fall 2003 vol.9 no. 2                                                                                                                            Return to Contents
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Texas Forum XXII

The twenty-second annual Texas Forum was held at the Texas Law Center in Austin on September 5, 20003. The State Bar of Texas Standing Committee on Legal Assistants (“LAC”) and the Legal Assistants Division of the State Bar (“LAD”) jointly host the Forum each fall. Attendees included members of both hosting groups, Austin area paralegals, and paralegal educators from around the state. The topic of the Forum was Issues and Emerging Trends for the Legal Assistant a/k/a Paralegal Profession.

Terry Hull, J.D., who is the Director of the Master of Legal Studies Program, Department of Political Science at Texas State University at San Marcos, gave a summary of information regarding current usage trends for the terms “legal assistant” and “paralegal”. Her presentation included information about national organizations and their positions, summaries of the activities of state law and task forces from several states that are addressing the profession within their state, and a comparison between our profession and that of the physician assistant.

She reported that the American Bar Association changed the name of its standing committee (“SCOLA”) to the Standing Committee on Paralegals in August of 2003, stating “SCOLA members concluded that it is important to remove any basis for confusion and that paralegal is the preferable title for the years ahead.” Although the National Association for Legal Assistants maintains their position that the terms are interchangeable, they have made application for a registered trademark for the use of the term “Certified Paralegal” and are using that term in addition to “Certified Legal Assistant”. The National Federation for Paralegal Associations adopted a resolution in 2002 indicating the organizations preference for the term “paralegal”. California, North Carolina, and Wisconsin are currently involved in legislation or task forces to better define the terms used in their respective states.

Debra Crosby, who is a co-chair of the LAC/LAD Joint Task Force, gave the next presentation about the history of investigations into regulation of paralegals in Texas and the current activities of the Task Force. The Task Force is in the process of preparing a presentation to the Bar Board on the issues it has researched and a proposal for more strictly defining the use of the term “paralegal” in Texas.

Dave Ellis, an attorney with Hughes and Luce, concluded the Forum with a presentation on the exempt v. non-exempt status of paralegals as employees. His presentation included information about the current status and the potential effects of the current proposed Department of Labor (“DOL”) regulations. Although he clearly stated that it would be a case-by-case determination, all of the opinions issued by the DOL to date have held that paralegals are non-exempt. However, this contradicts the Page and Addison court decision that held that those paralegals were exempt under the administration exemption. The new proposed regulation dilutes some of the language regarding exemptions to the point that paralegals would probably fall under the exempt status. However, it was his opinion that this proposal is unlikely to be enacted in its current form.

Texas Paralegal Journal © Copyright 2003 by the Legal Assistants Division, State Bar of Texas.

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