Ciprocity
Legal aid programs across the United States
Case management for legal aid programs. Formerly known as OCM and Pika. PHP and MySQL. Contact us to talk about a demo.
Helping your organization reach its peak.
Custom software for civil legal aid programs: case management, website chatbots, guided interviews and document assembly, online intake, and court-record tools.
Software we have built
Everything below is in use by a legal aid program today. Where the code is public, there is a link to the source.
Case management
Website chatbots
Moose
Pine Tree Legal Assistance, Maine
Helps visitors find self-help materials and their local office on a large, information-dense site. Built on Google Dialogflow so staff can maintain it themselves.
Sunflower
Kansas Legal Services
Site navigation and referral chatbot for kansaslegalservices.org. Google Dialogflow.
Marshall
Virginia Access to Justice Commission
Website chatbot for selfhelp.vacourts.gov that helps self-represented Virginians find courts, forms, and legal help.
Website assistant
Michigan Indian Legal Services
Generative AI assistant grounded in the program's own web pages and documents. Answers with citations, declines to give legal advice, and meets WCAG 2.1. Google Gemini on Vertex AI, FastAPI on Cloud Run.
Guided interviews and document assembly
Chapter 7 Bankruptcy Clinic
docassemble interview, open source
One guided interview produces a complete, filing-ready Chapter 7 petition packet: 20 official court forms, the creditor matrix, the means test, and state exemptions with statutory caps. Nebraska and South Dakota tables included. Other states on request.
National Ability to Pay Calculator
abilitytopay.org, with Alex Kornya
Tells a court in a few minutes whether a person can afford court-ordered fines and fees, using IRS collection financial standards instead of a stack of paperwork. Can also produce a financial affidavit ready to file. docassemble.
Court records for re-entry and eviction prevention
Napier
Iowa Legal Aid
Searches Iowa Courts Online for a client, pulls every case, charge, and balance, and builds a criminal record spreadsheet that applies Iowa's expungement rules and court-debt analysis. Used for expungement, professional licensure, and court debt relief. Python and Flask.
Eviction Scraper
Legal Aid of Nebraska
Watches Nebraska Justice E-Services for new eviction filings and produces spreadsheets so tenant advocates can reach defendants before their hearing. Python. Public domain.
INDEIT
Indiana Legal Services
The Indiana Legal Services Expungement Information Tool. Helps pro bono attorneys research a client's records and expungement eligibility. Login-protected web app.
What's new in OCM
Open Case Management, also called Pika or Ciprocity
OCM started life as Pika and is also sold as Ciprocity. It is the same product. The current release is version 9.
- Aurora interface
- a new look with a command palette, three-pane case view, saved views, inline editing, and light, dark, and high-contrast themes.
- Casey AI assistant
- answers how-to questions from the OCM documentation. Casey never sees case data, scrubs personal information before it leaves the server, and logs every request.
- Workflow engine
- when a case opens, changes status, or gets a new activity, OCM can create ticklers and send email automatically.
- Red flag rules
- admin-defined warnings that show on a case when its data matches a rule.
- Report formulas
- a formula language for computed report columns.
- Document assembly
- docassemble integration plus .docx and RTF templates filled from case data.
- Online intake
- connectors for JotForm, FormAssembly, Formidable Forms, and Gravity Forms, plus a read-only client portal with document upload.
- Integrations
- single sign-on with Microsoft Entra and Google, Salesforce case sync, Twilio SMS with scheduled reminders, Office 365 calendar sync, and inbound email to case.
- Program modules
- HUD housing counseling, VAWA, immigration, education, pro bono, referral, and grant management.
- In development
- Outlook and Word add-ins, Microsoft Teams integration, and a mobile app.
About
Clark Management Consulting builds and maintains software for civil legal aid programs, law firms, and human service non-profits. We have been doing this work since 2017.
Our founder, Alex Clark, is a Nebraska-licensed attorney and a full-stack developer, with certifications in information security, IT audit, and project management from (ISC)², ISACA, PMI, CompTIA, and Microsoft. Most of our customers are small and medium non-profit law firms across the United States.
The work does not come out of a box. It usually starts with a problem a program already knows it has: a case management system that does not fit, a website nobody can navigate, a court process that eats staff time. We cover strategic planning, information security, software development, and business process along the way. If we are not the right fit for what you need, we will tell you.
What clients say
“He basically saved the entire project. He impressed us and he also impressed our outside tech people, and both our organizations would absolutely reach out to him again if another problem were to come up.”
“Alex worked with us to bring our vision to life, and now, nearly a year after launch we are pleased to report that our chatbot, Moose, has been a great success! This is a project we are very proud of – and working with Alex is a big part of what made it possible.”
“Alex’s people skills, reasonable rates, and very rare skill set make him an indispensable resource for Legal Aid organizations such as ours. When one of our senior staff hears that Alex has taken on a project, a sigh of relief typically follows.”
Contact
alex@clarkmanagementconsulting.com
GitHub @amsclarkGitLab @amsclark
Alex Clark is a Nebraska-licensed attorney and full-stack developer. Clark Management Consulting has built technology for legal aid, law firms, and human service non-profits since 2017.