The Indiana Supreme Court’s courtroom. Photo by Whitney Downard, Indiana Capital Chronicle.

By Leslie Bonilla Muñiz
Indiana Capital Chronicle

INDIANAPOLIS — The Commission on Indiana’s Legal Future, tasked with brainstorming attorney shortage fixes, has released a final report packed with new recommendations and updates on ongoing initiatives.

The Hoosier State’s rate of 2.26 lawyers per capita was 43rd worst in the nation last year, per the American Bar Association.

About 16,000 practice in-state, but the distribution is uneven.

Marion County alone hosts more than 6,000 lawyers, almost 40%. When combined with those in seven surrounding counties, they make up more than half the total. Other counties have as few as five.

Indiana’s attorney production pipeline — stunted, in particular, by the 2020 closure of Valparaiso Law School — has also contributed.

“The answer is not as simple as ‘more lawyers,’” Appeals Court Judge Nancy Vaidik and Supreme Court Chief Administrative Officer Justin Forkner wrote.

“Instead, this challenge needs a complete reevaluation of how legal services are provided in Indiana,” the pair, who co-chaired the commission, continued.

The Indiana Supreme Court created the commission in April 2024. The group, published an initial list of budgetary and legislative suggestions four months later, ahead of the Indiana General Assembly’s budget-writing session.

The final report — which was completed Tuesday, July 1 and released last week — is open for public comment until Friday, Aug. 29 at noon.

Progress On Interim Recommendations

There’s already been movement on several earlier proposals.

The Indiana Supreme Court approved its Innovation Committee’s parameters for a new regulatory “sandbox” program in March. Inspired by a 2020 Utah agency, it would authorize and evaluate non-traditional legal service projects.

That pilot program incorporates another recommendation for grants to help launch nonprofit law firms that use lower-cost legal service providers like law students or allied legal professionals.

The court has also established uniform definitions of areas with high legal need, including maps of rural counties and legal deserts.

A subsidy program for legal practice startups in those needy areas is expected to go live this summer, according to the report. It’s for use on expenses that are most burdensome in the startup phase, like rent, utilities, insurance, legal research services, databases, case management software and billing software.

Also expected to go live this summer is a student loan repayment assistance program for law school graduates practices in areas of high legal need.

A scholarship program for law students who go into public roles was signed into law in May, but lawmakers allotted it no funding amid major spending cuts. The shortage is particularly acute among public prosecutors and defenders because the pay is often too low to pay off law school loans despite the heavy workload.

The commission suggested seeking private sector funding.

Other ideas also suffered in the cuts.

Funding for remote-appearance technologies in local jails was one.

“It is not clear yet if the Court will have sufficient funds to provide these grant opportunities in the current fiscal climate,” the commission wrote of proposal to upgrade technology in local courts.

It noted that a different potential funding source, the federal Digital Opportunity Grant, was recently suspended by President Donald Trump.

New Recommendations

The commission added several suggestions in its final report.

Many active attorneys have clustered in urban areas. Lawyers in rural counties are generally older. The darkest blue counties have the most attorneys, and the darkest brown counties have the oldest. Graphic from Commission on Indiana’s Legal Future final report.

Chief among them was designating someone with the “ongoing oversight, marketing, and coordination of the Commission’s recommendations so they do not ‘die on the vine.’”

It will also be “vital” to centralize information on initiatives and grants on one webpage, the commission added.

It also recommended piloting a public service pathway to licensure — not easier, and maybe even more demanding, than the current bar exam, but tailored.

“The initial parameters provide a tailored path to law licensure for qualified ABA-accredited Indiana-based law-school students who commit to and practice in Indiana for three years after graduation in either a high-needs public-sector field or in a legal desert,” the report said.

Other proposals are in progress, including some involving the use of artificial intelligence to ease the “unsustainable” workloads on judicial officers. By automating or simplifying some menial tasks, they’d have more time for duties that require deep thought and expertise.

Additional proposals focus on educational and career support: mentorship programs, curricular pathways, boot camps, a public service job board and more.

The commission acknowledged that its work was limited, and ended the report with suggestions of what comes next.

Would-be Indiana lawyers need more access to legal educational institutions, it asserted. Some possibilities include reopening Valparaiso Law School, launching Indiana University satellite law schools or widening access to online law school graduates.

But many graduates, especially those from Notre Dame and IU Maurer, practice law elsewhere.

“We must sell the idea of staying and practicing here—the notion that Indiana is a good place to live,” the commission wrote. “We must promote and market the value of not just being a lawyer, but also the unique importance of being a Hoosier lawyer.”

Student loan debt was identified as another major problem, because it often pushes graduates into higher-paying corporate careers in urban areas.