It is because of the committed partnerships among several state and local agencies that over 1000 attorneys, mediators, and judges are specially trained to work with foreclosure cases and help Hoosiers facing foreclosure. These training efforts have fulfilled the promise Chief Justice Randall T. Shepard made in his 2009 State of the Judiciary address, when he stated “by summer Indiana will have trained more judges and pro bono lawyers and mediators to help people facing foreclosure than any other court system in America.” In order to meet that goal, the Mortgage Foreclosure Taskforce was created, with representatives from the Indiana Supreme Court’s Division of State Court Administration, Commission for Continuing Legal Education, Indiana Judicial Center, Indiana Attorney General’s Office, Indiana Pro Bono Commission, Indiana Legal Services, Indiana State Bar Association, and Indiana Housing and Community Development Authority. The Taskforce was developed to educate trial court judges and train and recruit volunteer lawyers to help homeowners facing foreclosure.
Efforts to educate judicial officers began in March when the Indiana Judicial Center offered a foreclosure training session at the Indiana Judicial Conference’s Spring Judicial College. Additional judicial training was coordinated in conjunction with the Indiana Judicial Conference district meetings in central and southern Indiana, and a subsequent training event in northern Indiana. Most recently, an educational session dedicated to foreclosure law was offered to judicial officers at the September Annual Meeting of the Judicial Conference of Indiana. These training events have provided judges information on the latest developments in Indiana’s foreclosure laws, as well as the opportunity to share their own local policies and practices aimed to get both lenders and borrowers communicating
to determine whether foreclosure is avoidable.
Attorney foreclosure training efforts also commenced in March, when the Taskforce co-sponsored its first attorney training event in Indianapolis, hosted by the Indiana Housing and Community Development Authority. Next, with production assistance provided by the Indiana Continuing Legal Education Forum, the Taskforce developed the “Back Home in Indiana: Guiding Homeowners through Foreclosure” training curriculum, video, and materials, designed to be used in attorney training events offered across the state. Those training events began in June, and as of September 1, 2009, the Taskforce has sponsored or co-sponsored over thirty attorney training events facilitated largely through partnerships with local pro bono commission district committees. By offering training events in several locations, with a standardized curriculum, Indiana Court of Appeals Judge Melissa S. May, chair of the Indiana Pro Bono Commission, believes the Taskforce has “been able to quickly and effectively develop a contingent of several hundred attorneys capable of providing pro bono assistance to homeowners facing foreclosure.”
The General Assembly addressed the foreclosure crisis in Indiana by passing Senate Enrolled Act 492 (codified at IC 32-30-10.5 et.seq.). Among other things, this new law authorizes a fifty-dollar filing fee in mortgage foreclosure cases, provides borrowers the right to request a settlement conference prior to a final foreclosure judgment being entered, and requires creditors to direct borrowers facing foreclosure to foreclosure prevention assistance through the Indiana Foreclosure Prevention Network (IFPN).
The IFPN operates through the Indiana Housing and Community Development Authority and connects homeowners facing foreclosure with trained foreclosure prevention counselors to determine if a foreclosure prevention workout plan is possible and what mortgage payment would be affordable for the homeowner. If an IFPN counselor believes a homeowner needs legal assistance, they have a legal referral process in place to connect homeowners with pro bono attorney resources in their community.
The Taskforce worked with Justin Corbett, foreclosure mediation training project manager with the Commission for Continuing Legal Education, to develop a mediator-specific foreclosure training component to compliment the attorney curriculum. The mediator training component was offered in conjunction with five attorney training events, and has currently trained fifty-two Indiana Registered Foreclosure Mediators. Judge Nancy Boyer of the Allen County Superior Court believes “conducting the settlement conference in the courthouse and appointing a mediator
to facilitate the conference have been essential elements to the success of the settlement conferences.”
To ensure that judges and attorneys receive up-to-date information on the new law and settlement conference requirements, the Taskforce included updated information in the attorney training materials and created a “judicial resources” link on its webpage. The resources link contains information specific to the requirements of the new foreclosure law, copies of the pre-suit and complaint notices required under the new law, answers to frequently asked questions, as well as sample orders and other helpful procedural tools for judges.
The changes to Indiana’s foreclosure law and procedure have been complex, and judges have had to develop new case management strategies to handle the volume of foreclosure cases, that numbered over 45,000 filed in 2008. Indiana attorneys and mediators must learn quickly, and constantly monitor the evolving foreclosure law landscape, in order to effectively represent their clients and facilitate strategies to prevent foreclosures.