Represent!

Indigent Defense System needs $1.5 million to avoid a constitutional crisis

In recent weeks, the Legislature has scrambled to provide enough funding to hold agencies over until the end of the year: nearly $35 million to DHS, and over $700,000 to the Oklahoma Indigent Defense System (OIDS). Though it’s a relatively unknown and small agency, OIDS plays a critical role in the justice system, ensuring that people accused of crimes have the right to a “fair and speedy trial” as guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. 

Oklahomans who are charged with crimes but can’t afford an attorney to represent them are provided one by OIDS, either through a staff attorney or a contract with a private attorney. (Tulsa and Oklahoma counties have separate public defender offices, which do not receive appropriations from the Legislature.) When these offices don’t receive enough funding to fulfill their duties, they risk violating our constitutional right to representation.

OIDS has been inching toward insolvency for years, as the need for representation continues to grow while funding drops. This year, in order to avoid a legal crisis, the agency’s budget must be returned at least to the barely-adequate level of funding provided at the beginning of FY 2016. That will require $1.5 million more than what they got in FY 2017.

Ryan Gentzler is a policy analyst with Oklahoma Policy Institute. For the rest of this article and more, visit okpolicy.org.