Carmen M. Ortiz-Babilonia

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The “worst of the worst” is how attorney Carmen Ortiz-Babilonia describes the types of cases that come through her department at the Legal Aid Society of Milwaukee.

Ortiz-Babilonia is the supervising attorney for the Family Court Guardian ad Litem Project and child placement issues make up the majority of her caseload, which has only been bolstered by the recession.

“We just had a divorce case with multiple issues from adopted children to birth children,” Ortiz-Babilonia said. “When the case was referred to us, both parents were working, but now the mom is already out of a job, facing foreclosure.”

After a decade of practicing law exclusively with non-profit outfits and prior professional experience as a social worker, Ortiz-Babilonia has tried to make the best of the worst from both experiences for more than two decades.

She started her legal career with Centro Legal in 1999 and joined Legal Aid in 2002. But after two years, she returned to Centro Legal from 2004-06 before returning to Legal Aid for good.

As the only bilingual attorney on staff, Ortiz-Babilonia handles cases dealing with Spanish-speaking clients. Of the almost 50 active cases she handles at a time, about one-third deal with people who don’t speak English.

“If both parents are mono-lingual, most likely I will handle the case and need to make arrangements to translate,” she said. “I’ll make the time.”

Last year, Ortiz-Babilonia said she and her staff handled about 1,200 cases and closed about 800.

She said one of the biggest areas she has seen an increase in is child support issues, especially with people losing jobs at a record pace.

“You could technically have somebody sending support today based on a regular job and next week they are out of work,” she said. “I’m seeing that very often.”

Ortiz-Babilonia is also someone who lives her work as opposed to just doing it. As a resident of Milwaukee’s south side, she said it is common to run into past clients at the local grocery store.

“On occasion someone will come and ask about a case I did three years ago,” she said. “I feel it’s important to live in the community I serve.”