Amends and adds to existing law to authorize the Public Defense Commission to promulgate rules for indigent defense standards; to require compliance with indigent defense standards, to provide for indigent defense grants, to provide application procedures for indigent defense grants, to provide procedures for noncompliance with indigent defense standards; and to revise reporting requirements.

The purpose of this legislation is to improve the delivery of trial-level indigent defense services by providing funding to counties and creating standards with which counties must comply. It is the product of the Public Defense Reform Interim Committee, which studied the issue for three years at the direction of the Legislative Council. The legislation establishes the guiding principles for provision of public defender services in Idaho. In pertinent part, the bill requires the Public Defense Commission to promulgate rules regarding: procedures for the creation, oversight, implementation, enforcement, and modification of indigent defense standards; requirements for contracts between counties and private attorneys for the provision of indigent defense services; data reporting requirements; procedures for grant applications by which counties can apply for state funds to offset the cost of compliance with indigent defense standards; and procedures for administrative review of commission decisions.