Davis County legal defenders ask budget committee for funding boost for CLE, appeals and staff contracts

Davis County legal defenders told the county Budget Committee they need additional funding to cover continuing legal education (CLE) costs, rising appeals workloads and contract-related pay increases, and urged the county to include those amounts in the next budget.

The request, made during a budget committee meeting, came from a legal defender who said he has paid CLE expenses out of pocket for eight to nine years and can no longer absorb those costs. He asked the county to begin covering CLE expenses for the public defense program so those trainings no longer come from individual attorneys’ pockets.

Why this matters: Defenders said the county’s indigent-defense system faces sustained pressure from an above-guideline caseload and a growing volume of appellate work. Those pressures, they said, are driving higher costs for investigator time, transcripts and outside appellate counsel and could affect the county’s ability to meet constitutional defense obligations if not budgeted for.

Discussion and figures presented County staff clarified that an initial broad figure mentioned by defenders was not a single $300,000…