Mental Health Legal Advisors Committee (MHLAC) provides legal and policy advocacy for people with mental health challenges throughout the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. A State agency, its central priority is to address those concerns that are most closely related to clients’ ability to live full and independent lives. Like other legal services offices, this includes combating poverty, which is often characterized as a “social determinant” of mental illness. When clients are put in institutional settings, MHLAC seeks to protect them from abusive treatment that can often wreak permanent damage.