[WSBAPT] Keller Deduction Miscalculation

Tue Dec 26 10:54:58 PST 2017

Fellow WSBA Members,

As you know, each year the WSBA is required to permit its member to take a
Keller deduction for the amount of your bar dues that the Bar Association
estimates it spent on “political or ideological activities that are not
reasonably related to the regulation of the legal profession or improving
the quality of legal services.”

As you may have noticed, in recent years (and especially in 2017) the WSBA
has increasingly engaged in partisan political activity that has nothing to
do with regulating the practice of law. However, the amount of the Keller
deduction as a proportion of our bar dues has changed very little in recent
years. For this reason, I decided to pay attention to how the Keller
deduction was calculated this year. What I found was disappointing, but
sadly not surprising:* The Keller deduction should be four times larger
than the WSBA calculated. *I know the dollar amount doesn’t seem like much
given the increasing amount of your bar dues, but the First Amendment
implications of this are huge. The Constitution is clear: you cannot be
compelled to pay for political and ideological speech with which you
disagree. For this reason alone, I have sent a formal request for
arbitration of the amount of the Keller deduction to the WSBA.

Unfortunately, based on my reading of the rules for challenging the Keller
deduction, I cannot challenge the deduction on behalf of all WSBA members. *If
you want your Keller deduction to be corrected, you must submit your own
request for arbitration to the WSBA in writing no later than February 1,
2018.*

Per information on the WSBA website: “Delivery may be made in person or by
first-class mail, and mailed demands will be deemed delivered upon mailing.
Demands shall include the name and address of the member or members
demanding arbitration, a brief statement of the claim or objection, and the
signature of each objecting member.” (
https://www.wsba.org/docs/default-source/licensing/keller-deduction-overview.pdf?sfvrsn=9f3538f1_4
) I assume this means you cannot submit your demand via email.

*Below I have included the text of the demand letter I sent to the WSBA,
which you may copy and sign and send to the WSBA. *Feel free to edit or
change it however you see fit before you send it. If you think there is
something I have missed, please let me know. I expect that the WSBA will
consolidate these requests for arbitration, and I am fully prepared to
defend all of the claims made in my letter on behalf of everyone who sends
in a similar demand.

*Please feel free to forward this on to anyone you think might be
interested in having this information or post it on other listserves. *I am
not a member of any other listserves and do not have the capacity to send
this to all WSBA members, but I would like the information to get out to as
many people as possible so they can have the opportunity to be informed
about what the WSBA has been up to.

*What if I already paid my dues for 2018? *My understanding is that you can
still request arbitration and a refund for the proper amount of the Keller
deduction once it has been determined.

*Sample Demand Letter:*

Washington State Bar Association

1325 Fourth Ave.

Suite 600

Seattle, WA 98101-2539

RE: Request for Arbitration Regarding the Keller deduction

To Whom It May Concern,

This is a formal demand for arbitration regarding the amount of the Keller
deduction for the 2018 year. I allege that the Keller deduction was
calculated improperly in the following manner:

·         Political and ideological activities not related to direct and
indirect lobbying for legislation were not included in the calculation of
the Keller deduction. These activities include:

o   The cost of the Decoding the Law series, as this series was entirely
one-sided political argumentation in opposition to the death penalty,
Initiative 1552, President’s Trump’s travel bans, and espousing political
positions on race and police activity. No individuals representing the
other side of these extremely controversial political ideologies were given
the opportunity to present at any of the Decoding the Law presentations,
and numerous statements of political opinion were made by the presenters;

o   A large portion of the expenses of the Access to Justice Board, which
engages in substantial political activity, including:

§  The August 21, 2017 letter to Chief Justice Mary Fairhurst  regarding
Proposed ER 413 - Admissibility of Immigration Status (see September BOG
meeting materials pg. 392-93)

§  Comments before the FCC regarding Net Neutrality (see September BOG
meeting materials pg. 401-410)

§  The cost of the Access to Justice State Plan for the Coordinated
Delivery of Civil Legal Aid to Low Income People, as it is replete with
social and political opinion statements, including numerous references to
“systemic racism” and “racial bias that has been built into our societal
fabric.” (see March BOG meeting pubic materials pg. 129-147)

o   The expense of the publication of NW Lawyer magazine was not included
in the calculation of the Keller deduction. NW Lawyer magazine has, in 2017
in particular, become an outlet for political opinion pieces: publishing
only articles from one political perspective, while denying publication of
articles from the other perspective. Of the 60 substantive articles (not
part of a standard section such as the President’s corner or Bar Notes)
written for NW Lawyer this year, 27.42% were political in nature. Of these,
100% were written from a liberal/Democrat/left-leaning perspective. Not a
single article published in NW Lawyer magazine in 2017 was from a
conservative/Republican/right-leaning perspective. In fact, I am at a loss
to think of a single article published in NW Lawyer since I became a member
in 2013 that was from a conservative perspective. I find it impossible to
believe that this is simply the result of a lack of submissions from
conservative writers. The Letters to the Editor section contains many such
perspectives. Because of the discriminatory manner in which articles are
selected for publication in NW Lawyer magazine, the net cost of publication
of the magazine must be considered political and ideological activity on
the part of the WSBA. At the very least, the net cost of publishing the
27.42% of articles which were political in nature must be non-chargeable;

·         The amount of general staff time spent on legislative or
political matters was multiplied by an improper percentage: 58.13% instead
of 93.25%, which was the percentage of actual time spent lobbying for or
against legislation which was non-chargeable. The 58.13% figure was
obtained by dividing the number of staff hours actually spent working on
legislative activities by the number budgeted, and then multiplying that by
93.25% (the percentage of non-chargeable legislative activity). Because
only about two-thirds of the legislative budget was actually spent this
year, the percentage came out to 58.13%. However, it is improper to
multiply the amount of money *actually spent* on general staff time, BOG
meeting time, and conference calls by a number that was obtained by
counting *unspent *hours in the legislative budget. The proper calculation
should have been multiplying the value of general staff time actually spent
by the percentage of non-chargeable activities: 93.25%, resulting in a
deduction of $.13 for this portion of the Keller deduction, not $.08.

·         The portion of legislative and general staff time spent on
preparing opposition to the proposed restructuring of the 9th Circuit Court
of Appeals which was counted as chargeable time should be counted as
non-chargeable time.

*Based on the above, I estimate that the Keller deduction was miscalculated
by approximately $10.99, pending receipt of further information necessary
to make an accurate calculation. *

Per the rules set forth for arbitration, I am requesting information on the
following information:

·         A detailed breakdown of the exact manner in which the $5,456.30
of general staff time, (including salaries, benefits, and overhead), BOG
meeting time (overhead), and conference calls spent on meetings where
legislative or political matters were discussed was calculated;

·         The total cost of the Decoding the Law Series, including the
amount of staff salaries which went into running and advertising this
series, and whether this was or was not included in the calculation of the
Keller deduction;

·         The total amount of time spent by the Access to Justice Board on
political topics, including all of the above-mentioned items and whether
time spent on any of the above was already included in the calculation of
the Keller deduction.

·         A list of the title and topic of every article submitted to NW
Lawyer Magazine which was *not* accepted for publication, as well as a list
of any articles which were personally solicited by members of WSBA staff or
board members from any individual on a particular topic which were
published (in order to determine whether the selection of articles for
publication was made in a socially or politically discriminatory way).

I look forward to receiving the WSBA’s prompt response to this matter.

Sincerely,

[Name]

[Bar number]

[Contact information]

Sincerely,

Christina Faucett
Attorney at Law
faucettlegal.com
(206) 650-2420

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