Court dismisses parental leave proposal: Says the board has no standing to propose the rule.

The Board of Governors does not have the authority to propose a procedural rule on parental leave that was rejected by the Rules of Judicial Administration Committee.

Acting January 18 in Case No. SC17-1611, a unanimous Supreme Court said the only entities authorized to propose procedural rule changes directly to the court, under Rule 2.140, are the rules committees appointed by the Bar.

"There is no provision in the rule that authorizes the Board of Governors to unilaterally propose a procedural rule to the court, especially one like proposed new rule 2.570 that has been rejected by the RJA Committee," the court said in an order dismissing the case.

The issue of parental leave first came up in the RJAC two years ago when one of its subcommittees proposed a rule requiring judges to grant continuances in cases in which the lawyers were expecting children. The full committee debated the proposal at two meetings and then rejected it both times, with members saying they supported the policy but thought it was best left to judicial discretion and was not appropriate for a procedural rule.

Meanwhile, the Bar's Diversity and Inclusion Committee reviewed the matter and voted unanimously in favor of a continuance rule and then-President Bill Schifino appointed a special panel, with five members from each committee, to review the issue. That committee, by a 6-4 vote, recommended an amendment to the Rules of Judicial Administration, creating a presumption that expecting attorneys would be able to get a three-month continuance if they were the lead attorney in the case. A judge would have to give a reason on the record for rejecting such a motion.

The opposing party, under the proposed rule, could claim the delay would be prejudicial, and the burden would be on the petitioning attorney to prove there would be no such harm.

Both the Young Lawyers Division Board of Governors and the Bar Board of Governors, at its July meeting, unanimously approved that recommendation, and the Bar board submitted it to the court.

In October, however, the Supreme Court asked the Bar to explain why it had submitted the proposed new Rule of...