Maine public defense leaders say building out a robust network of public defense offices is the “best way forward” as the state struggles to find lawyers for hundreds of people who cannot afford their own.

But the Maine Commission on Public Defense Services is already facing an uphill battle: The governor’s latest two-year budget proposal offers less than they say is needed to maintain the status quo, and lawmakers who are weighing new bills must keep an expected $450 million revenue gap in mind.

The commission “recognizes its biennial budget asks for FY 26-27 are a hard pill to swallow,” executive director Jim Billings recently wrote in an appeal to state leaders. “But not taking that medicine now just leads to more pain later, again, in both the number of unrepresented cases and financial impact.”

He says the commission needs at least $137 million to increase the ranks and cover contracted lawyers who are already doing the work. That’s far below what Gov. Janet Mills has proposed, at roughly $102 million.

Billings said the commission cannot adequately address the crisis described in a recent court ruling, which found that the state is violating the Sixth Amendment rights of hundreds of people who are facing criminal charges and don’t have lawyers, roughly a quarter of whom were still in jail at the end of 2024.

“It is (the commission’s) position that the state, including the courts, needs to do more to discharge its Sixth Amendment obligations, that there ought to be a remedy for when the state falls short of its obligations, and that Maine should not take a cramped view of the Sixth Amendment when putting in place a system of indigent legal services,” Billings wrote.

Gov. Janet Mills’ office said in an emailed statement Wednesday that she looks forward to reading the commission’s report.

“With revenues leveling off and costs increasing, the State of Maine is facing a difficult budget cycle, and the Governor has had to make tough choices in her budget proposal – including program changes, spending cuts, and targeted revenue increases – in order to maintain core programs, like voter-approved health care, 55% of education, and municipal revenue sharing, among others,” said her spokesperson Ben Goodman.

Lawmakers on the Judiciary Committee will meet and discuss the matter next week.

BUDGET REQUESTS

The commission is a quasi-state agency established by law in 2010 to recruit and oversee lawyers who judges appoint to represent the indigent. They are led by a nine-member commission consisting of private attorneys, legal advocates and two former judges.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Maine sued the commission nearly three years ago. Originally, the ACLU alleged the commission wasn’t ensuring quality representation. Its lawsuit was updated last year to accuse the commission of failing to ensure any representation at all.

Next week, Superior Justice Michaela Murphy will consider a request from the ACLU to release anyone in jail who has been unrepresented for more than a week.

In the commission’s annual report to the Legislature this week, Billings paints a dire picture. With more than 1,150 cases in need of a court-appointed lawyer, he wrote, the state “either is failing to meet its constitutional obligations to its people, or it is so close to failing that it’s a distinction without any real difference.”

The commission says it needs $71 million in 2026 and $66 million in 2027 to increase the number of public defenders and continue paying private attorneys at the current rate, according to the annual report.

Mills has proposed roughly $51 million for each year in her biennial budget, but that doesn’t include any funding for the new public defenders that Billings says they need.

Last year, she approved emergency funding in her supplemental budget that helped the commission launch their newest two public defense offices, serving Androscoggin, Franklin and Oxford counties, and Down East. The commission has also launched offices in Augusta, Bangor and Caribou, and they’ve begun staffing a new office to represent parents in child protective cases.

If fully funded, Billings said, public defense attorneys will be able to handle 50% of the state’s current criminal case load, and that this will save the state money down the line.

Goodman, the governor’s spokesperson, said her previous investments were already significant. She and the Legislature have increased the agency’s headcount from less than 12 in 2019 to more than 70 people in 2025, he said. She also more than doubled their annual budget during the same time frame.

CHANGING BASELINE

Billings also wrote in his report that state officials have been working with an outdated understanding of the commission’s baseline. The reality, he said, is that the commission has had to spend more money on cases that are taking longer to process. The number of cases they cover also is dynamic, given that there’s no guarantee what will be filed in a given year.

New cases that required a court-appointed attorney increased by about 21% from 2018 to 2023, according to the commission’s report.

In that same five-year span, the commission lost about 35% of its rostered attorneys.

“If we look at the number of new filings from four or five years ago compared to recent years, one can easily see why we continue to struggle to find counsel for every case,” Billings wrote.

Some have complained that the commission’s eligibility requirements and caseload standards are strict and unattractive to new attorneys. That includes Mills, who even sent the group a letter last year in which she wrote that the requirements “while well-intentioned, are overly stringent.”

In July, the commission temporarily made it easier for attorneys to apply for a waiver to their eligibility requirements. Billings said only one person has applied.

However, a spokesperson for the governor’s office said the commission ignored her other recommendations.

He also said the attorneys representing indigent clients are burned out. In two surveys conducted since 2023, a majority of lawyers told the commission they feel overwhelmed with work. About half of those surveyed said they often “feel as though they are reliving the trauma experienced by their clients.”

Tina Nadeau, the director of the Maine Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, said the results weren’t surprising.

“This is concerning for their individual well-being,” Nadeau said, “but also, when we’re talking about more big-picture, zealous advocacy for the clients — if someone is approaching burnout level, they just can’t provide that for the clients.”

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