Overview

• Governor Maura Healey signed the supplemental budget on August 5, immediately boosting bar advocates’ pay by $10 per hour with another $10 increase slated for next year.
• The law allocates $40 million to the Committee for Public Counsel Services to recruit roughly 320 additional staff public defenders to ease the reliance on independent contractors.
• Jennifer O’Brien and the vast majority of bar advocates have declined to resume taking new court-appointed cases, maintaining the two-month work stoppage.
• District courts in Suffolk and Middlesex counties are operating under the Lavallee emergency protocol, issuing releases for defendants held over seven days without counsel and dismissing cases stalled beyond 45 days.
• Contract reforms now require bar advocates to enter biannual agreements with CPCS and treat coordinated refusals to accept assignments at set rates as potential antitrust violations.