SPD’s budget request includes private attorney rate hike

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The State Public Defender’s 2015-17 biennial budget request includes a proposal to increase to up to $60 per hour the rate paid to private attorneys who take on case work for the office.

The current rate is $40 an hour for case work and $25 an hour for travel. While far from the first time the SPD has made such a request, this year’s proposal, released Tuesday, is the first time the agency’s board has proposed a tiered system. The request proposes that private attorneys get paid $45 for routine cases, $50 for more complicated cases and $60 for the most complex ones.

The SPD requests the pay bump affects cases assigned after July 1, 2016. During the first fiscal year in practice, the SPD estimated, the new rate would cost $6,291,400. The SPD, in total, is requesting $185,230,900, or about 10 percent more than its budget for the current biennium.

SPD spokesman Randy Kraft said 1,200 attorneys are licensed to take public defender cases in Wisconsin. About a quarter of those take five or less cases a year.

According to the request, SPD reimbursement rates have not kept up with inflation. Federal Defender Services Inc., which hires private attorneys to handle federal criminal cases, pays $110 an hour for noncapital cases.

According to the budget request, “The current $40 per hour rate, applicable regardless of the complexity of the case, has been cited by private bar attorneys as the main factor in their decisions to no longer accept or too infrequently accept SPD case appointments. Most attorneys are small-business owners who must make sound economic decisions in order to remain in business.”

Kraft said Tuesday the reimbursement rate for case work in 1977, when the office was formed, was $45. The request also states that private attorneys hired to prosecute Office of Lawyer Regulation cases are paid $70 an hour.

Kraft said the SPD struggles in parts of the state to find attorneys to take cases, which often results in attorneys from several counties over getting hired and being paid to travel.

The SPD also requested the state change its law to allow for attorneys who are traveling from within their county to be reimbursed for travel. Currently, attorneys are paid $25 an hour only for the time traveling to handle a case in another county.

It also asked the state to pay $1,000 to an attorney in overhead reimbursement if he or she completes 26 cases or $2,000 if they complete 50 or more cases. Those changes would cost an estimated $2.27 million.

“Creating an overhead payment will allow private bar attorneys to take a consistent number of SPD appointments without causing undue hardship on their private practice,” according to the request. Follow @eheisigWLJ