WHB/6/1
Sponsored by Evy Cooper, Penny Myers, Riley Phillips of West High School
This legislation was filed in the Labor and Workforce Development category
Presented as part of the YIG Volunteer 2024 conference
| 1 | BE IT ENACTED BY THE TENNESSEE YMCA YOUTH IN GOVERNMENT |
| 2 | |
| 3 | Section 1: Terms in this act will be defined as follows: |
| 4 | Court appointed attorney: Court appointed attorneys are private lawyers that are appointed to |
| 5 | cases by a judge on a need basis and paid an hourly wage for time spent on the case. Court |
| 6 | appointed attorneys take cases for defendants that cannot afford their own private counsel. Court |
| 7 | appointed attorneys are not full-time employees for the state. |
| 8 | Reimbursement rate: The hourly rate at which money is paid to an attorney for services and |
| 9 | counsel they provided on individual cases. |
| 10 | Tennessee Administrative Office of the Courts: provides support services to the Tennessee Judicial |
| 11 | System including preparing the budget, administering payroll for full-time employees, and paying |
| 12 | court-appointed attorneys. |
| 13 | Employee Assistance Program (EAP): The program is run by the Tennessee Administrative Office |
| 14 | of the Courts and provides full-time employees free counseling sessions and mental health |
| 15 | support. |
| 16 | |
| 17 | Section 2: Court appointed attorneys employed by the Tennessee Judicial System will get an |
| 18 | increase in compensation from $50.00 an hour to $90.00 an hour for time spent working on |
| 19 | assigned cases. |
| 20 | |
| 21 | Section 3: Court appointed attorneys employed by the Tennessee Administrative Office of the |
| 22 | Courts will be granted 6 free counseling sessions per year with an EAP counselor, organized and |
| 23 | set up through the EAP. |
| 24 | |
| 25 | Section 4: Court appointed attorneys will submit their claim for reimbursement to The Tennessee |
| 26 | Administrative Office of the Courts, which will be responsible for administering payment. |
| 27 | |
| 28 | Section 5: The addition of this salary increase will cost the Tennessee Judicial System |
| 29 | $2,000,000.00 that will go to the Tennessee Administrative Office of the Courts. |
| 30 | |
| 31 | Section 6: This bill will require a raise in the General Assembly budget of $2,000,000.00 that will |
| 32 | go to the Tennessee Judicial System budget. |
| 33 | |
| 34 | Section 7: All laws or parts of laws in conflict with this are hereby repealed. |
| 35 | |
| 36 | Section 8: This act shall take effect on July 1st, 2024, the public welfare requiring it. |
| 37 |