A bill that would increase a fee to provide additional legal aid to indigent Nebraskans was advanced from the first round of debate March 29.<\/p>\n
LB1098, introduced by Lincoln Sen. Adam Morfeld, would increase civil court filing fees from $5.25 to $6.25. Revenue from the fee increase would be remitted to the Legal Aid and Services Fund, which provides legal services funding to the state\u2019s indigent population.<\/p>\n
Morfeld said increased use of alternative dispute resolution has led to a decrease in court filings and revenue generated for free legal aid.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor every $1 in investment in free legal services, a community receives $4 to $10 in consequential benefits,\u201d he said. \u201cThis would guarantee a significant increase in the availability of free legal services for low-income individuals across the state.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sen. Matt Williams of Gothenberg supported the bill, saying it is a reasonable increase.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen we look at where that increase is going go to and how it helps these vulnerable people, it\u2019s [clear] that it\u2019s something we can and should do,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Omaha Sen. Bob Krist introduced an amendment that would decrease the proposed fee to $6. Krist said a comprehensive study of the state\u2019s entire fee structure was needed before passing new increases.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe can\u2019t keep raising fees arbitrarily to fund even the best of causes,\u201d Krist said. \u201cWe have to make sure that when we put a fee in place that it goes into the right place and that it\u2019s used for a good purpose.\u201d<\/p>\n
Krist withdrew his amendment, saying he instead would introduce a study of the state\u2019s fee structure during the interim.<\/p>\n
Senators advanced the bill to select file on a 25-1 vote.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A bill that would increase a fee to provide additional legal aid to indigent Nebraskans was advanced from the first<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[13],"tags":[148],"class_list":["post-19129","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-judiciary","tag-sen-adam-morfeld"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19129","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19129"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19129\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19130,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19129\/revisions\/19130"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19129"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19129"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19129"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}