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Public Defenseless
493 | Two Oregon Public Defenders Sued the Oregon Public Defense Commission and Won. Now What? w/Shannon Wilson and Stacey Lowe
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Foreign.
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Welcome back to Public Defenseless with Hunter Parnell as we explore the rot in the criminal justice system and what we can do about it. Hey there everybody. Welcome back to another fantastic episode. Today I was joined once again by two amazing public defender leaders from the state of state of Oregon. Joining us once again is Shannon Wilson, executive director of the Public defender of Marion County Incorporated. And joining us as well is Stacy Lowe, executive director of the Southwest Oregon Public Defender Services. And what are we talking about today? Well, folks, as a reminder, the last time that these two were on the show, we were discussing a lawsuit that they had brought against the Oregon Public Defense Commission. In it, they alleged that a provision of the contract that they were working under was illegal. That provision required that public defenders working under this contract accept at least 90% of the workload standard that were provided by the Oregon Public Defenders Commission. The problem with that was that a Shannon and Stacy argued that the workload standards in Oregon are unethical, that they are too high, that if you were to actually carry 90% of them in almost every single case type, you would be carrying an unethical, unconstitutional workload. And they argued that because this provision was mandatory, it created serious ethical problems for them because if they didn't carry 90%, well, their offices would face a loss of funding, a loss of staffing. So they brought suit. And today we are here to talk about the results of that lawsuit. Back in February, a trial happened and the transcript for that trial is located down in the show notes for anybody who wants to read it, who wants to check it out. But I hope you listen to today's episode for a couple reasons. Number one, what is very clear from the testimony offered at this trial from Malia Brink, the renowned expert on workload standards around the country. In front of the show, Malia made it very clear that except for homicide and Jessica's Law cases, every other case type in the state of Oregon, if you follow the workload standards that the Oregon Public Defense Commission offers, you're very likely engaged in some unethical behavior because the workloads are simply too high. Now I am pretty saddened to see the response to this from other public defender leaders around the state of Oregon. I've reached out to a few and received no respons is about how they plan to change their practices in their offices. You see, we have one of the leading experts in the country coming to the state of Oregon saying these workloads are unethical. And I would hope that, you know, once a judge agrees with some of those findings that maybe some other leaders would join Shannon, would join Stacy, and would stand up and say, you know what? We are not going to abide by these workload limitations either. We are going to actually implement the national public defender workload study. We are going to create workload standards that are based on evidence, based on data. Even if you don't want to use the national public defender workload study, the workloads in Oregon are not based on anything. They're not based on data. And that was elicited through testimony during this trial. And it's been sad to see that so few have joined Shannon and Stacy. And I hope by hearing their story, other leaders in the state of Oregon will have the same courage to stand up for their people and say, enough is enough. Now to the next level of leadership with the Oregon public defense commission itself. One of the real disheartening, but in some ways refreshing aspects of this trial was the pretty straightforward honesty of Ken sanshegrin, the leader of the Oregon public defense commission. He was pretty direct when he said that the reason why we do what we do is because we are bound by the money that the legislature gives us and we work with what we've got. I appreciate that honesty, but it does worry me a little bit, because what appears to me to be the case is that the legislature and the executive in the state of Oregon want the unrepresented person crisis to go away. They are tired of the headlines. They are tired of dealing with this. They are simply tired of having to talk about public defense. And the directives that they have given to the Oregon public defense commission is that to make this problem go away. And here's the thing, folks, that is a noble goal. Making sure that people have counsel is something that we should be pursuing. I do not begrudge the commission for pursuing those ends, and I don't begrudge the executive or the legislature for making it priority. But it doesn't matter how we do. It does matter how we make sure that there are no unrepresented people. It is not a better system that people have a person standing next to them, but that they are so overworked, so overwhelmed that they can't provide meaningful, effective, competent representation to those individuals. In fact, I would argue that's a worse situation because now legislatures, now executives no longer feel the pressure of the public demanding that something be done about public defense. Because for all intents and purposes, people think the problem's gone away because they misidentified the problem. The problem isn't just that people are unrepresented. The problem is that the state of Oregon has not set up a system where we can ensure that every single person who needs counsel, who cannot afford it, gets counsel that is not overwhelmed, that gets counsel that is capable of providing effective representation because they do not have excessive workload. That is the actual crisis in Oregon Public defense. And I worry based on the tone and tenor of what was presented at the testimony, that we might be more interested in just making the problem go away instead of solving the actual root issue. Now, I have reached out to the Oregon Public Defense Commission for comment and as of recording, I have not received it. But just like I did on some previous episodes, I will post the questions that I asked to opdc and there is a chance that by the time I release this episode, they respond. Usually OPDC is actually very good about getting back to me with responses for questions. So if they do respond those questions, those responses will be posted down in the show notes. But folks, if you're out there listening in the state of Oregon, I hope that this episode serves as some inspiration to do more, to raise your voice to join Shannon and Stacey. Because the judiciary in Oregon, if they've shown one thing, they've shown a willingness to give public defenders relief. You do not have to fight this fight alone. And in fact, if there is a possibility for Oregon Public Defense to improve to solve its root issues, I think it is going to require the chief public defenders of the state to stand up in the way that Shannon and Stacy did and say enough is enough. As always, folks, if you're liking the show, like subscribe. 5 star rating 5 star review. Feel free to reach out to me on Twitter, Instagram, via email, or on Blue Sky. If you are liking what you're hearing and you would like to contribute to the ongoing cost of production for the Public Defenseless podcast, you can go down below in the show notes to PayPal, Patreon or Stripe, where you can contribute for as little as $5 a month or as much as you feel you can afford to give. As a reminder folks, I take no sponsorship money. I do no advertising reads. This show is funded predominantly from the generous contributions of listeners like yourself and out of my own pocket. So if you're liking what you're hearing, you want to contribute to the show, I encourage you to go below and subscribe on Patreon today. If you do so, you will gain access to the video versions of the show. You will get the episodes a day early and that means you will get to see my adorable miniature dots and puppy beans, who has once again been scooped up from his mid introduction nap, folks. If you want to see how adorable this puppy is, want to see how sleepy, how much he is fighting to keep his little eyelids open so he can present himself well on the show instead of just hearing me describe it. I encourage you to go below and subscribe on Patreon today. And now, without anything more from me, let's get to the episode. Shannon and Stacy, welcome back to the Public Defenseless podcast. How are you all doing today?
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I'm doing fantastic.
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Excellent.
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Hunter, folks. Shannon, that is the voice of somebody who, after a long weekend, working successfully on their chicken coop. That's why Shannon is fantastic, folks. As a reminder, folks, part one of this story came out earlier in the year. Go listen to part one both with Stacey and Shannon of how we got here, because we're going to jump straight into this. The only thing I want is whoever wants to take it. Could you please just give us a little bit of a reminder? This court case, what was it about and what was the goal of this hearing that y' all had?
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C
So this, this started back in. Yeah, the beginning of the fall when we first started seeing the initial terms of the contract we were being offered here in Oregon. This isn't something that surprised us. It was something that they were talking about, the commission here in Oregon, the Public Defense Commission, about requiring a provision where the attorneys would have to meet a certain quota of cases per year. And that provision, coupled with the Mac terminology, which, just to remind everyone, Mac is Oregon's version, modified version of the National Caseload standards from the 1970s. And so instead of 400 weighted misdemeanors a year, it's 300 weighted misdemeanors a year. And that provision, the caseload quota with the number, sheer number of cases required under the Mac caseload standards, was what gave us a lot of concern, caused us to be pretty concerned with what this contract was asking of the attorneys that we have the privilege of leading. So those standards, it was foreseeable in both of our opinions and our expertise in being public defense leaders here in Oregon that that would lead to ethical violations because there is just not enough attorney to go around for that number of people with that type of case. So Stacy and I made the decision to stand up to the agency here in Oregon and really speak truth to power. In essence, we decided that we would no longer be complicit with caseload numbers that were being imposed either directly or indirectly by the agency to Us and our attorneys and that we would speak up and speak out and require the agency prioritize the ethical responsibilities and obligations of us as supervising attorneys and of our attorneys in our office. So I think that. So that led to the initial filing of the lawsuit. We had a preliminary hearing that we were successful in November, and then we had our trial in February. I think it was February 19th and 20th. Is that it was around there. February 19th and 20th are around there. Of 2026. And so that's what we're here to talk about, is the outcome of that trial.
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Okay, so then let's get into actually what we find here. So the first person that I want to talk about is Malia Brink, because she is called as an expert witness, as she is so often called, to discuss the Mac standards in the state of Oregon, these workload numbers that have been proposed to you. And I want to take it from both of you as you heard or as you got an opportunity to read the transcript, because, Stacy, you weren't there from Aaliyah's testimony. Right. You were shockingly working. And being a. Being an attorney, not surprising, since that's what we're here to talk about is workload. You didn't get to hear everything, but you had an opportunity to read it. So as you were listening to Malia's testimony, or you were reading Malia's testimony, what do you think Oregon public defenders should take away from that testimony? What parts of it are really important for them to understand? And then we'll break down some of those, specifically.
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Sure. I think what's really important to internalize is that this is not about blaming public defenders for supporting the justice system in this provision of less than adequate representation, because we came into this line of work with good intentions, with wanting to do this hard work and wanting to ensure that everybody had access to justice. And when we came into this, we were just told, this is what it looks like. This is what you have to do if you're going to. To help indigent folks. And we weren't given a choice. And it was this idea of ethical blindness wasn't something that even existed in our world at that point in time. And so it's important to know that, because in order for us to stop it, we have to be able to say, yeah, this is what's happening. We cannot allow it to happen. But oftentimes people stumble over that because they don't want to feel like they have failed or that they are behaving unethically. And so I think that her discussion of ethical blindness is really important. And I was lucky to be able to actually experience the difference in my own career so that I can really understand how that works and how it is so insidious. And it's not the fault of public defenders per se, but it is something that we have to correct now that we can identify it.
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Yeah. And Shannon, want to go to you to build on that. Malia speaks explicitly. She takes the national workload standards, and she applies them to the Mac standards that y' all operate under. And what. It was very clear. She was asked very directly about every single case type, about the workloads that y' all have. And outside of, I believe it was murder and Jessica's Laws, which I. Could you explain real quick? What Jessica's Law?
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Yeah. It's a mandatory minimum sentence of at least 25 years for a sexual assault case involving a minor.
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Okay. So child sex assault case and homicide case. She is asked directly by counsel, do the max standards, as they apply in Oregon under this contract, if somebody were to go to the maximum, would they be, you know, presumptively facing some ethical issues with the workload they're carrying? And for every single case type, except for Jessica's Law and homicide, the answer was yes, there are ethical problems with the workloads you operate under. So, Shannon, when you heard that, how did that make you feel based on everything that you had been talking about for the past several months now about the. What you viewed as a mandatory requirement to carry up to, and often exceedingly max standards?
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C
So I think that what's really my experience of hearing someone like Malia, right, hearing this expert talk about when looking at this problem of not having enough time in public as an attorney in public defense, looking at this problem and looking at it from a nationwide standpoint and hearing that overwhelmingly, the data, the evidence, shows that our experience of feeling like we cannot do everything that we are supposed to be doing that appears to be national. Right. That is not siloed any longer. And so having an expert like Malia that has conducted these, you know, has ran the guided. These panels, ran these panels, had collected this information and was able to give a. An opinion based on what that data showed, validated what we were experiencing day to day. Right? It's this thing that we know what we're experiencing. We know that there is no possible way with every client I am supposed to carry. There is no possible way that I am fulfilling my ethical obligations to each of these clients. And it is a difficult thing in your practice to, to have, like Stacey mentioned, the privilege right, to be able to be in this position where now as leaders we can have our attorneys stop. We can give our attorneys space to think about what are you able to get to, what aren't you able to get to? And when, when Malia was testifying about the different things that we have to, we have to do as an attorney and that you just were not going to be able to get to those things that you have to do as an attorney. It's a real, it's not, I wouldn't say a wake up call because it's something that we experience in the practice, but it's just something where it's like a light, an additional light that's shining on our experience. Saying, of course, of course, these things that I'm experiencing every day and that our attorneys are experiencing every day, of course the evidence would show this, but it's just, I can't really put it to words what having an outside expert, somebody that is as skilled and is held in such high regard, right, with the work that she's done at the aba, with the work that she's continuing to do in her current position, that it is a really scientific, data based approach to the impossible standards and conditions that we face every day. I know that was kind of like a run on, but it is difficult, it is difficult to explain how supportive and validating that feels to be to hear that kind of testimony. Still, you can tell that I'm still taken back by it because it's almost like in the profession, we are constantly trying to hold it together in a system with impossible conditions. And a lot of the reasons, you know, Hunter, that the reason that the system works is because there's folks out there doing public defense work that are willing to sacrifice life and limb just to hold it together, just so that there's some sort of, some sort of possibility for justice or fairness available for our clients. And a lot of the times functioning under those conditions for such a long period of time, like Stacey talked about, leads to this kind of ethical blindness where you are so used to holding together the ideas of justice, the ideas of fairness and trying to make it work, and it just doesn't work over and over again. And you have to believe, to continue to do the work, you have to believe my efforts, my good intentions. That's justice, that's fairness, and that's enough. But when you look at the data, it's not. It is not. You're actually your goodwill, your goodwill and your kindness and your good Intentions is exactly why your clients won't receive effective assistance and counsel. It's not enough.
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And I hate to use the trite phrase, but, like, the road to hell is paved with good intentions. Right? And that is a. I think the hardest part of going into a public defender system is getting people to acknowledge that, yes, actually, you just continuing to take cases and never saying no and being okay with this, you are playing a major, not the biggest, but a major part in our mass incarceration problem because you are refusing to tell this system, actually, you are not funding the constitutional right of people in the manner that you are obligated to do so. So this system is going to have to break until you decide to take your obligation seriously, until you decide to decriminalize issues. That is. I have found the single biggest barrier to seeing public defenders act on this issue is coming to the conclusion that, no, it is us continuing to take cases that makes us complicit in this problem. Because nobody ever wants to think they're complicit in an issue you present to a judge. This has happened in other jurisdictions where you present to a judge, hey, judge, this workload that we've all been working under for the past 20 years that you've overseen in your courtroom. Yeah, it's illegal. That requires the judge to recognize he's been complicit in this. That requires prosecutors to recognize they've been complicit in this. It's very hard, not just for public defenders, but for everybody to take a step back and realize how they are contributing to the problem. But it is an essential first step to getting public defenders take action on workloads. What I want to ask you next is about, okay, so you already saw issues with this workload standard, with the workload standards that you had with Mac and with its enforcement.
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Do.
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Have you seen other chief public defenders start to grapple with the. With the results of this, like, with the testimony? Because I know we'll talk a little bit about Ken and his perspective on this and sort of kind of the ways he tried to get out of some of the responsibility here. But, you know, when I read this, it seems very clear to me that the expert opinion is that the contract you were under was illegal and that the workload standards are unethical. What are you hearing, if anything, from other chiefs? And if you're not hearing anything from around the state, what do you think they need to be paying attention to? From the way Malia talked about these workloads?
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C
Yeah, I think that so it's not. And I talked about this in my testimony as well. But it isn't necessarily anything different than what I was hearing before the trial. All the chiefs here, all the public defense leaders in our nonprofit offices, which they're about, I think 11 of us are part of PDO, public defenders of Oregon. We all know that the standards are unethical. We all know that the standards will result in excessive caseloads. We all know that. Everyone knows that, even the commission. Last week, the commissioners still, the Oregon Public Defense Commission said, we know that we should be using a workload standard. We know that the standards we have right now are wrong. And we know that these standards were created as a stopgap. So everybody knows that it's wrong. No one is saying that it's legal. No one, not even at the agency, no one is saying that this is the way it should be, that it's ethical, that it results in effective representation. No one is saying that. So the experience that I'm having here in Oregon is a very odd one. It's one where everyone is still kind of in that situation where we all know what the right thing is to do and everyone is truly, truly concerned with how do we get there, because we don't have a roadmap, right? And it's so easy for us as public defense leaders to say, yeah, we aren't there. We know what the right thing is to do. We're doing the best we can. But we're not as bad as insert whatever state. We're not as bad as Louisiana. We're not as bad as some of these other parts of the country that are severely, severely underfunded. And so I think that Oregon is having a real difficulty in internal struggle in the public defense community because they're saying, okay, we're not there yet. We know where we should be in the future. No one has come up with a plan. No one can show us how we are going to get there. So let's not really make any moves. Let's not take any steps towards doing the right thing until we know exactly what the right thing is, exactly what it's going to look like in the future. And part of the change that needs to happen, a lot of the times you aren't going to know what the next step is really going to look like. But you know that you have to take the step, right? Our ethical obligations demand that we take these steps. And I'm sorry, but I think being a public defender, part of what we sign up for is pushing and pushing for fairness, pushing for effectiveness for our clients, to bring balance to an imbalanced system, traditionally prosecutorial focus system and funded system. And if you are a practitioner that is afraid to make the right step because you don't know what the ultimate outcome would be, then I would say maybe it's time for you not to be in public defense. I know that sounds a little harsh, but you said earlier that we are not the biggest problem or contributor to this mass incarceration system that we have cultivated in this country. But I think that part of the first step of waking up to the harm that you're causing by being complicit is to maybe consider that we are because we have an additional responsibility to our clients and our community. They look to us and they depend on us to make sure that the system is functioning properly and is legitimate. And if we aren't the ones, the ones that are supposed to be speaking up, if we aren't the ones that aren't speaking up, people are going to assume that everything is good enough and it's not. And so I think that, yes, judges have a responsibility, yes, prosecutors have a responsibility, but they don't have the traditional responsibility to speak up when things are wrong. That's our job. And so what happens when the folks that know that things are wrong, know that they need to change, aren't saying anything? I think there is an enormous amount of harm that's caused because that is our job. Our job is to speak up, to say no. Right. Say no. To overwhelm and excess and say yes to our clients and our responsibility to uphold the ethical obligations and the rules and the constitutional requirements for effectiveness. Yeah. At all times.
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So I like the way that you laid that out there because in many ways it actually is more aligned with who I think is the most important person to solve this issue. I have said multiple times that ultimately we do not have the power to solve the workload crisis, the public, the staffing crisis. We don't have that power. But the people who have that power is the legislature, the executive. But the legislature and executive are never going to take this issue seriously if we don't say anything, if we continue to show up to court every day and say, everything's good, stamp of legitimacy, I'm here, I can do the work. Why would the legislature think there's a problem to solve? Why would the executive take you seriously when you say we're having a crisis in public defense? Well, it looks like you're able to handle all the cases. So how big is the how bad is the crisis? This is why I find the story in Oregon so odd, because I feel like you have all the tools necessary for the public offender to step up. You get the Roberts decision. There's already the type of relief that are granted to people who are unavailable. This is a state where I think we actually kind of know what would happen if people went unavailable.
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Right.
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We already did it. The court has responded in the way that we want to. That's why I find this story, especially compared to Maine and Massachusetts, the other two most recent unavailability issues. Maine and Massachusetts both recognize they got the court case they want. The positions are in place for us if we need to go unavailable. So we're going to do it when we need to. And because they both saw, okay, the legislature responded. And here in Oregon, I mean, the legislature hasn't solved the problem. But I do want to be fair. They have significant, they have put significant outlays to this issue through the unrepresented person crisis. They haven't sat on their hands and done nothing in response to this. They have done some things that I disagree with. Right. Restructuring OPDC to put it under the executive. Like there's, there's a lot of things that I don't love, but money has been there. So I do struggle when I hear that, especially to add data to the point you're making about everybody kind of knows. It came out from Malia's Testimony on pages 19 and 20. There was a survey done between 2023, 2024, and the results of the survey found that 73% of public defenders surveyed thought that workloads were either too high or much too high. And there's actually a reframing of this question that I want people. When you hear a public defender, a legislature, an executive, a whoever say our workloads are too high, you need to demand that they finish that sentence because that is an incomplete sentence. Workloads are not just too high, they are too high to do something. Are they too high to go on vacation? Are they too high to take a mental health day? Or are they too high to give ethical, effective, constitutionally mandated representation? That's the question we need to be asking. Because when we ask our workloads too high, the follow ons got to be to those attorneys who say, yes, they're too high. Too hard to do what? Because if you acknowledge they're too high, well, you should be acknowledging they're too high to do my job ethically. And the reason why people cut that sentence off short Is for what you've alluded to. If I say the full sentence. All right, my. It's my ass now. I got to take action, so I'm just gonna. Well, workloads are too high to do what we have to know to do what. So. All right, so now that brings us to the testimony, really, from the only opposition witness, if you will, that's qu. Called Ken Shanshagrin. He is the executive director of the commission. And before we get into the specifics in broad strokes, what did you expect him to say and then how were you reacting as he was actually saying what he was saying on the stand?
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C
Yeah, I. I thought. I expected him to be a little bit more in the know about the history of the agency and at least have some sort of understanding of where the standards that he has imposed upon the entire public defense practice here in Oregon, that he would have more of an understanding of where those standards came from, what type of representation that resulted in for clients. But he had. He had no understanding. It was clear to me that he really was in the dark about not only the standards that they were using or that we are using here in Oregon, and also a fundamental. Yeah. Just a fundamental lack of education and experience in public defense.
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B
Yeah. And to pull some examples of that, folks, I think he was asked very directly, I believe, by your council, hey, are you aware of how the Mac standards were generated? And I believe his first answer was, I wasn't a part of the organization when that happened. That's not really the answer that, like, I would expect from a leader when he is then drilled in further. He says, no, I don't know. And, folks, as a reminder, we talked about this on our first episode, but these standards kind of pulled out of thin air. Not really a methodological process that was involved in this and, you know, just not really thorough. That's why it shouldn't surprise us that the numbers or don't meet ethical limits, because there's. They weren't tied to ethical limits when they were postulated. They were more kind of like thrown together. Hey, here's something. And then we'll go from there. So now let's get into the details, because this was relatively surprising for me. The defense that they ran, really, if you want to even call it that, there wasn't a lot of discussion about defending the. Like. Here's why we need to do this. Just based on the contract themselves. It was a policy argument. Tell us a little bit about what the policy argument was of why the court shouldn't do anything about It.
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C
Yeah. So I think that we have. It's almost. We have the agency that is really concerned about the funding that's available, and they see it as. It's kind of like an economic analysis. Right. And they use economic terms that I'm not totally familiar with, but I hear these terms like that, you know, just simple things like meeting the demand. Right. We only have. We have a limited supply. And so it literally is. Their focus is elementary, and it's just to match an attorney, a named attorney, with a client. And if they do that with the amount of funds that the legislature has given them, they've met their obligation under that enabling statute. Okay. So that. That's the OPDC camp, and it's very much an executive agency, and they're just going to put a defense widget with a defense, you know, with a client's case, and their job's done. And now we have, you know, the folks actually doing the work and the folks that understand public defense, which there are not, maybe there's a couple public defenders left in the agency at this point in time, maybe one or two, and who understand that that's not how representation works. Right. And if you. You practice in any area of law, that is not how you make sure that folks are actually represented. So that's. That's the backdrop. That's right. We have folks that actually understand what legal representation is, what ethical obligations are, and then we have folks that are looking at this more as like a factory, and they're just matching product with, you know, a customer, essentially, and then their job's done. So when. When Ken tried to present some sort of. When he tried to present an argument or explanation as to why he had to go along with the standards that were in place being the Mac caseload standards, he stated that the legislature would not fund the agency sufficiently to operate under the workload standard, which is what the commission adopted, that there. If they use that standard, which was an ethical standard, essentially, but he didn't come out and say it, if they use that type of standard to provide public defense in Oregon, they would not be able to meet the need. There just wouldn't be enough lawyers to go around. So instead of recognizing that the most recent study and recognizing that what the actual work requires in today's day and age, by having those modern standards, we would not have enough lawyers. So that's like. If we actually are tuned into reality. Let's tune into reality here in 2026 and we look at reality and there's are in 2026 if we paid attention to that, we would not have enough lawyers. So let's not pay attention to that. And let's just go ahead and pretend that we're going to use a standard that, like you said, that was created out of thin air and based on 1970 standards for representation. Right. That those were also pulled out of thin air. And y' all heard the back of the napkin stuff. Everybody knows that. And let's go ahead and use those standards, because if we use those standards that don't apply to reality in today's day and age, then we might have enough lawyers to cover the need. It's just totally backwards math, backwards reasoning. And Ken's approach is, these standards were in place before I got here. These standards are what we base our budget on. That's the Office of Economic Analysis. Look forward and say, okay, by making sure that each attorney carries the equivalent of 300 misdemeanor cases, we have this amount of funds. We know that we can stretch our funds here, but that is not reality. And that's why the agency will consistently fail to meet their obligations under the enabling statute. They will not provide effective assistance. And when they do match an attorney with a case, they will, I think, I believe, continuously be underfunded, underfunding the providers that do the work. And I can get into the reasons why, which is not part of your question, but I'm happy to answer it. I'll get into that later on of where I think the funds, because like you said, the money is there, the funds are there, but where are the funds going? So I have some thoughts about that.
- [37:21]
B
Yeah, we'll end with that note, because I want to stick here with Ken because we get a lot from him. But just to respond to you before I kick to you, Stacey, is just that, you know, I. From everything that I've read on his. On his public commentary that I can find, I think it's very clear that Ken was put in this position to solve the unrepresented person crisis. And I want to say this. I think that is a noble pursuit. I do think we should be trying to solve the unrepresented person crisis. No question about that. That is something that needs to be addressed. That is a pressing issue that should be at the forefront of whoever is leading this agency's agenda. I could not agree more with that being like a priority one item. However, how we solve that crisis matters. And I fear from reading this, what my takeaway is that the focus is just to make the problem go away, that that's it. As long as that number goes down, there's not a lot of care for how it happened. And the problem is, is that we can't just make it go away by giving them substandard representation. And what's clear from Malia's testimony and obviously with the very quick ruling, I don't know how much time actually passed in the courtroom between when everybody rested and judge made ruling because obviously when you read the transcript, like reading the transcript, it felt very much like, yeah, man, this contract's illegal. I don't know what we're doing here. We didn't need this much test. This is pretty obvious, but put that aside for a second. Stacey, I want to go to you because we got Shannon's perspective on hearing from Ken about sort of how he was viewing this issue and why he thought this was appropriate given the limitations that he had. When you heard that, I want to get your perspective here. Right, because you're in a smaller office than Shannon in a rural part of the state, the consortia has left before. You have seen that even when money comes, like in these rural districts, it can just be hard to keep people. And if we don't have the ability to say no, I can tell you what's going to happen. It's going to be me and the three other people who stick around in this office fighting for our lives. So when you saw what his focus was, how did that make you feel and how do you think it should make maybe others in the state feel, seeing sort of what the priorities were from this testimony?
- [39:39]
A
Well, it made me feel that all of the work that I have put into this office was never going to end. Right. Like we are constantly in a cycle of recruiting, hiring, training, new attorneys, recruiting, hiring, training, new attorneys. And as soon as they hit minor felony qualification, usually they start looking to leave because we cannot compete with salaries, with benefits. And frankly, you know, when you're hiring brand new folks right out of law school, often they are not bringing a whole family with them and, and putting down roots. Right. And so being in a smaller rural community, we don't have any of the amenities that Salem, Portland, Eugene has to attract and keep people. And so frankly, it's exhausting and it was very disheartening. And it was clear to me that you nailed it. He that came into this position with one goal only. It was to. To get rid of the unrepresented persons crisis by any means necessary. And I'm concerned by that for a couple of reasons. One, I can't keep this pace up Forever. Neither can my senior attorney who helps me train. Because it's hard. It is. The job itself is hard already. And then when we are also training new attorneys on this nonstop treadmill, it's not sustainable for any sane person, period. Full stop. And we need more attorneys. But when your goal is just to make the problem go away, you're not focusing on providing quality representation. And if we're not providing quality representation, it's trash. It's not helping anybody. You know, when we talk about, for example, the early resolution dockets, I am very concerned about that because of the impacts just having a criminal case open against you can have on people's lives. And they don't necessarily know what the long term consequences would be of taking a deal. And I cannot even tell you how many times I hear I just took the deal because I wanted it to be over. Not because they did anything, but because they needed it to be done. Their jobs, their housing, their families, all of these things are at risk. That's far too much to ask somebody to give up, especially when they haven't even had the time to sit down with an attorney who can help them understand what those long term ramifications are before entering something in an early resolution type docket.
- [42:17]
B
And an attorney who has the time to know what's going on in their case. Right, because this is something we talked about on an episode a couple of weeks back where, you know, a lot of public defender systems rely on that you meet the client and the client looks at you and goes, I want to plead guilty. And a lot of public offender systems rely on that client to function because if that client didn't exist, we would all be fucked because we just couldn't handle a bunch of people saying, no, I don't want to plead in my first appearance. But and this is where I think my opinion is your job as an attorney right there is not to talk them out of it, but to give them hope that there is an alternative. And if you are not prepared for that first appearance because you haven't looked at discovery, you don't know anything about the case, you cannot provide them the hope they need. Because some people are just waving the white flag because they think this is a hopeless endeavor. And I think it is. When we have excessive workloads, we can't do what I think, which is one of our most important non written out job, is to give that person hope. And the only way you can do that is by knowing the case, showing them that you are not the overburdened overworked public defender that many of these people have had in the past.
- [43:28]
A
Who.
- [43:29]
B
Why am I going to be okay with this here? Because I know. I know what I'm going to get. We're going to do you. I'm going to. You're going to make the argument. Let's say I get bail, I get out of custody, and then three weeks from now, I haven't heard from you. A month from now, I haven't heard from you. The next time I hear from you, you're calling to tell me we got to continue the case. Because I haven't gotten a chance to look at everything yet. And I've been trying to reach out to you for the past three weeks to tell you about an investigative legal witness that is out there. And then what am I going to say? Oh, I haven't had a chance to look into that yet because my investigators tied up with some other stuff. And then six months have passed, the year has passed, and we're nowhere. We end up taking a plea deal there. That person has been through this system, and they know the outcome. And your job is to convince them that that's not true. And the only way you can do that is if you have a proper amount of workload. Only way you can do it. You have anything else you want to add there, Stacy? I do. I know I cut you off there, but you had a good point. I want to build on it.
- [44:19]
A
No, I think all those things are absolutely true. And even if the client ultimately were to stick with their original choice, they still need to do so with having all of that information at their fingertips. They need to understand all of the ramifications of their decision. That's the job. And if we are not there to provide that information to them, we are absolutely doing a disservice to every single
- [44:43]
C
one of our clients.
- [44:44]
A
Bottom line.
- [44:45]
B
Yep. So now there is a little bit of a. Really, the only contentious part, I think, of this because for the most part, it seemed like, you know, I think Ken came across as a relatively honest broker here, just being like, hey, we don't have the money, and that's why I'm doing this. Like, I was pretty shocked with his candor, although I do really appreciate it because we can kind of identify that the legislature is kind of driving this problem. But there is this one back and forth about whether or not the clause that y' all were upset about was actually mandatory. And boy, do I love. I love a cross examination that turns out like this. Shannon, I believe it was you who Got this email, right?
- [45:26]
C
Yes.
- [45:27]
B
So do you want to tell us a little bit about the why you believe and why? It's pretty clear that this was a mandatory provision, this wasn't optional and this was being enforced by the agency. Tell us a little bit about that.
- [45:40]
C
To make really, really clear that this absolutely was a mandatory caseload of quota, I requested back in September that that provision be removed because of the concerns that I had. And the response from the agency over and over again was that, yes, this is a quota or this is a caseload standard requiring attorneys to reach this standard, this number of cases per contract year is the only standard that we will be using in the new contracts. And so because that would ask us to ignore ethical obligations, I responded again with another email and I said, hey, here's why this is not a good idea in legal practice. We can't have a caseload quota determining what is effective and what's not effective. You have to look at something else. And so there's a lot of back and forth between myself, the head of the contract analyst, contract compliance, it used to be called the cap, like the performance. I forget what it is. But anyway, so they have a lot of new names this, this go round. But essentially the director of the contracting unit again responded with, no, we understand your concerns. We know that you want an hourly contract, we know that you want a workload contract, but we're sorry, our hands are tied. We have to have this mandatory term in the contract. So they had a lot of opportunities to explain it another way and they did not. And when Ken chimed in, he could not explain it another way other than this is what we were given by the legislature, this is what we use for the budget. He used the term, I think a lot intertwined. The standard is so intertwined with what our forecast is and how we're going to operate in the next biennium. We cannot remove it. Shannon. Sorry, that's it. And then after the preliminary hearing, when this was, he was at the preliminary hearing after that order was issued again, the analysts reached back out to us and several times told me in my capacity as the director here at PDMC that if we were to use the ethical shutoff provision, either as a firm or individually for an attorney, that we would either lose funding or we would lose that position altogether. So that those follow up emails, while Ken was not the direct person that I was communicating with, I'd assume that the folks that I deal with directly would be in communication with him. And she represented that she was taking information back and forth to him, but at no point in time did he ever step in and say, oh, actually what she's saying, that you'll lose funding or lose positions. That's actually not going to happen. It wasn't until that time right there on the record when he was testifying, that was the first time that I heard, you know, just kidding. This, this term is not, not mandatory. And yeah, I would not approve of something like that. That was the first time I've ever heard him say anything like that.
- [48:36]
B
Yeah. And folks, to be really, really clear here, if it's not coming through like with clarity of what we're talking about, so this term required you to carry at least 90% of the max standards and if you fell below it for a certain period of time, you could be at risk of losing full time funding. And it appeared that from me reading this transcript, what I came across with, tell me if I'm getting this wrong, is that Ken's position, what he had not seen these specific emails that had some sort of basically punitive measure coming to you for not doing this, that now that he has seen the emails, he wants to meet. The policy of the agency is that if you are under the 90%, we won't take anything away from you if you are doing it because of ethical limits that you have imposed. Am I getting that all correct?
- [49:30]
C
That is what he said in his testimony? Yes.
- [49:33]
B
Okay, so the legal listener right there might notice that that's a different answer than yes and no. So when you say that, why do you constrain it to just this testimony?
- [49:47]
C
Because it was very, it was very clear to me that the directives were coming from him that if we were not meeting those max standards, even if it was for ethical reasons. Right. Because one of our attorneys could not take on another case without violating the ethical rules for their clients. There was still instructions to our analyst and to others. It was clear to me that there should be a plan developed with PDMC or with other organizations maybe in the similar situation, a plan developed on how the agency could work with our organization to get us up to those standards, even if we were currently ethically not able to meet those standards. Okay, no problem. We won't remove funding now, but we're going to have a plan where we're going to build you back up to those standards. So I can't imagine that something that sophisticated and well developed just, was just, you know, was developed just by our contract analysts. And another thing that I want to say is that I am frustrated for the folks that are put in this position and employed by opdc, because these are folks that have worked closely with providers for a number of different years, and they know what it takes to provide effective representation of counsel because they've been working with us closely. They hear all of our stories, they hear our experiences, and they hear our complaints most of all. And for the director of the agency to say that this person did something outside of his directive was a little. I think that was poor form, to be honest with you, because I feel like he threw his contract analysts under the bus, for lack of a better term. I wish he would have. I just wish he would have phrased it a different way because that, in my experience, I think that's caused an additional strain on our relationship, PDMC's relationship with our analyst, because now I have an analyst that is very, very. Appears to be like very, very cautious and very concerned with even communicating is what she's saying. Correct. It creates a lot of difficulty now moving forward. So I wish that he was a little bit more clear.
- [51:59]
B
Yeah. And I'll read what Ken's response to that allegation was, that he was throwing that individual under the bus. What he said was, I think she has some general, genuine confusion as to how to apply those aspects of the contract. I think there was even a question when we discussed it internally as to how do we account for two months of Mac when PDMC indeed did not have two months of Mac yet. And I think that she was confused. And we have been trying to come up with an appropriate approach for a situation that is not contemplated very well under our existing contract structure. So that's what he said. So that. That's out there. So people have it. So they know the kind of how he responded to that. But, Stacey, I want to go to you here because I can see some people out there in Oregon. Right. Shannon discussed how it's kind of sad to see everybody acknowledge this issue and yet see so for people doing something about this. But I could foresee the public defender out there in Oregon going, okay, well, Ken has now said that this is no longer mandatory and it's no longer enforceable and we're going to allow ethical shut off. So Shannon and Stacey won. I'll go unavailable when I think I'm at my ethical limit. And right now I just don't think I'm there. So I. We're good. I think everything that's gotten out needed to get out. And with Ken now making this statement, I think there's nothing. There's no other issues with this contract, I saw you already shaking your head. And folks, you can't see the eyebrow raised, but it is approaching the ceiling. So, Stacy, what would you say to that individual?
- [53:27]
A
I would say that until we get appropriate workload model, the National Public Defense workload model, officially installed as the appropriate guidance for every office to use, we are still in hot water. Part of the problem is that public defenders, and I've tried this in my own office, do not know when they are approaching those lines, necessarily, because we have been trained to kill ourselves, to triage cases. And so to ask an individual public defender to be like, okay, you need to let me know when you're getting to the point where it's too much. Remember, these are people who are already sacrificing in terms of financial gain, in terms of time input, often status, right? Because we believe in ensuring that every single person has true and honest access to justice. So when you ask them to set their own limits, it doesn't work. It fails. So you have to have some sort of external limit to ensure that they are not killing themselves and dropping the ball. And that is why the national workload model is so important. And that's why it is absolutely essential that we get this installed and that we stick to it. Because as I said, I tried it in my office and it does not work. When you are just asking each individual to cry uncle, so to speak, it doesn't work.
- [55:06]
B
And it's especially difficult to put that on the line defender if leadership is not willing to do this. You know, there are the line defenders out there. I know them who are crazy enough to do, to go rogue and be like, nah, I'm going to be the one to do this. But that's the minority, if not super minority, of line defenders who are often your average line defender is somebody who has been doing this job for under three years, who probably doesn't know any better and is just trying to survive that person, they should, because they are a lawyer, do something about it. But we need to be honest, practically that they are the least likely person in a public defender agency to do something about this. And it's got to come from leadership. It's got to come from supervisors. Somebody has to say, we'll give you the COVID to let you know that this is acceptable. And folks, this is going to sound surprising because it's like 500 pages of transcripts, but really, that's about it. This was about as straightforward of a hearing, right? The only contentious parts were this is clearly being driven by the legislature and there was this back and forth about whether this was mandatory. But other than that there wasn't a lot of fighting, it seemed like about the issues with this contract. So we'll end it here with the fallout. Shannon, we've talked a little bit about where we go from this as a state, but I first want to we talked about like not seeing the response from the other public defenders in the state. I have hoped for and wanted to see. I was hoping that this result would happen in other public defender agencies would step forward. I have reached out to Carl McPherson at one of the Multnomah offices to try and get a comment from him about his strategy moving forward. I have not received a response, haven't been able to reach out to some of the other offices. But if you are out there listening in Oregon and you do run one of those other offices, I would love to hear from you to see what your strategy is. So that's the public offenders, but what about the other players? What about the agency? What about the legislator? What about anybody else in the state? Is this case which has now found that these workload standards we're operating on are very suspect and the unrepresented person crisis is going away very likely in a questionable manner. What are other people in the state saying about this? Whoever wants to take it first?
- [57:32]
A
I think that there are some folks who are continuing to say that public defenders just need to take on more cases. Not too long ago one of the folks running for office mentioned that public defenders just needed to stop taking Yoga Fridays and frankly, I found that to be incredibly insulting.
- [57:57]
B
What a fucking dipshit.
- [57:58]
A
I don't even remember the last time that I worked a week where it was only 40 hours. Frankly. I took some time off last week to expand my long weekend and both Thursday and Friday I took off and Thursday I ended up working four hours and Friday ended up working two. So when I try to take vacation, I often end up not being able to take vacation. And that has been a pattern for the last several years. So no, we don't take Yoga Fridays, my friend. And I'm just sick to death of hearing that. The solution is just we need to suck it up and take on more cases. We're trying to make sure that each and every one of our clients gets actual advice from a lawyer who has time to understand what is going on in their case and as you mentioned, can give them hope and give them a realistic understanding of what their options are and help them decide what is going to make their lives better and that actually can save money for all the other systems that we're working within as well. And that's a big piece that nobody wants to talk about.
- [59:05]
B
Yeah. And Shannon, before you jump in there, I do want to add one thing, because that individual, they, I think are very representative of a bunch of people who have not taken a moment's time to actually figure out why there was an unrepresented person crisis in Oregon in the first place. A lot of people have pointed to, and I think my home state of Colorado, there are people who do the same thing. They point to say, oh, well, they adopted workload standards and then the unrepresented person crisis happened. So this is because of workload standards, folks. What the confounding variable that everybody keeps forgetting about is those workload standards happened right during the middle of COVID and a bunch of people quit this system. And the single biggest driver of the unrepresented person crisis in Oregon was people just quitting, no longer doing public defense, walking away, because the workload standards they got were subpar. They did not actually control for anything. They put a veneer of it on the system and the system was crumbling under the weight of COVID Those two things drove people out of the system. And that's why you got an underrepresented person crisis, because people quit. If you respond to people telling you that we are going to quit by saying suck it up, do you know what is going to happen, folks? People are going to quit, quit. And you're going to be right back in the same situation wondering, well, why did everybody quit? It shows a level of disingenuousness that is difficult to process because this is not a complicated story. But people don't seem to understand that I am not obligated to do this work. I can go do other shit and I can get paid better for it. And people will take that option. And people in Oregon need to understand what is happening in Washington, because if you say, oh, I don't want to go private, I want to do public, the state who is doing the single best job in workload standard implementation is directly North King county has already got it. It's like this, that policymakers talking like that, that is a great way to light the whole system on fire and make an even worse crisis than it already was. Shannon, to you.
- [61:28]
C
No, that's a county commissioner who was running for governor from Marion County. So that gives you a little flavor of what we've been experiencing here in Marion county for the past few years. And by the way, I think that anybody who works in the system, judges or prosecutors, yeah, we probably should all do some deep breathing and some yoga practice because the system, no matter where you work in it, it's toxic, it's traumatizing. I mean, this is the most difficult stuff that we see right. On a day to day basis. And we're all humans here in the system. So one of the things that I think that I want to touch on here is I think my prediction is that what's really going to cause change to happen in Oregon, for us to recognize that there's not enough attorneys in public defense and that our entire system is not legitimate as it is currently funded, or excuse me, how it is funded, not the level, but how it is funded right now. But I think that what's going to help shift the conversation is what we're seeing in the rural parts of Oregon and in some district attorneys offices, there's the head DAs are coming forward and saying, you know what? We don't have enough attorneys either. And I know this is going to infuriate a lot of folks that are listening, but I think that it applies both ways. We have crappy charging practices and policies because there aren't enough prosecutors that are actually doing case reviews. And so what they're choosing to charge it has not been reviewed properly. It's not an intelligent charging practice. Right. And same thing on the flip side for people doing legal work in public defense. Right. Lawyers in public defense work, we aren't doing proper reviews of our cases. Right. We're shoving folks through the system. We're, like you said, happy to see the folks that are saying they just want to plead guilty because we just do not have enough time enough of us to go around. So I think that fundamentally for change to happen, this has to be a conversation in our profession, not just in public defense. Right. Lawyers as a whole in the state of Oregon need to wake up and realize that we currently have a court system where poor folks get injustice and something different than we find acceptable for every other person out there that can pay for legal services. And until the Oregon State Bar and our profession statewide recognizes the inequities that are present, we are not going to have change in public defense. It has to be a larger conversation.
- [63:52]
B
Yeah. And I think it's very odd to me that public defenders have the power to do something about this with going unavailable. And they see that the legislature hates having to deal with this. Like they see that the legislature hates these headlines. They hate the impact of it. They want it to Go away. They want it to stop and then to not use the power that we have. Like, we know the legislature will respond. We know the Oregon media is going to cover this issue. And I've seen some good coverage across the board. Not all of it's been great. Some of it has been, I'll just take more cases. But there have been some actual really thoughtful journalists in the state of Oregon getting to the impact. I know I saw one out of the Guardian that came up about for once looking at the cost to the person accused and not just victims. Like there are people here that we can tap into. So it is so arm weird to me to unilaterally disarm, which it seems to be the move that a lot of people are making is to go, you know what, we don't know what will come next. So we're just going to wait and see. These political actors, legislatures who want an issue to go away, they're not the kinds who are going to be proactive about solving problem. Once the headlines stop, the legislature is going to forget about this and move on to something they care more about. You got to strike while the iron's hot, folks. I encourage everybody to read this transcript is a lot less long than some of the other transcripts I've read for the show. Got through it relatively quickly. To each of you, just last parting shots. You know, we've covered a lot of top level issues, issues in the, in the individual office. But now that you have this ruling, now that you have this decision, what are your outlooks for your individual offices? Like? Does this give you the relief that you have been looking for? What do you do next? Now that you have been vindicated in your fight? To whoever wants to start us, this
- [65:43]
C
means that we can control our workloads, right? This means that the attorneys that work at pdmc, our attorneys, have the ability to come to me. They know that there's an opening now for conversation if they have too much on their plate and they cannot meet their obligations. And these aren't, these are concrete obligations. These aren't something that's out there and people think, oh, ethical obligations. They're fluffy. We're talking about. Do you have enough time to investigate on behalf of your client? Do you have enough time to review everything? Do you have enough time to conduct all the necessary research and writing and argue the motions at the hearing? Do you have enough time to communicate with them, consult with them, use interpreters, experts? Right? These are concrete things. If our attorney, see, I cannot do this for all my Clients, because I have too many cases or too many clients on my caseload, they can come to me, and we will protect them. We will say, no problem. You're not picking up cases next week or the following week. Let's get you some space. Let's make sure that you have enough time and ability to represent your clients competently. So that's different where, you know, you ask Stacey and I. Not only was that conversation not happening, if you even had those thoughts, you were on your way out the door at a public defense office. So I think we've made some progress there. And our shops are the only two shops where attorneys can make that stand and know that we will have their backs. Right. They can be public about that, that. That tension that they hold all the time about wanting to help, but there's not enough of me to help. How do I navigate that? And so we have practices, policies, procedures that support ethical workloads in our office here at pdmc.
- [67:19]
B
That sounds like a recruiting pitch there, Shannon, that you're just putting out there for all of the Oregon public defenders out there say, hey, if you're struggling with workloads, I know a couple offices that might be willing to do something for you. I love that.
- [67:31]
C
Yeah. But it's not even. It's not. It's something that I think more so that if right now, still, in so many offices, like Stacy mentioned, right. You either suffer under the current conditions in your public defense office, which is overwhelmed, or you exit. And if there's anything I want other public defense attorneys in Oregon to hear right now is that there's another way. You have the power. You have the power to stand up and to use your ethical obligations and duties as a shield. Right. You can protect your practice, and you can protect your integrity how you come into this profession. So no one came into this work because they thought, oh, I just want to move. I want to move 1,000 cases a year, or I want to move more cases than anybody else in the state of Oregon. There's nobody in PONCE that came in with that mentality. They came in with wanting to help. And I want to tell folks, and I want folks to see that here at PDMC and at Low Shop, that it's possible to actually be in public defense and make a difference and keep your ethics. Right? It's. All those things are possible. You do not have to exit. You don't have to run. You don't have to burn out. There's another way. So anyways, I just want folks out there to hear that Because I think that when you're not around it, it's hard to see that it's a possibility and it's actually happening. Happening in our shop now.
- [68:49]
B
Yeah. Yeah. I think that is a very powerful message. So many public. It's the real cruelty of the overburdened public defender. They don't have time to learn about other offices. They get told, well, this is. Everybody thinks they work in the best public defender agency in the country. And I'm here to tell you, you probably don't. But we get told we're at the best one, things are as good as they can get. Don't worry about what's going on. Focus on your cases. And then before you know it, you're out. And then you have the time to learn about new things and you go, oh, shit, there was something else. Stacey, take us home. What do you want to add?
- [69:23]
A
I would just echo what Shannon said and add to that that here at Swoped, we still have the. If you are feeling overwhelmed, you can't meet all of your ethical requirements, you come to me, we put a pause, you shut down taking additional cases. But at the same time, I am also working on instituting the national public defense workload model and using that as our guiding principle and having attorneys come to me and say, oh, I think I can take on more cases. Right. So I'm going to flip that around. Tell me why. Why do you think you can take on more cases than what is recommended? To make sure that every single person in our office is providing adequate representation, quality representation, and able to meet all of their ethical obligations.
- [70:13]
B
Fantastic. That is the first I've heard of somebody throwing that question back. And I really love that. If for nothing else, that gets a person thinking about what their ethical obligations are on every case. I think appointments in most office can feel very automatic. Like, I just get them. Our administrative staff handles it all. They send it to me, and they say, you have a new case. And we don't engage the thought process with every appointment that we need to. And that's part of why we're exercising a muscle that we never use. So I really love that. I hope other people look into doing that as a practice, because that seems great. Shannon and Stacy, again, I just want to say. I know I've said it to you, Bunch, thank you so much for doing this. Thank you so much for being courageous when others weren't joining you. Thank you so much for joining on. Thank you so much for being unrelenting on this issue, because this is what I hope will spark some other people in the state to do the same. Where can people contact both of you? Read more Learn more Where can they find information about your offices? Or what if here's an idea they wanted to apply to work for you? Where could they go and do that?
- [71:22]
A
So I can be reached@slow wopds.org or 541-267-2472 those are the best ways to reach me at my office and it's Southwestern Oregon Public Defender Services Incorporated.
- [71:39]
C
Please reach out to me if you want to talk about ethical obligations in public defense and how to say no. Swilson S W I L S o n@pdmarion.org you can also find all of the transcripts, all of the materials that we filed on our case, including Malia Briggs declaration, which I highly recommend reading that for inspiration and some enlightenment. And that is on our for the Media information page on www.pdmarion.org.
- [72:10]
B
fantastic. Well, thank you both so much for joining me again today and I'm hoping to see some more good news out of Oregon sometime soon. So thank you and hope to hear from you soon.
- [72:18]
C
Thanks Hunter thank you.
- [72:19]
B
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