Last week the California State Bar Board of Trustees voted to move forward with the exploration of a regulatory sandbox approach.
The goal: achieving greater access to legal services through innovation. The vote was based upon the California Task Force On Access Through Innovation of Legal Services Report that was submitted in March.
The California Report recommends a regulatory sandbox approach similar to the one that has been approved by Utah’s Supreme Court. The Report provided the Board of Trustees with three options. The Trustees voted to adopt the most extensive option that empowers a working group to evaluate the use of a sandbox to explore innovative technologies for the delivery of legal services that may include the participation by nonlawyers.
Approving the participation of nonlawyers in delivery of legal services would ultimately require amending the rules of professional conduct that prohibit sharing fees with nonlawyers and the unauthorized practice of law. In fact, Utah’s proposed amendments are currently posted and available for public comment until July 23, 2020.
The California Report included a visual (below) borrowed from Utah’s Task Force that may provide a clearer view of the sandbox concept.
Basically, the Sandbox Model allows both experimentation and evaluation to determine whether fundamental regulatory changes should be recommended to support greater access to legal services.
As our reliance on technology has increased during the pandemic, it will be interesting to see if innovation in legal services becomes more easily accepted.
