It’s Lawyers vs. Recyclers in Scrap Over Paper : Environment: Sierra Club wants attorneys to use less. But state Judicial Council will not require use of recycled goods.
Lawyers trail only the government in their consumption of paper. According to the American Bar Assn., the average attorney uses an estimated one ton of paper a year, at a cost of 17 trees.
Armed with an array of statistics such as these, environmental lawyers are trying to cut the use of paper in this state with a plan to require attorneys to use recycled paper in most court documents and use both sides of a page.
The Sierra Club Legal Defense Fund says using recycled paper in court documents instead of virgin paper could save more than 6,000 trees annually; two-sided printing could conserve another 10,000 trees. Even greater savings would result if lawyers applied those policies to non-court paperwork, the group says.
Sierra Club lawyers have asked the rule-making state Judicial Council to require the use of recycled paper now and to mandate the use of two-sided court documents within five years.
“California has a chance to be the leader in a nationwide environmental reform movement,” said staff attorney Deborah S. Reames. “What’s at stake is whether the legal profession is going to do its part . . . or whether everyone else is going to have to do more of their share to make up for the lawyers.”
Despite its noble aims, the proposal has encountered strong opposition from the State Bar of California and dozens of attorneys, judges and court aides who warn of higher costs and inconvenience.
The Bar’s Board of Governors told the Judicial Council that it opposes mandatory use of recycled paper because of economic burdens it would cause, particularly to small law firms and sole practitioners.
The plan for mandatory two-sided documents is widely opposed, the board said, because many offices do not have equipment to make two-sided copies. It noted that many court papers are bound at the top; using two-sided copies would mean rotating a document every other page to read it.
As the debate has emerged, the state’s highest court has quietly instituted procedures aimed at reducing the use of paper.
The state Supreme Court is making wide use of recycled paper and has begun using both sides of the page in court opinions and internal memoranda. Significant long-term paper savings are anticipated: for example, a ruling in a capital case can run more than 100 pages.
“So far, the program seems successful,” said court spokeswoman Lynn Holton. “We’ve heard no complaints.”
If the paper-saving requirements are adopted by the Judicial Council, California’s courts would become the first in the nation to mandate such sweeping steps. The Florida Supreme Court recently required the use of recycled paper in the courts, and a number of states encourage such use. Sierra Club lawyers say they have been contacted about the proposal pending in California by officials in 14 states.
The Sierra Club, citing several studies, petitioned the Judicial Council last summer to adopt rules requiring court documents to be printed and copied on recycled paper, allowing the use of unbleached paper and, after five years of voluntary use, mandating the use of both sides of transcripts, appellate records and copies of other court documents.
The group noted that the 1989 Integrated Waste Management Act requires California communities, through recycling and other measures, to reduce solid waste 25% by 1995 and 50% by 2000.
Although the Sierra Club proposal would apply only to court documents, the group contends that the state’s lawyers would quickly apply the policy to the vast quantities of letters, records and other legal papers not filed with the courts.
“If the Judicial Council will go all the way on mandatory recycled and double-sided documents, the educational benefits would be immense on an industry that uses so much paper,” said Jonathan Alan Rosenfield, a Sierra Club researcher.
But at a meeting here this month, the Judicial Council appeared divided on the issue and voted to only encourage the use of recycled paper and to give further study to mandatory recycling and two-sided printing.
Some of the 21 council members were impressed by the anticipated savings of paper. “That’s not saving trees, that’s saving forests,” said San Bernardino Superior Judge Patrick J. Morris.
While dozens of judges, court aides and lawyers have written in support of the proposal, dozens more have registered their opposition.
Lawyers for the Pacific Legal Foundation, a conservative public interest firm, cited concern over unanticipated costs and hardships on small firms and indigents. The due process rights of prisoners to file appeals could be endangered if they lacked access to recycled paper and two-sided copying equipment, the foundation warned.
Some lawyers asked whether mandating such requirements would add burdens to hard-pressed court staffs.
“Court personnel have more important things to do than be paper inspectors,” wrote attorney Paul Robinson of Fresno. “Court rules should not be used to prove ‘political correctness’ or as a club to advance the agenda of special interest groups.”
