Public defense lawyers conduct one-day strike

By DON MCINTOSH, Staff reporter

On June 27, a scorching hot day that had most people scrambling to stay inside, a group of lawyers bearing picket signs marched around the Multnomah County Courthouse at SW Fourth and Main to demand a 30 percent pay increase.

It was a one-day "unfair labor practice" strike called by the employees of Metropolitan Public Defender Services, a non-profit agency that has a contract with the state court system to represent clients who cannot afford their own attorneys. Those clients include mental patients facing commitment hearings, children in foster care, parents whose children are being taken away from them, and indigent criminal defendants.

The lawyers, along with investigators, paralegals, and office workers at the agency, are members of Local 3668 of the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees; they've been without a contract since the end of 1999.

"I believe in doing this work," said lawyer Steve Sherlag. "Rather than quitting, I believe in fighting." Sherlag, in his sixth year at the agency, makes $49,000 a year. Nine years after leaving law school with $60,000 in student debt, he still has more than a decade to go before it's paid off.

Salaries for lawyers at the agency start at $33,000 and top out at $54,000, quite low compared with their counterparts in the prosecutor's office. Accordingly, their chief demand is "parity" with their counterparts.

Right now, they say, the only employee who enjoys parity is the top guy: Executive Director Jim Hennings makes $95,000 a year, about the same as District Attorney Michael Schrunk.

Hennings has maintained that money for wage increases would have to come from the state court system, which awards the agency its contracts. He did not tender his first wage proposal until the day before the workers were to go on strike, six months after bargaining began.

But labor economic analyst Peter Donahue looked at the agency's books and reported a $1.2 million discretionary fund that management has built up over three years. The union says that fund could supply the raise they seek, even if the state court system does not increase the amount it awards. The union has filed charges with the National Labor Relations Board accusing management of committing unfair labor practices: bargaining in bad faith and going around the bargaining team to contact members members directly.

The lawyers had conducted several pickets already, including demonstrations at the courthouse and at the First Interstate Tower offices of boardmember Barnes Ellis, who works at the Stoel Rives law firm.

At the June 27 strike picket, the union brought a shopping cart full of water bottles to ward off dehydration among the strikers.

Lawyers who were able to had asked judges to postpone hearings. Those who could not reschedule continued to work during the strike, with the union's approval.

Inside the courthouse, judges, lawyers, and court workers showed solidarity by pinning green ribbons to their garments - even their courtroom opponents, the district attorneys. Interviewed by a KXL-radio reporter, District Attorney Schrunk spoke in support of the strikers' desire for parity. The next bargaining session was scheduled for July 5.