By “level funding” line item 0321-1510 at $96,000,000 [same as FY 2017], where FY 2017 was “short” over $50 million, with a case load growth of about 38%, the FY 2018 is deliberately and severely underfunded. Payless months and delayed payments to attorneys who are “1099 independent contractors” are guarenteed to be WORSE in 2018. In effect, solo private attorneys are forced to give interest-free loans to the Commonwealth. The “Democratic” legislature lies and says it has balanced the budget while bleeding private attorneys. The Commonwealth does not pay interest when it makes 1099 contractor attorneys wait months for payment. We do pay interest on lines of credit, loans, credit cards – and incur penalties from raiding IRAs and 401ks. Don’t believe the myth that all attorneys are wealthy and our private clients keep us rolling in dough. First, the fast paced high volume nature of child welfare appointments and practice makes it virtually impossible to meet the needs of private clients in the same practice. Second, shouldn’t those who work so hard to meet the needs of the most vulnerable in society be rewarded by “Democrats”? I grew up believing that the Democratic party took social justice seriously. Not the legislative, party Democrat culture in Massachusetts. I feel like those folks sneer at the poor and look down on the indigent defense bar. I admit today I am feeling “stiffed”, underfunded, and ill treated. But then, it looks like the work I did in June and timely billed and invoiced the state for doing in June, will not be paid until maybe October, possibly November. So, yes, without raiding my 401k I am not financially okay or able to pay bills on time. Fun times, to be sure. But as a 69 year old pancreatic cancer widow, I will also admit that this intense, sometimes life-or-death work is meaningful and helps me get up in the morning and so despite having the Commonwealth balancing its budget on my small old back – I am not climbing out of the trenches. And I am not about to shut up either!!!
This ought to haunt every D legislator tonight. Every one. These are folks who work on behalf of literally the most vulnerable people in the Commonwealth.
Start at the bottom of the social ladder in your list of priorities. The last shall be first. Blessed are the meek.
Priorities.
Thank you so much for the solidarity. We in the private indigent bar, frankly, don’t experience much of that from any side or party. Our few allies in the legislature need to hear from BMG’ers.
Well , AmberPaw and I share a Rep and (to-be) Senator, and I’m sure they hear from her. Legal aid for the poor needs to be something that you just don’t skimp on — a requirement for any kind of fair society is access to legal counsel.
This is such an extraordinary post. Thank you so much for sharing our story so compellingly. Incredibly, one of the worst tormentors of the defenders of the indigent,
? Terry? Not sure what you are saying, was it “Incredibly, Speaker DeLeo, officially a Democrat and an attorney himself is one of the worst tormentors of those who defend the indigent? If that is what you meant, I agree but it began in 2003 or maybe earlier.
“Reserve Fund” what reserve fund? As always “the devil is in the details” and so are the lies. The answer to whether there is a “reserve fund” will almost certainly be in the so-called outside sections, where the line item [IF there is a new line item at all with funds put into it] for any alleged “reserve” is located and whether it is a new line item, and the rules and time for accessing it and for how many line items it is an alleged reserve. To cover “our” underfunding alone would take, in my analysis $60 million dollars.
I have reviewed the outside sections to H3800 and DO NOT find any language creating a new reserve fund. The current “rainy day fund” also commonly called “the reserve fund” has left line item 0321-1510 and 0321-1520 empty for months before.
Again, to avoid stiffing court appointed attorneys and bullying us into taking loans or pulling down retirement IRAs and 401ks to pay mjortgages and other expenses, the alleged reserve would need $60 million for line item 0321-1510 alone.
And if it funds sheriffs and district attorneys my belief and experience is the legislature especially Mr. DeLeo of Wintrop will let court-appointed attorneys and their vendors shrivel while they wait.
The reserve fund is line-item 1599-1690.
Thanks. I wonder where the regulations as to how it is funded, how it is accessed, and disbursement timelines and procedures may be found?
No reserve fund that I can see in the outside section. Zip. Zero!
Charlie – this is not “legal aid”. That is the Legal Services Corporation. The underfunded line item and “stiffed” attorneys provide Gideon mandated constitutional representation and access to justice to those faced with losses that hit a level where the Constitution itself mandates representation. While the landlord tenant work the legal aid folks do is important, the work court appointed attorneys do deals with losing your child forever because you are mentally ill or homeless, or being locked up for life. Little things like those.
The story hit the Globe https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2017/07/08/state-budget-gap-leaves-private-lawyers-for-poor-financial-straits/xkXwVvcGvlfXqkJ0bXfzMP/story.html
Also, Legal Aid attorneys are members of the Teamsters Union – but that all being said, they do good work for modest pay and we complement each other. I will leave “divide and conquer”: to the corporate world. The Legal Services Corp deserves more funds and also makes a huge difference in people’s lives. Its attorneys, though, do have paid sick time, paid vacations and health care and do not have to buy their own paperclips and copy paper [and everything else] like court appointed attorneys do. On the other hand, answering only to who I see in the mirror, my client, judges across the state and God has been a grand way to practice law. No regrets.
Great Globe article, Amber – important exposure of an unconscionable injustice to you lawyers and to the society as a whole.
I do need to correct the record here in a few respects. Some legal aid lawyers are members of a union (I know, for example, that Greater Boston Legal Services lawyers are members of the United Auto Workers union). Not all are — I am not. The funding source for my work is the Massachusetts Legal Assistance Corporation, not the Legal Services Corporation. That entity provides federal funds but with so many strings attached (no class action lawsuits, for example) that many legal services offices in the state choose to go without its funding. We represent poor clients in landlord tenant cases, as you say, and also public benefits, family law and immigration matters among other areas. While our legal help is not constitutionally mandated, ensuring that kids and their parents don’t have to sleep in their cars or in a train station is another form of public good. I assume that the unfortunate suggestion that we do not answer to the same authorities as you was unintended.
Thank you for the kind words. Sorry I got the wrong union; the only MLAC attorneys I know are GBLS, to the best of my knowledge. At one time the LSC funds were accepted; I didn’t know they no longer are. Nor did I intend to suggest [but in fact thought I lauded] what MLAC does and before I had two hip replacements and the “run” of deaths [husband, sister, mother, father between 2012-2014] I was a regular at the Walk to the Hill and in fact, know Judy Meredith well. I am not even sure what was meant by “not answer to the same authorities”. I do apologize for whatever discomfort I unintentionally caused and certainly do not claim that I know it all. Remember [or it may be before your time?] when MLAC had an adjunct panel on the DV cases? I used to do those but my energy level at 69 managing arthritis is not what it was 25 years ago. Keep up your great work; what is for sure is that laws only protect those they are intended to protect if there is access to the courts to confront and address needs and wrongs.
Per my analysis, even with the new “Reserve Fund” to fund 5 known underfunded line items including ours [0321-1510], with the “capped maximum draw” and growing caseload funded by the opiod epdemic, and the reduction of public defender caseloads [the “W2” CPCS employees per 0321-1500, a different line item] EVEN if the maximum draw of $44 million from the new reserve fund is possible and allowed with the others who can draw against it, Imy analysis paints a $30 million shortfall in FY 2018.
Should have been that the case load uptick is forced or fueled by the opiod epidemic and that the my analysis shows AT LEAST a $30 million shortfall and payless June or May- ? for FY 2018 and still potentially as high as $50 million shoftfall. As one attorney who also does court appointments for the indigent, destitute, and desperate [which includes children in foster care and homeless teens] told me once I explained my analysis, “Maybe we should all take our vacations in June. Ugh.”