Board of Trustees Approves Scaling Plan for Fee Increase: The State Bar Board of Trustees met on May 17th and, among other actions, the Board authorized restructured fee-scaling options to expand reduced or waived licensing fee increases among attorneys whose incomes fall below certain thresholds.

Last year, the California legislature passed S.B. 1343, which changed the rules on which employers in California have to provide sexual harassment training, and which employees have to receive that training. The changes mean that many small firms (those with 5 or more employees) will have to start providing sexual harassment training to their employees, and it must be provided by January 1, 2020. Cal. Govt. Code § 12950.1(a).

Paying yourself from an IOLTA account is an important concept in law office management. An IOLTA account is a trust account used to hold money paid to you by a client until that money is earned. One of the most common reasons ethics complaints are filed against lawyers is mismanagement of an IOLTA account. Every jurisdiction has their own rules related to when (and how) an IOLTA should be opened, how it must be managed, and when you may pay yourself from that account. Some jurisdictions, including California, require lawyers to use an IOLTA even for flat fee services.

A court may sanction attorneys for engaging in meritless actions or tactics with the intent to harass or cause unnecessary delay. CCP §128.5. But what is meritless to one person may be a rational extension of the law to another. Luckily, there’s a safe harbor provision in the statute for that.