Jacki Payne

About Jacki

• Grandparental relationships have always been very near and dear to my heart—my parents were very young, so my great-grandmother lived with us and helped raise my siblings and I.
• I graduated from Spelman College with a degree in sociology and then went on to earn my law degree from the University of Georgia.
• During my second year of law school, I interned with the Atlanta Legal Aid Society and decided that I’d like to build my career around helping the community through free legal services.
• After my internship, I applied for a position with Atlanta Legal Aid and received a fellowship to work with senior citizens—I spent a few years doing that and then branched out into other services.
• I eventually left the firm because I was now a single parent with young kids and knew I could make more money in private practice.
• During that two-year break, my former executive director at Legal Aid would check in to see if I wanted to return—I eventually took him up on the offer because I wasn’t fulfilled in private practice.
• I rejoined Atlanta Legal Aid in their family law unit—I ended up really loving it and eventually became the managing attorney for the unit.
• I now work as the managing director of our kinship care unit, where I'm focused on helping relatives raise children in the place of deceased or absent parents.