While north Louisiana’s Public
Defender Offices won’t
be the only ones in Louisiana to face budget cuts for the remainder of the
fiscal year – most around the state are – their struggles and consequences
illustrate questions that deserve addressing about funding of this service.
As part of fiscal shortfalls at the
state level, the state’s contribution to the 42 offices carrying out the
function of representing indigent clients – around 90
percent of all trials in Caddo Parish involve a public defender and four-fifths
of all felony accusations accrue to individuals eligible to be declared
indigent – will see a $5.4 million reduction or about one-sixth of the entire
contribution spread out over one-third of the fiscal year. Funding comes from
the state, from local governments (by grants, contracts, and a fee on bonding),
from $45 assessments, up from $35 three
years ago, on the accused not found innocent, and from $40 application fees
and possible reimbursement assessments, although
less than half in the First District pay the fees and a much smaller proportion
engage in partial reimbursement.
Several years ago the state revamped
the public defender system and increased the state funded portion of it to
serve as a backstop against the vagaries of court assessments. By reducing the
state’s contribution, this depletes the backstop and begins to approach the
same situation as some years ago. As the First District gets about half its
funding from the state, this has thrown it into crisis.
As a result, its head Alan Golden has had to reduce personnel hours and/or salaries and caseloads, not only to balance the budget in face of exhausted reserves but also to create a baseline to survive into the next fiscal year. He also has had to eliminate the misdemeanor panel and the conflict panel, which comprise the majority of cases and will force farming these out to local lawyers who will donate their time but may not have expertise in those areas of law. These go into effect Apr. 1.
The Twenty-Sixth District in
Bossier and Webster Parishes has been fared slightly better, avoiding layoffs of
full-time personnel but not able to fill vacant positions and having to cut
ties with some contract attorneys. Its head Pamela Smart will implement
its restriction is services plan on Mar. 26. Local governments have helped by waiving some
costs or providing services. But in both districts a hold will be in place on
taking new cases, meaning the accused, even if eventually found innocent,
likely will spend more time in jail waiting on a trial.
As a whole, northeast Louisiana as
far as regions go actually may be in less financial trouble than any other in
the state. Nevertheless, current
trends show while by next year the Fourth and Sixth Districts’ offices may
be accruing funds, the Third will be operating in deficit and the Second, Fifth,
and Thirty-Seventh will be insolvent.
Policy-makers generally expected that
the court cost increase would bring some funding stability to the system, but
that has yet to pan out, and now state budget cuts only exacerbate the
situation. This underscores the problematic policy choice made in Louisiana to
place such a large burden on court fees, decentralized out among 42 districts,
making it the only state to rely primarily on such fees to fund the system in
the aggregate. Worse, the increase is due to expire a month after the end of
fiscal year 2016 and past proposed legislation to convert more felonies into
misdemeanors, especially in the area of illegal drugs, that would lower defense
costs are uncertain to gain any traction in the future.
While the logic of court fees is
not thoughtless – those convicted of crimes should pay to provide
constitutionally-required defense to others – the execution could be improved
to flush more funds to indigent defense. These assessments could be altered to be
10 percent of any fine levied by a court or a minimum of $50, permanently. If crimes
are of such magnitude that the higher fines imposed on the guilty reflect the additional
effort the state must put in for investigation and conviction, it’s fair that
part of their debt to society also include increased responsibility for
assisting defense of the indigent. Concurrently the state could make a better
effort to keep its contribution adequate for performance of this task.
Major strides occurred with the
structural reforms of several years ago. Making needed financial reforms can
avert the present funding crisis that threatens by next year to affect almost
all districts in the state so these agencies can worry less about this and more
about representing clients.
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