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Candace Sanders has been in the law business for more than 40 years, but she’s never had a client of her own.

Until now.

Sanders, 59, recently became one of the first limited license legal technicians (LLLT) in America, practicing out of an office on 12th Avenue in Longview. Washington is the first state to try out an LLLT program, which is overseen by the Washington State Bar association and certifies non-lawyers to provide lower cost legal assistance to clients who want to represent themselves in court. There are now nine throughout the state, and Sanders is the only one in Southwest Washington.

The goal of the program is twofold: Educate people about the law and give a chance at legal representation to those who can’t afford a lawyer, a need the program’s leaders say hasn’t been met until now. According to a 2003 study by the Washington Supreme Court, that’s a lot of people. It estimated that low-income people have 1.1 million legal problems annually and yet “face 88 percent of their legal problems without advice or representation from an attorney.”