Shoring Up the Safety Net

For years, a hole in Washington state’s social safety net prevented undocumented immigrant and refugee kids from getting care for complex mental health issues. Then in 2021, Blake Marks-Dias and his pro bono legal team got involved.

“This is one of the most underserved, least-resourced groups in our country,” says Marks-Dias, co-managing partner at Corr Cronin in Seattle. “Good things aren’t just going to happen to them. It does require the legal system to get justice for them.”

The Seattle office of Kids In Need of Defense, an NGO devoted to protecting unaccompanied and separated children, worked with Marks-Dias and his now-retired colleague at Riddell Williams, Mike Pierson, for help.

“They were working with a group of children who’d experienced something very traumatic in their home country,” says Marks-Dias. “One of them in particular was having problems here—understandably. He and his four siblings came here from Mexico; his mother had been murdered in front of him by a drug gang. He was having significant problems at home and at school. He and his siblings needed mental health services, and the state wouldn’t pay for it.”

They had been trying to get psychological help for the boy through Washington’s Wraparound with Intensive Services program. The WISe program supports people under the age of 21 with complex behavioral health needs through a team approach that draws in family, friends and religious leaders, as well as professionals—counselors, schools, Child Protective Services and probation officers. However, Washington state policy prevented undocumented and refugee children from receiving these benefits.

“Intervening when these kids are young and providing services pays huge dividends later in terms of outcomes.”

The Washington State Health Care Authority was hesitant about expanding coverage. “Mike and I were running into roadblocks,“ Marks-Dias says.

So, along with Disability Rights Washington, Marks-Dias filed a petition in the Thurston County Superior Court. It led to a quick settlement. As of September 2021, the state extended WISe coverage to all immigrant and refugee families. “As residents of Washington and members of our community, these people should have access to the same mental health services that others do,” Marks-Dias says. “Especially because people in that population are often here because of some sort of trauma. We know from all sorts of research that intervening when these kids are young and providing services pays huge dividends later in terms of outcomes.”

Marks-Dias has been involved in a significant amount of additional pro bono work, much of it centered on immigrant and refugee families. In 2011, he worked with Northwest Health Law Advocates (NoHLA) to get the state to reenroll thousands of immigrants in the state’s basic health plan after their coverage was terminated due to budget cuts. He also represented unhoused people whose property had been seized by the city of Seattle without adequate notice. In addition, Marks-Dias served on the board of NoHLA for several years and was board president for three of those. He is currently the vice chair of AKIN (a merger of Childhaven and Children’s Home Society of Washington).

“I have been very fortunate in my own life,” he says. “And I just see a moral imperative to give back, to do what I can. To use my education and training to do things that make for a better community.”

Marks-Dias credits his parents with his passion for helping others. “My mom was very caring,” he says. “She was always helping people in our neighborhood who needed transportation to appointments, or extra help. She instilled in me a sense of social justice and equity. My dad, as long as I can remember, has been on nonprofit boards. He would often put in a full day at the office, and then in the evenings and on weekends, he’d do his nonprofit work.” 

Marks-Dias says a focus on pro bono work fits in well at his firm: “Because we’re small, we have the flexibility and ability for me to do the things I want to do; I don’t have to ask somebody for permission or fill in a million different forms.”

That sense of community responsibility has spread to younger attorneys at Corr Cronin. “I don’t want to take any credit for what other people do. I’m not very preachy about doing pro bono stuff,” he reflects, “but there are some associates here who are doing a lot of great pro bono work with school discipline matters. I see them doing cool stuff, and whether I have anything to do with that by leading by example, I have no idea. But it’s good to see.”