The State Bar is proposing significant changes to its Mandatory Continuing Legal Education (MCBE) program. These proposed amendments would increase the educational requirement from 25 to 36 hours every 3 years, and modify the specialty credit requirements. There still will be 4 hours required in legal ethics, but an additional 4 hours will be required either in legal ethics or in law practice management, or in any combination of both. The “substance abuse” specialty credit will be substituted by a “competence issues” credit, which includes substance abuse issues as well as mental or physical issues which impair the ability to perform legal services with competence. The specialty credit of “elimination of bias in the legal profession” will be modified as “the recognition and elimination of bias in the legal profession and society.” The requirement for both the “competence issues” credit and the “elimination of bias” credit will remain at one hour of each.
Among the changes proposed for MCLE providers is a requirement that all MCLE programs include substantive written materials to be distributed to participants. Currently, distribution of substantive written materials is required only for programs offering more than one hour of MCLE credit.
Comments regarding the proposed amendments should be sent to Laila Bartlett, at Laila.Bartlett@calbar.ca.gov, no later September 6, 2013.