Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles

Nonprofit profile at a glance

EIN
951684067
IRS 990 coverage
2010–2025
Official website data refreshed
Sep 2026
Forms available
Form 990 2025
Location
Los Angeles, CA, USA
Phone
(800) 399-4529
Rating
86
Verdict
STRONG
Rating confidence
Moderate
Sector
Legal Services

Official website

Reported finances

Revenue
$78,247,867
Expenses
$73,253,584
Assets
$79,255,388
Liabilities
$30,092,668

Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2025. Amounts in USD.

Leadership & pay

42 people listed

Executive titles in this filing

  • Kahn A Scolnick (President)
  • Lynette M Jones (Vice President)
  • Silvia Argueta (Executive Director)

Highest reported compensation

  • Silvia Argueta (Executive Director): $325,905 total reported compensation
  • Barbara Schultz (Director of Housing Justice): $296,862 total reported compensation
  • Phong Wong (Pro Bono Director): $255,823 total reported compensation

Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2025. Names and roles reflect this filing, not necessarily current officeholders.

Overview

Mission

Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles seeks to achieve equal justice for people living in poverty across Greater Los Angeles. We change lives through direct representation, systems change, and community education.

What it reported doing in 2025

Client Intake Workgroup: The Client Intake Workgroup's receptionist team performed trauma-informed legal intake for over 75,000 individuals in 2025, connecting qualified applicants with LAFLA's robust legal services and referring others to meaningful community resources. The Client Intake Workgroup's housing intake paralegal team delivers limited scope legal services, under direct attorney supervision, to indigent tenants experiencing housing insecurity and unsafe living conditions. In 2025, the Client Intake Workgroup closed 5,852 eviction diversion cases.Santa Monica Community Office: Funded through grants from the City of Santa Monica, this office provides legal services to residents of Santa Monica only. They staff a domestic violence clinic at the court and offer regular housing clinics. Attorneys work with local agencies and city services to provide family law, housing, government benefit and immigration services. This office closed 808 cases in 2025.Restoring Communities: Addresses the core legal needs of communities impacted by the criminal justice system by providing direct legal services to remove barriers to reentry to society, including employment barriers, by providing community education, working with community partners to offer holistic services, and engaging in systemic change to support the restoration of impacted communities. Holistic legal services provided by the Restoring Communities Work Group include record clearing, occupational license denial challenges and assistance with family law, housing, government benefits, fair chance ordinance violations and other legal needs. In 2025, the restoring communities workgroup closed 2,987 cases in these areas of law.Survivor and Family Justice: The Survivor and Family Justice Workgroup assists survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault obtain domestic violence restraining orders, divorces, child custody and visitation orders, and helps secure the return of concealed and abducted children. We deliver on-site, in-person domestic violence legal services to survivors at two L.A. Superior Court locations: the Stanley Mosk Courthouse and the Governor George Deukmejian Courthouse. We provide virtual appointments for survivors seeking assistance with family law legal services, including motion and brief drafting. Additionally, we offer in-person, on-site appointments at three domestic violence shelters in Los Angeles County. The Workgroup also partners with health and human services organizations to link survivors with holistic support beyond legal services as they rebuild their lives away from their abusers. In 2025, the Workgroup closed 1,119 domestic violence and family law cases.Veterans Justice Center ("VJC"): Provides holistic, trauma-informed legal support to low-income, homeless, and at-risk veterans, regardless of discharge status or length of service. Its experienced, culturally competent staff-supported by hundreds of pro bono volunteers-help veterans secure life-sustaining income, health, and housing benefits; prevent homelessness by fighting wrongful evictions; remove employment barriers; clear criminal records; and advocate for discharge upgrades. Through deep partnerships with Veterans Affairs, veteran service organizations, and community agencies, VJC combines outreach, needs assessment, education, and direct legal services to close the justice gap for veterans. In 2025, VJC closed 578 cases, and in 2025, it assisted 980 veterans with a wide range of legal issues, including housing, benefits, family law, consumer issues and more. By leveraging a multidisciplinary team and robust data systems, VJC delivers high-impact, sustainable results, helping veterans achieve lasting stability, dignity, and opportunity.Asian & Pacific Islander Community Outreach Project: Provides legal help in all areas of practice including family law, immigration, housing, and government benefits in a wide range of API languages, including Korean, Mandarin, Cantonese, Japanese,

Operating model

Revenue model
Grant-funded. 91% of the money available for current operations came from government grants.
Distribution model
Hybrid. The nonprofit split its reported program spending across 43% for direct work, and 57% for grants.
  • Includes noncash contributions: Reported contributions include donated property or goods.

The verdict

STRONG - A large share of available resources goes toward mission work and the filed numbers largely add up. Total assets are small relative to annual expenses; liquid coverage is unknown and liabilities are high compared with assets.

Rating breakdown

  • Financial Efficiency: 86
  • Transparency & Controls: 79
  • Accountability: 100
  • Sustainability: 49
  • Growth: 100

Detailed rating inputs

Financial Efficiency

  • Mission deployment rate: 83.4%; rating input score 83
  • Program expense ratio: 88.9%; rating input score 89
  • Fundraising efficiency: $516.29 raised per $1 spent on fundraising; rating input score 94; 94th percentile among comparable filings

Transparency & Controls

  • Consistency checks: 100%; rating input score 100; 66th percentile among comparable filings
  • Pay-setting controls: 2 of 6 controls in place; rating input score 33
    • Compensation committee: Missing
    • Independent consultant: Missing
    • Other Form 990s reviewed: Missing
    • Written employment contract: Missing
    • Compensation survey or study: Pass
    • Board or committee approval: Pass
  • Foreign activity oversight: Limited
  • Grant itemization coverage: 100%; rating input score 100; 81st percentile among comparable filings
  • Major donor itemization: Yes; rating input score 100
  • Related-party transparency: Limited

Accountability

  • Independent voting board: 100%; rating input score 100; 65th percentile among comparable filings
  • Governance controls: 9 of 9 controls in place; rating input score 100
    • Conflict-of-interest policy: Pass
    • Whistleblower policy: Pass
    • Document-retention policy: Pass
    • CEO compensation review process: Pass
    • Other executive compensation review process: Pass
    • Form 990 shared with the board: Pass
    • Board meeting minutes documented: Pass
    • Audit committee oversight: Pass
    • Independent financial-statement audit: Pass

Sustainability

  • Operating margin: 6.4%; rating input score 60; 60th percentile among comparable filings
  • Total-asset coverage ratio: 1.08; rating input score 31; 31st percentile among comparable filings
  • Liabilities to assets ratio: 0.38; rating input score 50; 50th percentile among comparable filings
  • Officer compensation ratio: 2.4%; rating input score 53; 53rd percentile among comparable filings

Growth

  • Program expense growth: 17% per year; rating input score 100; 87th percentile among comparable filings
  • Revenue growth: 10.8% per year; rating input score 100; 76th percentile among comparable filings
  • Asset growth: 11.1% per year; rating input score 100; 74th percentile among comparable filings

Details

  • What they do: 19 programs and campaigns described on the official site · 4 operating locations identified
  • Where the money goes: 83.4% of revenue deployed · 88.9% of spending went to programs
  • Governance: 35 of 35 board members independent · 9 of 9 filing controls reported
  • Programs: 4 filed program accomplishments · $65.1M in reported program spending
  • Leadership: top reported pay $326K · 42 people listed · 2 of 6 pay-setting controls reported
  • Consistency: 36 of 36 current checks pass
  • Schedules: 7 filed schedules · includes major donors, grants, and executive pay
  • Filing history: 16 filing years from 2010 to 2025
  • Contacts: How to reach this organization
  • Money network: 20 filed money-flow records
  • Related organizations: 13 filed related-organization links
  • Grant readiness: Federal tax and exclusion status, award history, and grant-maker relationships.
  • People: Everyone the filings name, and which of them the filings identify by more than a name.
  • Staff and benefit plans: Retirement and health plans the organization files with the Department of Labor, and the people in them.

Key Signals

Signals prioritize questions for review. They are not findings of misconduct.

  • Moderate — Sustainability: Total-asset coverage ratio scored 31/100.
  • Review — Sustainability: Liabilities to assets ratio scored 50/100.
  • Review — Sustainability: Officer compensation ratio scored 53/100.