Vol. 78, No. 7, July 2005

Help the SPD; Earn Free CLE

by George C. Brown,
State Bar executive director

Recently, I did a quick, thoroughly unscientific, survey of plumbing rates. Specifically, I talked with three plumbing companies in the Madison area. Trip charges averaged $39, and repair rates averaged $90 per hour, charged in half-hour increments. Rates for overtime work, meaning after 4:30 or 5 p.m. or on weekends, were at least 1.5 times the regular rates.

Compare that to the $40 per hour earned by lawyers representing people accused of committing crimes.

The Wisconsin Legislature sets the hourly rate paid by the Office of the State Public Defender (SPD) to private bar attorneys taking SPD assignments. Since 1995, the state has limited the SPD to paying $40 per hour, with $25 per hour for travel time. The type of case doesn't matter. If office overhead takes between 40 percent to 60 percent of your hourly rate, and you have to buy your benefits, including vacation, you can quickly see why few lawyers take these cases full-time.

This year, the SPD ran out of money in February, so lawyers have not been paid for any work done since then and won't get paid until the governor signs the new biennial budget bill.

Is it any wonder why Deborah Smith, director of the SPD Assigned Counsel Division, is desperate for help?

Enter State Bar of Wisconsin CLE.

Knowing the increasing difficulty the SPD was having in recruiting new assigned counsel and the growing numbers of attorneys who could not afford to take more cases, Tom Dixon, State Bar CLE director, approached Deb Smith about developing a program to encourage attorneys to take more SPD cases.

The program works like this. If you are an attorney who has never taken an SPD case or you have not taken an SPD case in the last two years and you volunteer to take at least five cases as assigned by the SPD, you will receive a certificate from the State Bar that is good for one free State Bar CLE seminar.

Since the program's inception, more than 81 new assigned counsel have taken at least five public defender cases each, for a total of more than 400 cases. By mid-June, State Bar CLE had awarded more than $16,000 worth of State Bar CLE seminar certificates to these attorneys.

To volunteer for SPD case assignments, contact Attorney Deborah Smith at the Office of the State Public Defender, (608) 261-8856. To learn more about becoming certified to take public defender cases and other requirements, access the SPD Web site (www.wisspd.org).

Wisconsin Lawyer