PSJD Public Interest News Digest – January 24, 2020
Sam Halpert, NALP Director of Public Service Initiatives
Hello there, interested public!
Digest is squeaking out just under the wire this week, so I’ll be brief. Major stories include a proposal to fund the Right to Counsel for Eviction at the federal level, the new San Francisco DA’s decision to end pretrial cash bail, and the Trump Administration’s decision to relocate hundreds of immigration detainees’ hearings from northern to southern California. Thematically, work conditions for public defenders dominated the news, with Philadelphia public defenders preparing for a unionization ballot while state-wide policy proposals moved forward in Wisconsin, where public defenders are set to receive pay parity with state prosecutors, and in Georgia, where the governor is proposing to cut public defender funding by $3 million–and to increase prosecutors’ funds by about the same.
As always, these stories and more are in the links below.
See you around,
Sam
Immigration, Refugee & Citizenship Issues
- In San Francisco CA, “Northern California immigration attorneys are reeling after learning of a controversial Trump administration decision to move hundreds of immigrant detainees’ court hearings out of San Francisco and to a new courthouse in Van Nuys, a neighborhood in north Los Angeles.”
- In Texas, “Gov. Greg Abbott [explained] in a TV interview [] why Texas will be the only state in the nation to reject refugees seeking resettlement, saying that aid groups working with refugees should instead prioritize other Texans in need, including the state’s homeless population.”
- Also in Texas, “[w]ith a substantial increase in filing fees for immigration benefits looming, advocates are urging migrants to get their applications in as soon as possible. Once the fees go up, attorneys and nonprofits who assist migrants fear the benefits of U.S. citizenship, legal residency for relatives, work permit renewals and a host of other services will be out of reach for many of their clients.”
- In a motion before the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles CA, “[l]awyers representing undocumented immigrants detained by ICE allege that courts and government authorities under the Trump administration are not complying with a federal court order that protects mentally disabled immigrants in California, Arizona and Washington.”
Student Loans & Student Debt
- In New York NY, “Educational Credit Management Corporation (ECMC) — a nonprofit that guarantees and services student loans on behalf of the Department of Education (ED) — is challenging the January 7 decision made by Chief U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Cecelia G. Morris, who discharged $221,385.49 in student loan debt for Navy veteran and lawyer Kevin Rosenberg under chapter 7 bankruptcy.”
- In California, “[i]n an opposition motion [to a federal court’s $100,000 sanction against Education Secretary DeVos for violating a court order and billing thousands of students with loans tied to now-defunct Corinthian Colleges], the Education Department said it’s been doing its best to comply with a preliminary injunction that prevents it from demanding repayment for Corinthian-related student debt.”
- In Washington DC, “Sen. Elizabeth Warren [] praised the IRS and Treasury Department’s decision to provide tax relief to more people with discharged student loans.”
- The Chronicle of Higher Education, surveying the legislative agendas of the Democratic presidential candidates featured in the last debate, determined that “Free College, Student-Debt Forgiveness, and Pell Grant Expansion Dominate Higher-Ed Policy for Top Democratic Candidates.”
- Moody’s Investors Service released a report indicating that “student loan debt still stands at $1.7 trillion [with] borrowers taking longer to pay it back, which means they’re paying more interest in the end.”
Disaster Law & The Environment
- In San Francisco CA, “the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals threw out…Juliana vs. the United States[,]” in which “21 young people sued the US government, alleging that by contributing to climate [change] despite knowledge of its dangerous consequences, it was violating their constitutional rights to life, liberty, and property.” The opinion found that “the plaintiffs’ case must be made to the political branches or to the electorate at large.”
- Time Magazine has more on this story and “what it might mean for the future of climate litigation.”
Legal Technology
- In New York State, “Elizabeth A. Garry, Presiding Justice of the Appellate Division, Third Department, provide[d] an update on access to justice in rural communities, writing that court simplification will ameliorate some of the challenges rural attorneys currently encounter.”
- In Washington DC, Above the Law, citing reporting from the Wall St. Journal, reported that “[w]hile Barr is trying to turn the public against Apple by suggesting it protects terrorists and murderers, FBI employees are worried his words and actions will harm them more than help them.”
- Also in Washington DC, “[a] year after passage of a law requiring federal agencies to improve the quality and accessibility of digital services, the General Services Administration on Wednesday released a set of website design standards agencies across government can use to meet that mandate.”
- In Canada, “[t]he RCMP [] would neither confirm nor deny that it’s using Clearview AI’s technology, which allows police forces to check photos against a database of three billion images scraped from the web.”
Non-Profit & Government Management & Hiring
- In Washington DC, “Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) says she wants to expand the use of direct hire authorities to fill critical vacancies throughout the federal workforce. She wants to find ways to reinstate qualified former federal employees back to the workforce. Warren is also recommending a government mentorship program specifically for employees of color. As well as expanding the cooling off period to six years for lobbyists before they can take a government job.”
- In Hawaii, “Hawaii Attorney General Clare Connors subpoenaed [] KAHEA, or the Hawaiian Environmental Alliances [because t]he AG believes the group involved in protests against the Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) on Mauna Kea is illegally using donations to fund civil disobedience.”
- In Alberta, “Legal Aid Alberta (LAA) is asking its roster lawyers to update their online profiles in order to reflect changes it is implementing on choice of counsel for clients and travel compensation for those who take on legal aid certificates.”
- On the internet, “[a] private equity fund backed by three prominent Republican billionaire families is expected to buy the dot-org domain, throwing into question whether the online safe haven for rights organizations and nonprofits could now face censorship or spiralling costs[; ] a small and vociferous group of nonprofits, charities, and human rights organizations have banded together to make a last-ditch attempt to block the sale.” (See previous editions of the digest for additional coverage of this story.)
Access to Justice – Civil
- In Washington DC, “Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro (D-Connecticut)…re-introduc[ed] what’s known as the Eviction Prevention Act[:] ‘It would allow the U.S. Attorney General to authorize $125 million in grants to states, counties and cities to provide people with representation by an attorney [in] any eviction cases[.]”
- In California, “State Bar leaders took another step…toward opening up the regulation of legal services in the state, launching the assembly of a task force to explore a licensing scheme under which paraprofessionals would provide certain legal services and advice to consumers.”
- In New York NY, the New York Daily News argued that “with the housing and homelessness crises unabated, it is more imperative than ever to expand the right [to counsel for eviction] to include the many low-income New Yorkers who are currently ineligible.”
- In Manitoba, “Legal Aid Manitoba has a short-term “contingency” plan ready should the province’s private criminal lawyers stop taking new cases to protest the current rates of compensation, says an official with the service provider.”
- LegalShield, “the world’s leading provider of affordable legal and identity theft protection plans, released the results of The 2019 LegalShield Workplace Study[.]” Among the study’s findings were that “77% of employers believe access to affordable legal services can help improve employees’ financial well-being [and] 61% of employers would consider offering identity theft and / or legal protection plans.”
Access to Justice – Criminal
- In Philadelphia PA, “public defenders will vote to decide whether to unionize their workplace after informal negotiations with management stalled.”
- In Mercer County OH, “Justice Judith French [] talk[ed] to local judges about the issues they are facing and what resources the Ohio Supreme Court can provide to them. [On the shortage of public defenders,] French says even though the state has tried to address the problem with more funding, the solution is simple, Ohio needs more lawyers on both the criminal and civil side.”
- In related news, the Ohio state legislature deliberated on “House Bill 5[, which] would give lawyers who become public defenders tuition loan assistance up to $85,000 for five years of service.”
- In Macomb County MI, local news reported the county “will create an office to represent indigent criminal defendants as part of statewide and national efforts to improve their legal representation.”
- In Atlanta GA, “Governor Brian Kemp has unveiled his proposed budget for the upcoming fiscal year, which will begin on July 1, 2020. In it, he asks lawmakers to slash the funds available to state public defenders by more than $3 million—and to increase the funds available to prosecutors by about the same amount.”
- In Madison WI, “[t]he state Senate [] passed an amended version of Senate Bill 468 to provide a pay-progression plan for assistant state public defenders.”
- In Jefferson City MO, “[d]uring the annual State of the Judiciary address, given to a joint session of the Missouri Legislature, Chief Justice George Draper III [stated that] ‘Speaking from the perspective of both a former prosecutor and a former trial judge, I can tell you the system simply does not work without a sufficiently funded and staffed public defender system’[.]”
- In Prince William County VA, “[a] proposal to create a public defender office for Prince William County has won two favorable votes already at the General Assembly.”
Criminal Justice Reform
- In San Francisco CA, “San Francisco’s new top prosecutor says his office will no longer ask for cash bail as a condition for defendants’ pretrial release, fulfilling one of his key campaign promises.”
- In Los Angeles CA, LA Magazine profiled “Rachel Rossi, the Progressive Ex-Public Defender Running for DA”
- In Honolulu, Hawaii News Now reported that “[p]rosecutors [have] recently started looking for warrants of witnesses and victims who are set to testify in upcoming trials.”
- In Washington DC, “Attorney General [] Barr [] swore in 16 members of a new national commission to study crucial issues in law enforcement, which aims to follow in the footsteps of a similar commission formed in 1965 that launched such concepts as improved training for police, increased data collection in policing and the 911 emergency dispatch system.”
- In Milwaukee WI, “Milwaukee’s District Attorney and the head of the Wisconsin Public Defender’s office have crossed turf lines to develop a system of ‘community-oriented’ justice whose end goal is to put fewer people in prison.”
- In Harris County TX, the Houston Chronicle reported that while “[t]he Harris County District Attorney’s office contends it needs more staff to ensure due process and increased diversion options [ c]ritics and primary challengers to District Attorney Kim Ogg contend that doing so would reverse justice reform efforts, believing more prosecutors equate to more convictions.”