GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF NORTH CAROLINA

SESSION 2005

SESSION LAW 2005-237

HOUSE BILL 896

AN ACT to provide the state bar with an appeal of right from final orders of the disciplinary hearing commission and to increase the maximum amount of the annual membership fees for members of the state bar.

The General Assembly of North Carolina enacts:

SECTION 1.  G.S. 84‑28(h) reads as rewritten:

"(h)      There shall be an appeal of right by either party from any final order of the Disciplinary Hearing Commission imposing admonition, reprimand, censure, suspension, stayed suspension, or disbarment upon an attorney, or involuntarily transferring a member of the North Carolina State Bar to disability inactive status to the North Carolina Court of Appeals. Review by the appellate division shall be upon matters of law or legal inference. The procedures governing any appeal shall be as provided by statute or court rule for appeals in civil cases. A final order which imposes disbarment or suspension for 18 months or more shall not be stayed except upon application, under the rules of the Court of Appeals, for a writ of supersedeas. A final order imposing suspension for less than 18 months or any other discipline except disbarment shall be stayed pending determination of any appeal of right."

SECTION 2.  G.S. 84‑34 reads as rewritten:

"§ 84‑34.  Membership fees and list of members.

Every active member of the North Carolina State Bar shall, prior to the first day of July of each year, pay to the secretary‑treasurer an annual membership fee in an amount determined by the Council but not to exceed two hundred dollars ($200.00), three hundred dollars ($300.00), and every member shall notify the secretary‑treasurer of the member's correct mailing address. Any member who fails to pay the required dues by the last day of June of each year shall be subject to a late fee in an amount determined by the Council but not to exceed thirty dollars ($30.00). All dues for prior years shall be as were set forth in the General Statutes then in effect. The membership fee shall be regarded as a service charge for the maintenance of the several services authorized by this Article, and shall be in addition to all fees required in connection with admissions to practice, and in addition to all license taxes required by law. The fee shall not be prorated: Provided, that no fee shall be required of an attorney licensed after this Article shall have gone into effect until the first day of January of the calendar year following that in which the attorney was licensed; but this proviso shall not apply to attorneys from other states admitted on certificate. The fees shall be disbursed by the secretary‑treasurer on the order of the Council. The secretary‑treasurer shall annually, at a time and in a law magazine or daily newspaper to be prescribed by the Council, publish an account of the financial transactions of the Council in a form to be prescribed by it. The secretary‑treasurer shall compile and keep currently correct from the names and mailing addresses forwarded to the secretary‑treasurer and from any other available sources of information a list of members of the North Carolina State Bar and furnish to the clerk of the superior court in each county, not later than the first day of October in each year, a list showing the name and address of each attorney for that county who has not complied with the provisions of this Article. The name of each of the active members who are in arrears in the payment of membership fees shall be furnished to the presiding judge at the next term of the superior court after the first day of October of each year, by the clerk of the superior court of each county wherein the member or members reside, and the court shall thereupon take action that is necessary and proper. The names and addresses of attorneys so certified shall be kept available to the public. The Secretary of Revenue is hereby directed to supply the secretary‑treasurer, from records of license tax payments, with any information for which the secretary‑treasurer may call in order to enable the secretary‑treasurer to comply with this requirement.

The list submitted to several clerks of the superior court shall also be submitted to the Council at its October meeting of each year and it shall take the action thereon that is necessary and proper."

SECTION 3.  This act is effective when it becomes law and applies to final orders of the Disciplinary Hearing Commission issued on or after that date.

In the General Assembly read three times and ratified this the 21^st day of July, 2005.

                                                                    s/ Marc Basnight

                                                                         President Pro Tempore of the Senate

                                                                    s/ James B. Black

                                                                         Speaker of the House of Representatives

                                                                    s/ Michael F. Easley

                                                                         Governor

Approved 2:01 p.m. this 29^th day of July, 2005