CIPARICK, J.
This appeal presents the question of whether the City of New York's 2010 plan for indigent defense, permitting representation by both institutional providers and private attorneys in cases in which a conflict of interest precludes representation by the initial provider, constitutes a valid combination plan within the meaning of article 18-B of the County Law (County Law § 722). Petitioners, various county bar associations, challenged the proposed plan and its implementing regulations (see 43 RCNY 13-01 et seq.) as violative of County Law § 722 and Municipal Home Rule Law § 11 (1) (e). We conclude that the City may assign conflict cases to institutional providers, that its ability to do so is not contingent on the consent of the county bar associations and that the City's proposed indigent defense plan does not run afoul of the County Law or Municipal Home Rule Law.
In 1965, the legislature enacted article 18-B of the County Law (County Law § 722) in response to the Supreme Court's landmark decision in Gideon v Wainwright (372 U.S. 335 [1963]), which held that the fundamental right to counsel in criminal
Subdivision (4) further provides that when the City has not enacted a plan conforming with subdivisions (3) or (4) and "the judge ... is satisfied that a conflict of interest prevents the assignment of counsel pursuant to the plan in operation ... the judge ... may assign any attorney in such ... city."
Also in 1965, the Association of the Bar of the City of New York (not a party to this case) and petitioners proposed a joint plan for indigent defense (the 1965 Bar Plan) that, consistent with section 722 (4), "combine[d] representation by a private legal aid society [pursuant to subdivision (2)] and by private attorneys [pursuant to subdivision (3)]." Under the 1965 Bar Plan, the county bar associations would submit a list of names
In November 1965, then Mayor Robert F. Wagner, Jr., issued New York City Executive Order No. 178 establishing a combined option plan as proposed by the bar associations for indigent defense pursuant to County Law § 722 (4). In conformity with the 1965 Bar Plan, Executive Order No. 178 designated the Legal Aid Society as the primary provider of counsel to indigent defendants and stated that "[i]n those cases where by reason of a conflict of interest ... the Legal Aid Society declines to represent any such defendant, such defendant shall be represented by counsel furnished pursuant to the [Bar Plan]." It should be noted that at that time the Legal Aid Society was the only institutional provider of legal services in New York City.
While in subsequent decades the provision of indigent defense functioned in accordance with the plan established by Executive Order No. 178, it was not wholly without practical alterations. In 1980 and 1991, the First and Second Judicial Departments adopted new rules, which the county bar associations approved, whereby committees designated by the Appellate Division would perform the function of screening attorneys for the 18-B panels (see 22 NYCRR 612.0 et seq.; 22 NYCRR 678.1 et seq.). Beginning in 1996, the City began contracting with other institutional providers in addition to the Legal Aid Society. Presently, institutional providers furnishing indigent defense services also include Staten Island Legal Services, the Bronx Defenders, Brooklyn Defender Services, New York County Defender Services, Neighborhood Defender Service of Harlem and Queens Law Associates.
In June 2008, recognizing that the Legal Aid Society was no longer the sole institutional provider of primary defense counsel, Mayor Michael Bloomberg issued New York City Executive Order No. 118 of 2008, which repealed New York City Executive
On January 6, 2010, the City adopted chapter 13 of title 43 of the Rules of the City of New York (43 RCNY 13-01 et seq.) entitled "Indigent Defense Plan for the City of New York." Of great significance to this appeal, chapter 13 addressed the assignment of conflict counsel, providing:
Thus, chapter 13 permits the assignment of conflict cases to institutional providers in addition to 18-B panel attorneys. Chapter 13 also created the Office of the Assigned Counsel Plan (OACP), which is "overseen by two Administrators in consultation with the Presiding Justices of the First and Second Judicial Departments" and is "responsible for management of the City's Criminal Defense Panels" (43 RCNY 13-01).
In February 2010, as per the procedures established in chapter 13, the City issued a request for proposals (the RFP) inviting institutional bids for the provision of indigent criminal defense services and for the assignment of conflict cases. The RFP stated that "the City is interested in providing representation in conflict cases and anticipates issuing awards to vendors who propose to provide representation in conflict cases."
The City subsequently issued two addendums to the RFP. A February 8, 2010 addendum clarified that "[t]he City has not decided and the RFP does not state that a definite number of providers will be selected for each county." The second
Petitioners
Subsequently, on July 13, 2010, Mayor Bloomberg issued New York City Executive Order No. 136 of 2010, which repealed the preceding Executive Orders,
In response to Executive Order No. 136, petitioners amended their pleading, asserting that the most recent order "attempts to selectively preserve portions of the 1965 Bar Plan while rejecting other portions" without the approval of the county bar associations in violation of County Law § 722 (3).
The City answered, asserting that its indigent defense plan is a combination plan pursuant to County Law § 722 (4), that the second addendum indicating otherwise was a misstatement, that "the criminal defense panels of private attorneys continue to be administered in the same manner [as prescribed by the 1965 Bar Plan] and [that] the role of the bar associations has not been changed or modified by the City in any way." The City cross-moved for summary judgment.
Supreme Court granted the petition to an extent not relevant to this appeal, otherwise dismissed the petition with prejudice and granted the City's motion for summary judgment (see Matter of New York County Lawyers' Assn. v Bloomberg, 30 Misc.3d 921 [Sup Ct, NY County 2011]). A majority of Appellate Division justices affirmed (Matter of New York County Lawyers' Assn. v Bloomberg, 95 A.D.3d 92 [1st Dept 2012]), finding, as did Supreme Court, that section 722 (2) authorized the City to assign conflict cases to institutional providers without petitioners' consent, that section 722 (3) as amended did not reserve exclusive authority over the provision of conflict counsel to the county bar associations and that the City's indigent defense plan "is a lawful `combination' plan under County Law § 722 (4)" (id. at 95). The majority determined that any differences between the bar plan component of the City's proposed combination plan and the 1965 Bar Plan were immaterial (see id. at 102). The dissenting justices would have granted the petition, finding that "[t]he City's Bar Plan is markedly different from the version devised and approved by the County Bars in 1965," and that regardless of how the court "characterize[d] the changes [between the plans], the ineluctable reality is that a
Petitioners appeal pursuant to CPLR 5601 (a) and we now affirm.
"It is fundamental that a court, in interpreting a statute, should attempt to effectuate the intent of the Legislature" (Patrolmen's Benevolent Assn. of City of N.Y. v City of New York, 41 N.Y.2d 205, 208 [1976]; see also Matter of M.B., 6 N.Y.3d 437, 447 [2006]). To that end, in our present interpretation of County Law § 722, we must look first to the statutory text, which is "the clearest indicator of legislative intent" (Majewski v Broadalbin-Perth Cent. School Dist., 91 N.Y.2d 577, 583 [1998]). We are also guided in our analysis by the familiar principle "that a statute ... must be construed as a whole and that its various sections must be considered together and with reference to each other" (People v Mobil Oil Corp., 48 N.Y.2d 192, 199 [1979]).
Petitioners contend that County Law § 722 neither contemplates nor allows the City's assignment of conflict cases to institutional providers. According to petitioners, because section 722 addresses the provision of conflict counsel in subdivisions (3) and (4) only, conflict counsel may only be appointed by the bar associations or the judiciary pursuant to those provisions. Specifically, petitioners rely on the 2010 amendment to section 722 (3), which allowed for representation pursuant to a bar plan whereby an "office of conflict defender" would provide conflict representation (see County Law § 722 [3] [a] [ii]). Arguing that the phrase "office of conflict defender" must be read broadly to encompass institutional providers, petitioners assert that the county bar associations alone possess the authority to appoint institutional providers in conflict cases. By necessity, then, the services of institutional providers under section 722 (2), which omits reference to conflicts of interest, are limited to primary representation. We do not agree with petitioners' interpretation and conclude that the statute permits the City to assign conflict cases to institutional providers of indigent defense services.
Section 722 compels the City to "place in operation ... a plan for providing counsel to persons charged with a crime ... who are financially unable to obtain counsel." As the United
The 2010 amendment to section 722 (3) does not alter our analysis; it simply gives municipalities yet another option for the handling of conflict cases — representation by an office of conflict defender pursuant to a bar plan (see County Law § 722 [3] [a] [ii]).
Our reading is also fully consistent with County Law § 722 (4). That section allows for representation of indigent defendants "according to a plan containing a combination of" section 722 (1), (2) or (3). It also allows the court to assign counsel where the City has not "placed in operation a plan conforming to" subdivision (3) or a combination plan under subdivision (4), and the court "is satisfied that a conflict of interest prevents the assignment of counsel pursuant to the plan in operation." In accordance with our analysis, nothing in County Law § 722 would prevent the City from implementing a plan whereby both primary and conflict counsel are furnished by various institutional providers pursuant to section 722 (2). In that case, because the plan in operation would most often provide a mechanism for resolving a conflict of interest, the occurrence of a conflict would typically not trigger the court's discretionary authority to appoint counsel unless, of course, a third conflict exists. Thus, petitioners' assertion that County Law § 722 reserves authority over the assignment of conflict representation
Having concluded that the City may appoint institutional providers to conflict cases independently of the bar associations and the court, we turn to the question of whether the City's proposed indigent defense plan is a valid combination plan adopted pursuant to County Law § 722 (4). Petitioners assert that the purported "bar plan" component of the City's proposed plan is not actually "a plan of a bar association" under section 722 (3) as the bar associations have not ratified, and in fact object to, the City's alterations to the 1965 Bar Plan. Of those alterations, petitioners point primarily to the departure from that portion of the 1965 Bar Plan designating conflict representation exclusively to 18-B panel attorneys. If we are to effectuate the legislative intent underlying County Law § 722, however, we cannot invalidate the City's proposed plan on that basis.
To condition the City's authority to implement a combination plan incorporating a subdivision (3) component either on the adoption of the 1965 Bar Plan in its entirety or on the bar associations' consent to abandon that portion of the plan reserving conflict representation exclusively to 18-B attorneys would be to allow the bar associations to unilaterally block the City from adopting a plan for conflict representation that includes institutional providers. In effect, the bar associations would control the City's ability to fulfill its statutory mandate to formulate a comprehensive plan for indigent defense. We do not believe the legislature intended such a result. Rather, County Law § 722 appears to contemplate precisely what occurred here — that the City, in response to needs actual or perceived, could implement a combination plan apportioning conflict representation among both institutional providers and private counsel retained pursuant to the selection method created by the 1965 Bar Plan, the 18-B panels.
Petitioners also point to other changes, which they claim run counter to the 1965 Bar Plan and violate County Law § 722. First, petitioners assert that the City's proposed plan impermissibly transfers authority to determine whether a conflict of interest exists from the judiciary to institutional providers. We disagree. The 1965 Bar Plan stipulated that the court would appoint an 18-B attorney where it "deems the assignment of other counsel to be required in the interest of justice because of ... a conflict of interest." However, nothing in the 1965 Bar Plan
Next, they assert that in creating the OACP, the City's proposed plan usurped management authority over the 18-B panels from judicially appointed administrators and placed it under executive control. OACP, however, is "overseen by two Administrators in consultation with the Presiding Justices of the First and Second Judicial Departments" (43 RCNY 13-01) and, as the majority below found "takes no authority away from the [county bar associations]" (Matter of New York County Lawyers Assn., 95 AD3d at 102). Petitioners also assert that the City's proposed plan impermissibly replaces the county bar associations' role over the selection of 18-B panel attorneys with "screening and advisory committees" designated by the First and Second Judicial Departments. While the 1965 Bar Plan did not provide for the Appellate Division's involvement in the screening of 18-B attorneys, it is undisputed that in 1980 and 1991, the county bar associations approved new sections of the Appellate Division rules that created the very screening committees for 18-B panels to which they now object (see 22 NYCRR 612.0 et seq.; 22 NYCRR 678.1 et seq.). Thus, the City's proposed plan merely codifies a change that the bar associations ratified and that has been in practice for decades.
Finally, we reject the argument that the City's 2010 plan violates Municipal Home Rule Law § 11 (1) (e), which prohibits the adoption of a local law that supercedes a state statute if such law affects the courts. No such situation exists here.
We thus conclude and agree with the majority below that the City's 2010 plan for indigent defense constitutes a valid combination plan under County Law § 722 (4). Construed as a whole, section 722 affords the City the flexibility to appoint institutional providers to represent indigent defendants where a
Accordingly, the order of the Appellate Division should be affirmed, without costs.
Chief Judge LIPPMAN (dissenting).
While I do not disagree with that part of the majority's analysis concluding that a County Law § 722 (2) indigent defense plan may draw upon institutional providers for both primary and conflict representation, I do not view that conclusion as necessary or even helpful to a correct analysis of whether the indigent defense plan now before us comports with the County Law.
As the majority has so meticulously detailed, the City, after purporting to jettison the combined (County Law § 722 [4]) plan that had been in place since 1965 and replace it simply with a section 722 (2) plan in which panel attorneys would play no part, has now clarified that that was not its intention at all and that its new plan is, like the plan it is to supplant, actually a County Law § 722 (4) combination plan, in accordance with which legal services would be provided by private practitioners pursuant to a section 722 (3) bar association plan, and by private institutional providers pursuant to section 722 (2). The salient and transformative difference between the new and old plans is that under the new plan institutional providers may be called upon to provide either primary or conflict representation, whereas under the old plan, both as formulated by the bar associations and implemented by the City, representation in conflict cases was to be handled exclusively by panel attorneys. The new plan reduces, and indeed will likely marginalize the participation of panel attorneys, dramatically shifting from them to institutional providers retained through competitive bidding, the conflict defense function.
As the majority acknowledges, and as is in any case clear from the record, it was an express element of the 1965 bar association plan and of the consequent City plan adopted in the same year that panel attorneys would be assigned all of the matters in which the then sole private institutional provider,
Inasmuch, then, as the City's presently proposed combination plan lacks an essential combinative element, namely "a plan of a bar association," it is not a valid County Law § 722 (4) plan and that is where the analysis logically must find its point of repose. The majority, however, would avoid this conclusion, not because it is sensible to suppose that the bare retention of the panels is or may be deemed "pursuant to ... a plan of a bar association," but because it finds unacceptable the notion that bar associations may, by withholding consent to a City plan for the provision of panel attorneys, "unilaterally block the City from
While, under the statute, the absence of "a plan of a bar association" operates to prevent the City from devising a subdivision (3) plan or a subdivision (4) plan depending on a subdivision (3) component, these limitations manifestly do not prevent the City from fulfilling its statutory mandate to formulate a comprehensive plan for indigent defense. And, given the majority's understanding of what a subdivision (2) plan may include, it is clear that the City may adopt a plan that will meet its dominant motivating objective of shifting conflict representation to institutional providers. Indeed, the present plan's subdivision (2) component, standing alone, would appear independently to be statutorily compliant as a subdivision (2) plan.
Although the City may prefer a combination plan involving the retention of panel attorneys so as to assure that there will be no situation in which a court will appoint conflict counsel pursuant to section 722 (4),
The City doubtless has considerable discretion to fashion an indigent defense plan, but like any other locality charged with the obligation of devising such a plan, its discretion is limited by County Law § 722; it does not have laissez-faire to construct a plan except from the elements the statute makes available (see e.g. Goehler v Cortland County, 70 A.D.3d 57 [3d Dept 2009]
The City may have very sound policy reasons for the change it proposes, but as it goes about altering, perhaps irretrievably, the network of indigent defense service providers that has been in place for some 47 years, it would seem more than ordinarily important to insist upon compliance with the limitations contained in County Law § 722, among them that bar association consent be obtained as a condition of a City plan purporting to rely on "a plan of a bar association." This is not simply a question of logic and manners. The purpose of the statute is to assure that there will be quality representation for indigent defendants pursuant to the mandate of Gideon v Wainwright (372 U.S. 335 [1963]), and toward that end the legislature has, quite reasonably, required localities to act cooperatively with the bar associations whose members are to be drawn upon for their professional services. If the panels are to be retained and usefully administered as a representational resource, it would be prudent and natural that it would be according to a sustaining plan devised not only by the City but also in part by legal professionals concerned first and foremost with the delivery of quality representation. That is, in any event, what the statute requires and what municipal discretion therefore is not appropriately invoked to excuse.
Order affirmed, without costs.