Pro bono leaders from the city's big firms gathered at Kilpatrick Townsend & Stockton on Tuesday for updates from Dan Werner of the Southern Poverty Law Center and Michael Lucas of Atlanta Volunteer Lawyers Foundation on two ambitious new pro bono initiatives that are quickly gaining traction.

The SPLC launched an unprecedented deportation defense project at the Stewart Detention Center in April, and AVLF last year started a project at Thomasville Heights Elementary School in southeast Atlanta that provides legal aid to resolve housing problems that cause children to struggle with school and miss days.

Both pilot projects embed staff lawyers on-site—at the immigration court and the elementary school, respectively—and recruit volunteer lawyers from the private bar to help with individual cases. Each has gained enough support to start expanding to new locations, Werner and Lucas told the Atlanta Pro Bono Roundtable members.