Mainebiz

V O L . X X I I I N O. X X V I I N OV E M B E R 1 3 , 2 0 1 7 16 L AW F O C U S T he long road from Houlton to Presque Isle goes past wind turbines atop Mars Hill and potato farms, eerily quiet in late October with unat- tended roadside huts peddling you-weigh, you-pay Aroostook County spuds and other produce. Driving from Portland, it's the last stretch of a four-and-a-half hour journey that might take you to Canada if you're not paying attention. Arriving into Presque Isle feels like coming into the big city. Main Street is home to a few eateries and shops, a cinema and most of its lawyers — there are just 17 in this city of 9,171. Many work on their own or with associates, but nothing like the big city fi rms. Among the latest to join their ranks is Cassie Rodgers at Swanson Law PA, a 28-year-old Presque Isle native who returned home to practice law after graduating from the University of Maine School of Law in 2016. Although she enjoyed her time in Portland where she often visits family and friends on weekends, she says she never considered staying in southern Maine or working for a big fi rm. " e large fi rm life just never seemed like it would jibe with my personality," she says, her Yorkshire terrier Teddy curiously nipping at this reporter's bag before fi nding his favorite hedgehog squeaky toy. "It's not an environment that I felt I would be comfortable in or that would work for me." Rodgers has come to value the collegiality of working in a small town, the variety of cases and areas of law from criminal defense to family law and cultivating client relationships in a way that's not spelled out in legal textbooks. "I like oppor- tunities when I'm able to resolve a matter by way of making it human. at's my style, it's my personality, that's how I advocate," she says. Another industry aging out Maine's rural communities could use more lawyers like Rodgers, and more lawyers of her generation overall, amid a looming shortage prompted by an aging out of the profession. It's much like what's happening in rural health care. Around the state, sole practitioners approaching retirement age are having an especially hard time fi nding young talent to work with and even- tually take over a practice. "I'm 70 and I really need to be retiring," says Paul Dumas, by phone from Oxford County, in west- ern Maine. Unfortunately, he adds, "I can't get any young lawyer interested in coming here to Mexico, Maine. ey all want to be in Portland." Data from the Maine Board of Overseers of the Bar backs that up. It found in a 2014 demographics report that, outside of Cumberland County, just 10% of lawyers in private practice are younger than 35, while more than 65% are 50 or older. Data in the same report on recent Maine Law grads paint a similar picture, with more than two-thirds living in southern Maine nine months after graduating. e report identifi ed concerns about a "signifi - cant reduction" in lawyer numbers over the next decade and an increasingly small, and older, group of lawyers serving rural communities. It recommended eight ways to address the problem, including student "road trips" to rural communities and regular visits to the law school by jurists from areas where there's an existing or threatened shortage of lawyers. Since then the board of overseers has followed up on sev- eral fronts from educating the bar about succession S O U R C E : Report and Recommendations of the Board of Overseers of the Bar's Task Force to Study Bar Demographics, June 2014; results are based on a survey of 758 Maine lawyers who have practiced in maine for fi ve years or less. Rural: 17% Non-rural: 83% Downeast: 1.6% Midcoast: 3.2% Western: 6.5% Northern: 8.1% Central: 12.9% Southern: 67.7% County Percent change 2015–2016 Waldo 10.81% Oxford 7.14% York 3.96% Franklin 3.70% Androscoggin 1.91% Cumberland 1.06% Aroostook, Hancock, Piscataquis, Sagadahoc 0% Penobscot −1.72% Lincoln −2.70% Somerset −2.78% Knox −2.83% Kennebec −3.90% Washington −5.71% S O U R C E : Board of Overseers of the Bar, 2016 Annual Report REGISTERED MAINE ATTORNEYS PER COUNTY REGIONAL DISTRIBUTION RURAL VS. NON-RURAL 2,008 (37.9%) 468 (8.9%) 342 (6.4%) 315 (5.9%) 205 (3.8%) 104 (2.0%) 103 (1.9%) 87 (1.6%) 75 (1.4%) 72 (1.4%) 45 (0.8%) 41 (0.7%) 35 (0.7%) 33 (0.6%) 28 (0.5%) 8 (0.2%) 1,350 (25.3%) Cumberland Kennebec Penobscot York Androscoggin Hancock Knox Sagadahoc Aroostook Lincoln Oxford Waldo Somerset Washington Franklin Piscataquis Out-of-state Maine Law graduates residing in Maine nine months following graduation, 2012 Lawyers practicing in rural Maine or who have considered practicing in rural Maine Rural appeal Efforts to attract lawyers to remote parts of Maine gain momentum

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