AUGUSTA, Maine —
Maine defense attorneys who represent criminal defendants who cannot afford an attorney on their own are getting a raise.
The Maine Commission on Indigent Legal Services voted on Wednesday to raise their pay from $80 to $150 dollars an hour, effective March 1st.
The boost financed by almost $7 million dollars -- $2.8 million allocated from previously unspent state general funds and $4 million in leftover federal coronavirus relief funds.
The state’s supplemental budget, passed by the Maine State Legislature last week and signed by Governor Janet Mills on Tuesday, authorized the commission to implement the raise.
Maine legislators propose emergency funding to boost pay for attorneys doing public defense work
In an interview at his office, MCILS Executive Director Justin Andrus described the significance of the higher rate.
“That’s not a wage that’s being paid to the attorney the way another person working in a different job might receive a wage. That’s the total payment the state makes for an hour or work on an indigent defense case, and it has to pay for overhead and staff and insurance and benefits, and it has to go a lot further,” Andrus said. “That’s going to help us retain and recruit and bring back some of the people we’ve lost, and it’s already working.”
As word of the forthcoming raise spread, Andrus said, 20 more attorneys have registered to take on criminal and child protective cases on track for trial.
But the total number of attorneys...
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