Oppressive caseloads and a lack of basic resources have driven down morale and increased turnover in the D.C. Office of the Attorney General, leaving lawyers in place with little experience handling critical cases, union leaders told the D.C. Council on Monday.
The General Litigation Division within Attorney General Linda Singer’s agency is hemorrhaging its staff, said Steven Anderson, president of the union that represents lawyers within the office.
Facing excessive caseloads and a lack of administrative support, 15 of 22 lawyers charged with defending the District in tort and civil rights lawsuits have left in the last year.
That means “more than half the attorneys have a year or less of experience,” Anderson told the council’s judiciary committee.
“My experience with young lawyers is it takes that long to figure out where the bathroom is,” he said.
Singer leads a $92.3 million office of roughly 725 lawyers and administrative staff. In the last year, she said, the agency has handled 29,000 legal matters and 70,000 child support cases, including D.C. Public School legal work.
Singer used the hearing to tout her successes in the last year, including taking on mortgage scammers and slumlords, improving rehabilitation options for juveniles, and filing the handgun ban appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court. But she also acknowledged a continued lack of basic infrastructure to support her employees.
An audit of the office conducted by the National Association of Attorneys General found the District’s lawyers spend one-third or more of their time on administrative tasks such as copying, Singer said.
The agency has one secretary for every 10 lawyers and still has no document management system, which might cost as much as $400,000.
“No private law firm would permit this type of inefficiency,” she said. “It simply costs too much.”
Singer said the 92 current vacancies in her office — 40 lawyers and 52 support staff — are being filled in two-month increments.
“The impression that I have is that we’re moving backward,” Council Member Phil Mendelson, committee chairman, said of the vacancy rate.
