The new Washington Supreme Court Rules on Defender Caseload limits are leading to major positive changes and also challenges in funding needs.  This conference will address legislative efforts for improved state funding, litigation including defenders declaring unavailability, and developing alternatives to traditional prosecution.  Representatives from the Washington Office of Public Defense will discuss their recent survey as well as information about their existing funding efforts.  Attendees will explore the role of public defense in public safety discussions.

 

*CLE credit has been requested*.

 

The Defender Initiative

2026 Next Steps with Defender Standards and Funding

Seattle University School of Law | Room C-5

Friday, June 26, 2026

 

Robert C. Boruchowitz |Professor From Practice and Director of the Defender Initiative

Agenda:

 

8:45 AM – 9:00 AM | Welcome

• Paul Holland| Associate Dean for Experiential Learning and Associate Professor of Law; Director of the Ronald A. Peterson Law Clinic

9:00 AM – 9:30 AM | Discussion of Recent National Events Related to Public Defense

• Robert C. Boruchowitz

9:30 AM – 10:30 AM | What Happened in the 2026 Legislature and What We Can Do for 2027

• Discussion with Jamie Pedersen | Washington State Senator, 43rd District

• Moderator: Neil Beaver | Lobbyist and Political Consultant

10:30 AM – 10:45 AM | Break

10:45 AM – 12:00 PM | Office of Public Defense Reports

• Discussion of what the Office of Public Defender plans for its report to the Court in three years.

• Report on OPD’s recent survey and information received from local jurisdictions seeking funding under RCW 10.101.

• Office of Public Defense Staff:

  • Elizabeth (Liz) Mustin | WA State Office of Public Defense

  • Geoff Hulsey | Office of Public Defense

12:00 PM – 1:15 PM | Buffet Lunch Service

• Location: Second Floor Gallery

1:15 PM – 2:15 PM | Diversion Programs Supporting public safety, helping clients, and reducing the size of the increase needed for more defenders.

• Lisa Daugaard | Co-Executive Director, Purpose Dignity Action

• Maia Vanyo | Deputy Chief, Whatcom County Defender

• Vanessa Martin | Whatcom County LEAD & LEAD Bureau Site Advisor

2:15 PM – 3:15 PM | Discussion: Another Perspective on State Funding of Public Defense

• April Berg | Representative, District 44, Position 2

• Strom Peterson | Representative, District 21, Position 1

• Adan Espino, Jr. | Lobbyist & Principal, The Cascadia Group

• Moderator: Jason Schwarz | Director, Snohomish County Office of Public Defense

3:15 PM – 3:30 PM | Break

3:30 PM – 4:30 PM | Litigation on Workload and Related Issues Discussion includes the lawsuit brought by the counties against the state and defenders declaring unavailability.

• Toby Marshall | Plaintiffs’ Counsel in In Re M.E. and Wilbur v Mt. Vernon

• David Montes | ACLU Staff Attorney (Leads the lawsuit against Yakima County for not providing counsel to some accused persons)

• Paul Lawrence | Senior Litigation Partner at Pacifica Law Group (Leads the counties’ suit against the state)

4:30 PM – 5:00 PM | Concluding Session

• Brainstorming Discussion of Plans for Organizing for 2027.

 

Faculty & Speaker Biographies:

 

Robert C. Boruchowitz | Professor & Director of the Defender Initiative Robert C. Boruchowitz was an attorney at The Defender Association, a non-profit public defender office in King County, for 33 years. He is leading an initiative at the law school to advance efforts to improve public defense representation in Washington and other states. He has handled appeals at all levels of the state and federal courts and argued the Seling v. Young case in the U.S. Supreme Court, challenging the application of Washington’s "sexually violent predator" law. He was lead counsel on a Washington Court of Appeals decision that due process requires that children in truancy proceedings have counsel (Bellevue v. E.S., 2009). That case began in the Youth Advocacy Clinic and two clinic students worked with him on the appeal. The Washington Supreme Court reversed the decision, but many counties reduced the number of truancy filings before that decision.

For 28 years, he served as The Defender Association’s Director. He established there the Death Penalty Assistance Center and the Racial Disparity Project. Founding president of the Washington Defender Association and a former member of the Executive Committee of the American Council of Chief Defenders, he has been instrumental in developing defender standards that have been endorsed by the Washington State Bar Association and the American Bar Association. He led a subcommittee that developed both Performance Guidelines for Criminal Defense Representation and Standards for Indigent Defense Services that were adopted by the Washington State Bar Association. Professor Boruchowitz is chair of the Standards Committee of the WSBA Council on Public Defense (CPD). The Washington State Bar Board of Governors adopted recommendations from the CPD that led to the Supreme Court adopting rules limiting defender caseloads.

Professor Boruchowitz is co-chair of the Workloads Committee for the National Association for Public Defense and a member of the NAPD System Builders Committee. He serves on the American Bar Association Indigent Advisory Group. He is an emeritus member of the Washington Minority and Justice Commission. He led a committee that wrote a caseload statement for the ACCD. In 2003, he was a Soros Senior Fellow working on access to counsel in misdemeanor and juvenile cases.

Professor Boruchowitz was an expert witness in the Hurrell-Harring case in New York that settled with an agreement by the state to develop caseload standards, provide counsel at all arraignment hearings, and improve the quality of public defense representation in five counties. He was appointed counsel on appeal in State v. K.A.B., 14 Wn. App. 2d 677(2020), winning reversal of a juvenile conviction because of ineffective assistance of counsel and an erroneous trial court ruling. The prosecutor agreed to dismiss the case upon remand.

The first project of the Defender Initiative was a joint effort with the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers to conduct a comprehensive investigation of misdemeanor public defense in the United States. That project produced a report, "Minor Crimes, Massive Waste: The Terrible Toll of America's Broken Misdemeanor Courts". The Initiative had a grant from the U.S. Department of Justice to work in conjunction with The Sixth Amendment Center to provide assessments and technical assistance to improve public defense services nationally. The grant supported reports on Utah, Mississippi, Illinois, and New Hampshire.

The Initiative received grant funding from the Open Society Foundation to improve access to counsel in misdemeanor courts. The Initiative has worked in Washington, Kentucky, New Hampshire, and South Carolina. Separate funding supported a joint assessment project with 6AC in Wayne County, Michigan, that resulted in transforming the defender program there.

 

Neil Beaver | Political Consultant and Contract Lobbyist Neil Beaver is a Political Consultant and contract Lobbyist. He has managed and consulted on statewide ballot measures to stop Initiatives that would harm the state’s ability to raise revenue and worked on a campaign to establish more restrictive campaign finance laws. He worked for a number of legislative candidates in Eastern and Western Washington. His lobby efforts are focused on Climate Change, Wildfire, Wildlife, managing the state’s solid waste streams, and helping organizations that represent underserved populations.

 

Representative April Berg | Washington State Representative, 44th Legislative District Representative April Berg was elected in 2020 to represent Washington’s 44th Legislative District, which includes the cities of Mill Creek and Snohomish, as well as parts of Everett and unincorporated Snohomish County. She serves as Chair of the House Finance Committee, where she oversees legislation related to state and local revenues, and as a member of the House Appropriations Committee, where she helps develop the state’s operating budget.

Representative Berg also serves on the Economic and Revenue Forecast Council, the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Committee, and the National Conference of State Legislatures Budget and Revenue Committee. She was recently appointed to the Millionaire Income Tax Implementation Advisory Group and serves on the board of the Economic Opportunity Institute. She was the first Black and youngest student body president in the history of Oregon State University.

 

Lisa Daugaard | Co-Executive Director of Policy, Purpose Dignity Action (PDA) Lisa Daugaard is Co-Executive Director/Policy at Purpose Dignity Action (PDA), formerly the Public Defender Association, based in Seattle. She joined the Defender Association in 1996 as a public defense staff attorney, later served in multiple management positions. She led TDA’s Racial Disparity Project, combatting racial discrimination in, and generated by, the criminal legal system at the height of mass incarceration, from 2000-2013. As part of the RDP work, from 2001-2008, Lisa led a successful selective enforcement litigation challenge to drug arrests of Black people in Seattle. The settlement of that litigation effort resulted in an agreement by SPD and the King County Prosecutor’s Office to launch a pilot pre-booking diversion framework for drug offenses, which came into being in 2011 as the Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion (LEAD) model.

Lisa was founding Co-Chair of the Seattle Community Police Commission, serving on the CPC until 2019. In 2019, she was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship for work building consensus around community-based responses to illegal behavior related to unmet behavioral health needs and extreme poverty. Lisa grew up in the Seattle area, attended the University of Washington, was an anti-apartheid activist at Cornell University in the mid-1980s while occasionally attending class and earning an MA, and obtained her JD from Yale Law School (class of 1992). After law school, she worked in New York City as a fellow at the ACLU National Legal Department, leading a successful challenge to the first US detention camp at Guantanamo (for HIV-positive Haitian asylum seekers); as Legal Director of the Coalition for the Homeless; and as Organizing Project Director at the Urban Justice Center.

 

Adán Espino Jr. | Contract Lobbyist & Principal, The Cascadia Group Adán is a contract lobbyist and government affairs consultant based in Olympia, WA. He has a strong background in human services, housing, education, and business sector issues. He began his career at UW Tacoma and is the Principal of his firm The Cascadia Group, which also subcontracts with Sermonti Public Affairs and Water Street Public Affairs. Additionally, he has managed several state and local campaigns. He has a deep understanding and instinct for translating policy ideas into legislative action. Adán has consulted clients at the state legislative and local government levels in the development of affordable homeownership and public utility projects, human service contracting, developments in state law for residential property appraisers, recycling issues for brewing companies, and consumer protection issues for independent auto dealers.

 

Geoff Hulsey | Managing Attorney, Washington State Office of Public Defense Geoffrey Hulsey serves as the Managing Attorney for the Washington State Office of Public Defense's (OPD's) Public Defense Improvement Program, managing grants to local governments through Chapter 10.101 RCW. Previously, Geoff served as a staff attorney in OPD's Disproportionality Training Unit. Prior to joining OPD, Geoff practiced civil, criminal, and family law while in private practice. From 2016 to 2019, Geoff worked as a Defense Attorney at Thurston County Public Defense.

 

Paul Lawrence | Senior Litigation Partner, Pacifica Law Group Paul Lawrence is the senior litigation partner at Pacifica Law Group. He concentrates his practice on complex appellate and civil litigation, including commercial, municipal, constitutional, environmental, and insurance coverage cases in federal and state courts.

Paul’s appellate experience includes over 125 appeals, principally in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, the Supreme Courts of Washington and Montana, and the various Courts of Appeal in Washington. He has also practiced in the United States Supreme Court, the Second, Third, Seventh, Eleventh, D.C., and Federal Circuit Courts of Appeal, and the California and New York appellate courts. His appellate clients include a variety of public and private entities, whom he has represented in a broad range of cases, including many of first impression.

Paul has been included in The Best Lawyers in America® in the field of Appellate Practice since the inception of that category. In 2021, he was selected as “Lawyer of the Year” in Appellate Practice in Seattle. His clients include a broad range of public entities and private clients, including Fortune 500 Companies, significant local businesses, a foreign nation, and Washington counties, cities, special purpose districts, and port districts. He previously chaired the Litigation Department at Preston Gates Ellis (now K&L Gates) and the Appellate Practice Group at K&L Gates.

 

Toby Marshall | Founding Member, Terrell Marshall Law Group PLLC Toby Marshall is a founding member of Terrell Marshall Law Group PLLC, where he represents plaintiffs in class actions, collective actions, and other complex litigation. Toby has dedicated his career to fighting for people who cannot afford access to justice. Through his advocacy, Toby has recovered tens of millions of dollars for workers subjected to wage theft, consumers treated unfairly by businesses, and employees who faced discrimination or retaliation. He has also obtained substantial injunctive relief for individuals whose civil rights were violated by governmental entities.

Toby has successfully litigated and tried cases in state and federal courts. He has also secured numerous appellate victories before the Washington Supreme Court, the Washington Court of Appeals, and the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Toby has practiced in courts around the country, and he co-counsels with many firms and nonprofit organizations. He was co-counsel in Wilbur v. Mt. Vernon and represented King County Department of Public Defense in In the Matter of the Detention of M.E.

 

Vanessa Martin | LEAD Management Team, Whatcom County Vanessa Martin serves on the LEAD Management Team in Whatcom County, where she helped guide the initiative from its launch into long-term implementation. She works at the intersection of behavioral health, public safety, and systems change, with a focus on collaborative community response models. She is a site advisor with Purpose Dignity Action, supporting LEAD, Recovery Navigator Program, and Arrest and Jail Alternatives sites nationwide, and is the Managing Director of the Co-Responder Outreach Alliance of Washington, where she works to strengthen co-responder systems through statewide collaboration and policy development.

 

David Montes | Staff Attorney, ACLU of Washington David Montes is a Staff Attorney at the ACLU of Washington. His work focuses on immigration and the criminal legal system, including bringing a case challenging Yakima County's failure to provide attorneys to indigent defendants in their Court. Before his time at the ACLU of Washington, he was a public defender in King County for 11 years.

 

Liz Mustin | Supervising Attorney, Washington State Office of Public Defense Liz Mustin is the Supervising Attorney for the Adult and Youth Criminal Defense Programs at the Washington State Office of Public Defense. In this role, she supervises the Youth Access to Counsel (YAC), Public Defense Improvement and Recruitment and Retention Teams. She came to OPD to help launch the YAC program and led the creation of a statewide program to provide attorney consultations to youth who are contacted by law enforcement and asked to waive their constitutional rights. Through YAC, she collaborates with youth defenders nationwide to provide advice on similar initiatives and works to support youth defense work in Washington state.

Alongside YAC, she worked with her team to create the statewide Recruitment and Retention Program at OPD, which houses the Rural Public Defense Fellowship. The fellowship places rising third year law students in rural and underserved public defense offices statewide and provides training and mentorship, along with other recruitment and retention initiatives. Finally, she oversees the RCW 10.101 grant program that provides grants and technical assistance to local jurisdictions to support improvements in public defense. Prior to joining OPD, Liz worked as a public defender in King and Snohomish Counties for almost ten years. She handled serious adult felony cases and served as the Lead Juvenile Attorney for the Snohomish County Public Defender. She has represented youth in both juvenile and adult court.

 

Senator Jamie Pedersen | Washington State Senator, 43rd District Jamie Pedersen grew up in Puyallup, graduated from Puyallup High School and worked at McDonald’s to help put himself through Yale, where he studied Russian and history, and graduated summa cum laude. After spending a year living in Russia and collecting oral histories of Soviet Afghan war veterans, Jamie attended Yale Law School. He clerked on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit and then returned to Seattle – and Capitol Hill – in 1995. He practiced law at Preston Gates & Ellis (now K&L Gates) for 17 years. In May 2012, he went to work at McKinstry, a Seattle-based construction and engineering firm with substantial expertise in green building, where he is Executive Vice President and General Counsel.

Jamie was elected to the House of Representatives in 2006 and was appointed to the Senate in December 2013 and elected in 2014, 2018, and 2022. He served four years as chair of the Senate Law & Justice Committee. In November 2024, he was elected Senate Majority Leader after serving three years as Majority Floor Leader. He continues to serve on the Ways & Means Committee and the Rules Committee. Jamie has also been a commissioner on the national Uniform Law Commission since 2010.

Jamie helped to organize and was a plaintiff in League of Education Voters v. State of Washington, the case that overturned several Tim Eyman initiatives that purported to require 2/3 majorities to pass tax increases in the legislature. In 2012, Jamie led efforts to pass historic marriage equality legislation as prime sponsor of the House version of the bill. Voters approved the law that fall, making Washington the seventh state in the nation to allow same-sex couples to marry. In 2021, in the wake of the murder of George Floyd, Jamie passed legislation to provide timely and effective enforcement of state standards for law enforcement officers, allowing the Criminal Justice Training Commission to discipline officers unfit to carry a badge and gun.

In 2023, he helped to end a decades-long legacy of injustice by passing legislation to abolish the death penalty in Washington law. Due to the racially biased application of the death penalty, it had been deemed unconstitutional by the State Supreme Court in 2018. In 2026, he sponsored and passed the Millionaires Tax – the most substantial progressive tax reform in state history. The 9.9% tax on income above $1 million represents historic progress to reduce taxes for working families and make one of the most regressive tax codes in the nation more fair. Jamie has helped lead efforts on several measures to reduce gun violence.

Jamie is actively involved in many community and nonprofit organizations. He is the past President and current Treasurer and council member of Central Lutheran Church on Capitol Hill, where he helped establish a nonprofit to run a community lunch program that feeds hundreds of people each week. Jamie chaired the board of the national civil rights organization Lambda Legal, continues to serve on its National Leadership Council, and was Lambda’s lead volunteer lawyer on the state’s marriage equality case. Jamie lives on Capitol Hill with his husband, Eric Pedersen, and their sons Trygve, Leif, Erik and Anders, all of whom attend Seattle Public Schools.

 

Representative Strom Peterson | Washington State Representative, 21st District State Representative Strom Peterson has been a champion for the people and quality life of the 21st District. Dedicated to serving with integrity and leading through collaboration, Strom has brought Legislators together on issues of safety, environmental protection, housing and health to get things done for us.

Prior to his election to the State House of Representatives, Strom served as an Edmonds City Councilmember where he focused on public safety, environmental sustainability, and a thriving local economy. Strom also serves on the Snohomish County Council giving him a clear vision of what’s needed at the local level to help his constituents. Active in the community, Strom also serves on the board of the Progressive Animal Welfare Society (PAWS) and has been proud to work with diverse organizations in the community including the Edmonds Center for the Arts, Edmonds Community College, and the Veterans Plaza Committee.

Strom grew up in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and received his B.A. in English from the University of New Mexico. He and his wife, Maria Montalvo, settled in Edmonds in 2001, and founded three successful small businesses in Edmonds. Strom’s grandfather served more than ten years as a County Council member in Colorado, and his parents served on numerous political groups and committees in New Mexico. Strom and Maria are active members of the Edmonds community and live in the Seaview neighborhood of Edmonds with their beloved Bitzer, Lulu.

 

Jason Schwarz | Director, Snohomish County Office of Public Defense Jason Schwarz is Director of the Snohomish County Office of Public Defense. Before that he was a staff attorney and supervisor for the Snohomish County Public Defender Association for 12 years. He is a graduate of Seattle University School of Law and Evergreen State College and has an M.A. in history from the University of Chicago. He was an extern for Washington Supreme Court Justice Tom Chambers. After graduation he taught at Evergreen an upper-level Shakespeare course for undergraduates. As chair of the Council on Public Defense, he was key in advocating for the Board of Governors approval of the new standards. He has advocated in Olympia and nationally for defender standards.

 

Maia Vanyo | Chief Deputy, Whatcom County Public Defender’s Office Maia Vanyo is the Chief Deputy of the Whatcom County Public Defender’s Office and Outgoing Chair of the WSBA Council on Public Defense. Maia has been a public defender since she graduated with honors from the University of Washington School of Law in 1999. She has extensive experience representing juveniles and adults charged with misdemeanors and felonies, including sex offenses and homicides.