Bar to adhere to ‘real’ deadline for dues payment
$100 late penalty will attach Feb. 2
By Nancy McCarthy
Staff Writer
If you’re one of more than 60,000 California lawyers who wait until
March 15 to pay your bar dues, here’s a heads up: you’ll have to
start paying on time or face a penalty.
By statute, State Bar dues are due on Feb. 1. In 2007, bar dues not postmarked
or paid online by Feb. 1 will be considered late and a $100 penalty will attach
on Feb. 2. In addition, every lawyer who ultimately is suspended in late summer
by the Supreme Court for non-payment of fees will be required to pay a $100
reinstatement fee before being allowed to practice law.
The State Bar Board of Governors enacted the tougher measures last month in
an effort to shorten the 10-month span and enormous expense it takes to collect
dues every year. On average, after the Feb. 1 statutory deadline, the bar sends
out 65,000 second notices to members who haven’t complied.
A third and fourth mailing are subsequently sent to delinquent dues payers,
with a statutory “Final Delinquent Notice” included in the fourth
mailing. The board must wait 60 days following the final mailing before it
can act to have the Supreme Court administratively suspend the attorneys who
haven’t paid.
“We want to adhere to the statutory due date,” said Peggy Van
Horn, the bar’s chief financial officer, who noted that fee statements
are initially sent on Nov. 15 and that the administrative suspension does not
occur now until 10 months later, on Sept. 15.
Added Dean Kinley, the bar executive who oversees the fee statement, “Every
year it is virtually the same 5,000 to 6,000 non-payers” who receive
all the notices and whose names appear on the suspension list generated in
the summer. “Over the years, we started making exceptions for nearly
everyone,” he added.
The cost for the first mailing in November to all members runs close to $100,000,
and the second, third and fourth mailings can each cost between $20,000 and
$30,000, depending on postage. Kinley said he could not begin to estimate the
tens of thousands of dollars in labor it costs the bar to process four mailings
while non-paying attorneys are permitted to practice law more than 10 months
after they receive their dues notice, and more than eight months after their
dues were due.
The change the board approved means that active lawyers whose payment is not
postmarked, or paid online through My State Bar Profile, by Feb. 1 must pay
a $100 penalty. Inactive members will be charged a $30 penalty.
Although the deadline for bar dues is Feb. 1, the bar has long offered a 45-day
grace period before it penalized people who pay late. As a result, thousands
of lawyers, and many large law firms, wait until March 15 to pay their dues.
A second penalty that previously was assessed May 15 was eliminated.
But Richard Crabtree, a governor from Chico, opposed the change. “People
have gotten used to flexibility in deadlines,” he said. “I think
we should stick with the current penalties.”
The reinstatement fee, which Van Horn called “an attention-getter,” drew
opposition from Marguerite Downing, a governor from Los Angeles, who felt it
flies in the face of any bar efforts to be member-friendly. Lawyers “have
to pay dues to belong,” she said. “We want them to feel they belong.
It’s important to limit the ways” they do not become unhappy with
the bar.
The board did change a staff recommendation that new admittees who don’t
pay dues within 30 days of their invoice date be given 45 days to pay. Lawyers
admitted to the bar between Jan. 1 and May 31 pay full dues; the penalty for
late payment in that group will be $100. Those admitted between June 1 and
Nov. 30 pay $200 in dues for their first year of practice; the penalty for
that group will be $50.
“I don’t want them to join the club and have them mad at us,” Downing
said. Kinley noted that a variety of proposals are being considered to help
make the new admittee experience “more welcoming.”
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