On Monday, June 24, 2013 lobbyist Larry Doyle, who is working with the director of TJSL's Solo Practice Concentration and the Center for Solo Practitioners, Professor Lilys McCoy, and the Conference of California Bar Associations (CCBA) presented the group with some welcome news. “I am very pleased to inform you that Governor Brown today signed into law AB 1183 (Jones), containing your CCBA Resolutions 02-06/08/09-201. The bill is now Chapter 18, Statutes of 2013, and will take effect 1/1/2014. This is the first of what hopefully will be several CCBA-sponsored bills signed into law this year. Congratulations on being the groundbreaker!”
Professor McCoy is the former CCBA Chair and is proud that AB 1183 was her original idea. She says her involvement was to write up the idea and present it to the delegates at the 2012 Conference of Delegates in order to win their support.
The bill, now Chapter 18 of the Statutes of 2013, will take effect January 1, 2014. It is based on CCBA Resolutions 02-06-2011, 02-08-2011, and 02-09-2011, by former CCBA Chair Lilys McCoy of the San Diego County Bar Association delegation. The measure passed both houses of the Legislature without opposition or ‘No’ votes.
“The CCBA worked on this bill less than a year in terms of working with the legislature, but the process started in Winter 2012 when I drafted the resolution and began working to obtain the support of the delegations to the CCBA,” said Professor McCoy, who added that one of the CCBA lobbyists worked with Assemblymember Brian Jones to help get this bill passed.
According to the CCBA website, AB 1183, by Assemblymember Brian Jones of Santee, specifies in statute that the clock does not begin to run on the deadline for filing motions to compel further response to discovery requests until verified responses to the requests are received. This simple clarification in the law will help decrease litigation games-playing and abuse of the discovery process, to the benefit of practitioners, clients and the courts.
“I am pleased to be a part of this great organization that takes California legislative proposals from concept to law,” said Professor McCoy. “This really is a great group.”
The Conference of California Bar Associations is a group of attorneys from local, specialty, and minority bar associations across the state, who are focused on improving California’s laws.
“The group is great fun and actually changes the law for the better,” said Professor McCoy. “It’s been a professional passion of mine for 20 years and I would love to see more people involved.”
For anyone who is a member of the State Bar of California and interested in learning more about the Conference of California Bar Associations, please visit http://calconference.org/html/.
