For criminal cases in Nevada defendants are entitled to a public defender if they are indigent and they are accused of either a felony, a gross misdemeanor, or a misdemeanor where the District Attorney is seeking jail time. To be indigent means the defendant has no resources to hire a private attorney. Note: Indigent people can also get a public defender in other types of proceedings such as parole hearings, juvenile trials, involuntary commitment hearings, and parental termination petitions.
At the February 22nd Ely City Council Meeting, Municipal Court Judge Mike Coster stated “traditionally, and until recently the Municipal Court has been in a co-sharing arrangement of public defender services through White Pine County as is required by the NRS-Nevada Revised Statutes. As the Council may know, starting in October the County is contracting with the Nevada State Public Defender Agency instead of using local counsel as they have for the past eight or nine years. What we have found is that the agency has been unable to maintain sufficient staff to handle the entire White Pine County and City of Ely workload, and they have told us that. As a long-term interim solution, they are requesting that all of the Municipal Court Public Defender work be assigned to local attorneys that they approve at a rate of pay that they had established. What that means is, under their model, the City of Ely will be directed to contract with an attorney who has rightfully said, until that contract is in place, they are not prepared to take on work at the Municipal Court… so, we have a little bit of a traffic jam in public defender assignments right now. The City Attorney and I learned of this change about two weeks ago. Last week we initiated a phone call from the interested parties, and we need to get a fix in-place in an expedited fashion. I think you can stay tuned for one of two solutions in the near future; either White Pine County will be contracting with one local attorney to handle Municipal Court cases, which is fine from my perspective and from the Court’s perspective, or as the State seems to be designing it, the City of Ely will be told to contract directly at the same rate that the State is using. There would be no budget impact, but there needs to be a written and approved contract vehicle, so that when those attorney bills show-up in City Hall, your accounting staff will know what they are paying on, and they will not be unexpected uninvited bills. This should not have happened this way, and I have made that clear to the State. I am calling this to your attention because we might need quick action, assuming that the City Council agrees. I know I will recommend that agreement, and if we are going to be making a direct contract, that we get it in place at the next City Council meeting, so that the services can continue at the Municipal Court for public defender services with minimum disruption.”
February 29th, Ely City Council Meeting Municipal Court Judge Coster, and City Attorney Cahoon Discussion/For Possible Action – Approval for the City of Ely to contract with Eberhardy Law, LLC for the provision of public defender services.
City Attorney Cahoon stated “I would like this item to be tabled for now.” We were trying to get this pushed through because, as of right now, we don’t have any public defender services for the city. However, the Nevada Department of Indigent Defense Services (DIDS) is required to approve all of these contracts, and they did raise an objection to how this was being done. I intend on meeting with DIDS Jane, and the County either tomorrow or sometime next week, to get this resolved, and we hope to get something on the next agenda.”
Public Defenders are in great demand as it’s becoming more common to seek one out due to economic factors, life-style, and/or other issues.
Councilman Trask moved to table the City of Ely contracting with Eberhardy Law, LLC for the provision of public defender services. Councilwoman Elliot seconded the motion. The motion was carried unanimously.
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