Wednesday, July 10, 2019

Bar Fees increase

Annual Lawyer Fees Will Go Up, but Not as Much as State Bar Wanted


  • State lawmakers have settled on a new annual licensing fee of $544 for active California lawyers in 2020.
  • The Assembly Judiciary Committee on Tuesday approved amended legislation that includes the fee hike, which is significantly less than the $860 that bar leaders had sought at the beginning of the year. The $544 figure was crafted instead based on recent critical analyses of the bar’s proposals from the state auditor and the legislative analyst’s office.
  • Lawyers, as they can now, can choose to deduct $47 from that bill—the portion that pays for legal aid programs, the bar’s lobbying in the Legislature and elimination of bias programs. Inactive attorneys will be charged $183 in 2020, under the legislation.
  • The bill, now headed to a Senate fiscal committee and ultimately to the governor’s office, offers a 25% fee discount to licensees with gross annual incomes of less than $60,478.