maximum callback per slot	Number	Maximum callbacks that can be scheduled in a time slot per service. Can be overridden at the organization level

Intake Settings

Intake settings are tied to a specific service. A service can have an unlimited number of intake settings but each should be unique.

Field	Type	Description
ID	Auto-generated number
Name	Short text	Name for the intake settings
Service	Number	ID of the associated service
Legal issues	Multi-select Required	Legal issues taken from ILAOs’ legal issues taxonomy; may be copied from service
Service area	Required	Can be copied from service; otherwise is statewide, counties, cities, zip codes fields required
Intake open	Yes/No; required	Indicates whether intake is open or closed
Number of intakes allowed	Number; required	Number of intakes to allow per time period Zero is treated as unlimited
Intake reset period	Daily, weekly, or monthly.	Required when number of intake is not zero Count of etransfers reset based on this
Allow applications from jail/prison	Yes/No; required	Allows/disallows applications from jail or prison.
Minimum age to qualify as a senior	Number; required Defaults to 60	Individuals at or above this age are considered seniors for intake purposes
Minimum age to apply	Number; required Default is 18	Minimum age to apply via OTIS. Minimum is 13 to comply with online regulations
Qualifiers	Term reference to qualifiers	Option rules to apply to the intake to determine eligibility
Collect income?	Yes/No; required	Determines whether we collect income
Income types	Term reference to income types; multi-select	List of income types to collect when income is collected
Apply income limit	Yes/No; required	Determines whether the system tests for income eligibility
Income standard	Single select	Required when apply income limit is yes. Options are Federal poverty level and area median income
Max. percentage of income standard	Number	Required when apply income limit is yes
Waive income for populations	Multi-select term reference to population taxonomy	Ignores income calculation for these groups
Collect income for waived populations	Yes/No required	If No, income will not be collected for people in those populations
Hours & Callback settings	Hours Entity	Indicates which hours & callback rules to use
Bypass intake and contact program	HTML text	Message to display when programs want the person to call instead of apply online
Program disclaimer	HTML text	Text to display after application complete as required by the organization
Household definition	HTML text	Text to display to help applicants define adults and children in household
Exit message for current clients	HTML text	Text to display if applicant indicates they are already clients for this problem
Exit message for applicants who applied already	HTML text	Text to display if applicant indicates they’ve already applied to the program.
“Please call us” message	HTML text	Text to display for completed applications where the applicant must call program
“We call you” message	HTML text	Text to display for completed applications who have scheduled a callback/appointment
Collect country	Yes/No; required	Should we collect country of origin
Collect ethnicity	Yes/No; required	Should we collect ethnicity
Collect adverse information	Yes/No; required	Should we collect adverse party information

Note

The system collects race, gender, language spoken at home, marital status automatically.

Hours & Callback Settings Entity

Hours and callback settings are tied to an organization and can then be attached to any intake settings on any service for that organization.

Field	Type	Description
ID	Auto-generated number
Title	Short text	Title of the entity; useful for finding
Parent organization	Number	ID of the parent organization
Callback number	Telephone; required	Phone number for person to call program
Callback type	Single select; required	Options are we call cient, client calls, or we call client - no appointment
Maximum callbacks	Number; optional	Maximum callbacks per slot
Call back hours by day	Multi-select slots	Time slots for callbacks; each day has its own select field
Hours of operation	Office hours Required if open at least once a week	Up to 4 time slots per day, each with its own start and end times
Add to calendar	Yes/No; required	Indicates whether we should add callback to program calendar
Legalserver URL	URL	Base url for calendar on LegalServer
Calendaring URL	URL	Full url of calendaer to add appointment to
Calendaring credentials	Short text	Token or API credential to write to calendar

Note

Callback hours are grouped in 1 hour slots from 6am to 10:30am, with starting times on the hour and half-hour. Additionally, blocks of morning, afternoon, and evening are also available.

Qualifiers

Qualifiers live in Guided Navigation in LegalServer. They are referenced via the Qualifiers taxonomy. See Qualifiers for more information.

Field	Type	Description
ID	Auto-generated number	Term D
Name	Short text	Name of the qualifier
Guided Navigation process ID	UUID	UUID for the process from LegalServer

Case Acceptance Entities

Case acceptance rules are managed through Drupal’s webforms module. Submitted webforms represent a specific service’s case acceptance. See Creating case acceptance webform for more information.

Field	Type	Description
ID	Auto-generated number	Webform ID
Title	Short text	Title formatted as Case Acceptance - Topic
Status	Open/Closed	Indicates whether a webform should accept new submissions.
Service	Entity reference Required	Reference to the service the submission is attached to.
Legal issue	Term reference to legal issues taxonomy	Reference to parent legal issue; all child terms will use this form to determine case acceptance for the service
Outcomes	Checkboxes; Multiple selection	Each checkbox corresponds to a specific outcome from a completed Guided Navigation process.

Case acceptance submissions by programs are then used to match outcomes from Guided Navigation to specific services when completed by applicants.

Guided Navigation

Guided Navigation is a feature within LegalServer. ILAO uses it on the statewide instance to create case acceptance triage rules. See Guided Navigation Overview.

OTIS Triage User

The OTIS triage user (aka the OAS triage entity) stores information from a specific intake via OTIS.

Note

ILAO does not keep all relevant data in the OTIS triage user entity. Some information is just passed through to the organization.

Field	Type	Description
ID	Auto-generated number	Triage ID
User_ID	Number	If the user has an ILAO account, their id; otherwise, 0
Status	Open/Closed	Indicates whether a webform should accept new submissions.
Created	Timestamp	Timestamp of when the record was created
Changed	Timestamp	Timestamp of the last time the record was changed
Intake_created	Timestamp	Timestamp of when intake was started if offered
Intake_changed	Timestamp	Timestamp of the last time intake was changed if started
Zip code	Short text	Zip code as entered by the applicant
Household size	Number	Total household size
Household adults	Number	Number of adults in household
Household children	Number	Number of children in household
Overincome	Yes/No	Indicates if a person was over-income
Last screen viewed	Small text	Tracks which intake form page the user last viewed. Allows us to track dropoff
County	Small text	County name
State	Small text	State name of user’s location
Total income	Number	Total income as collected
Triage status	Short text	One of a set of predefined triage statuses Includes referrals, self-help, program triage completed, legal issue
Intake status	Short text	One of a set of predefined intake statuses Includes started, diverted, eTransferred, Bypass, Offered, Overincome
Intake organization	Entity reference	Intake settings ID used to match user
LSC code	Short text	Not currently used
LSC subcode	Short text	Not currently used
Referral source	Short text	Tracks how user entered system (SMS, Fast entry, etc)
Gender	Short text	Applicant’s gender
Race	Short text	Applicant’s race
Ethnicity	Short text	Applicant’s ethnicity
Marital status	Short text	Applicant’s marital status
Age	Short text	Applicant’s age
Primary language	Short text	Applicant’s language
Country of origin	Short text	Applicant’s country of origin if provided
Adverse party	Adverse party entity Unlimited	First, middle, last name, type, address city, state, zip, business name
Callbacks selected	Text	List of selected callback times
Email	Email	User’s email adddress
Rejection date	Date	Date application rejected by legal aid
Populations	Term reference to populations taxonomy	User-identified special populations
Guided navigation Profile	JSON	JSON results sent from Legal Server Guided Navigation process
Mobile phone	Telephone	Mobile number of applicant; required to receive text messages
SMS Opt In	Yes/No	Whether the user has opted in to SMS from ILAO
Triage search	Text	Any free-form text the user searched on
Legal issue	Term reference to legal issues taxonomy	Lowest level legal issue identified by user
Legal Server UUID	UUID	UUID returned by Legal server during eTransfer

Note

ILAO collects but does not store date of birth, individual income types and amounts, or uploaded documents.