About - Disaster Legal Assistance

DLAC is a coalition of organizations and law firms in Northern California working together to offer free legal services to the communities in the aftermath of natural disasters. Survivors of disasters such as wildfires face a wide variety of legal and financial needs ranging from insurance claim assistance to requests for government programs such as FEMA assistance.

For more information, contact Tiela Chalmers (Chief Executive Officer and General Counsel, Alameda County Bar Association and Legal Access Alameda) at tiela@acbanet.org, or (415) 806-0225, or Greg Shin (Program Manager, State Bar of California) at greg.shin@calbar.ca.gov or (213)-765-1505

Our Members

In Memory Of

Without the quiet persistence of our friend and colleague Sharon Ngim, this collaboration, this website, our statewide efforts would never have happened. Though she would always deflect thanks and turn the praise to others, she was truly the driving force behind disaster legal services in California. She pushed us to do this work long before climate change brought us regular and out of control wildfires – back when we knew there would be earthquakes sometime, but they seemed so remote.

Sharon began her community career at Cameron House, protecting victims/survivors of domestic violence. After this, she transitioned to the State Bar of California as a Program Developer in 1985, and she remained at the State Bar, supporting pro bono work, until her untimely death in 2018. She knew just how to gently nudge volunteers to step up, to lean into the work, to work together when we might have otherwise been inclined to just go our own way. In the face of challenges, Sharon would sigh, and put her head down, and find a way around them. We miss her enormously, and owe her a huge debt of gratitude. This website, and our work together, is dedicated to her memory.