Financial Incentives

Educational Debt is a Barrier to Rural Criminal Legal Practice

One reason that fewer lawyers are working in rural areas may be that law school is much more expensive than it used to be. Private law school tuition in 2025 was 2.54 times higher than it was in 1985 (around when current retirement-age lawyers attended), and public law school tuition was 5.12 times higher, after adjusting for inflation.¹ A lawyer retiring now would have paid, on average, $6,262 per year (in 2025 dollars) to attend an in-state public law school in 1985; a lawyer starting now would have paid $32,051 per year in 2025² if they paid full price.³

Most law students must take on enormous debt to cover these costs. In 2022, law school borrowers took out loans totaling, on average, $119,292.⁴ This does not include interest accrued during law school (at a rate of around 8% for federal loans⁵ ), which capitalizes and is due six months after graduation, so that someone who borrowed $130,000 could expect to owe over $150,000 shortly after they graduate.⁶ A 2021 survey found that Black borrowers more often than other racial and ethnic groups had debt balances over $200,000 at graduation and were most likely to have their debt grow after graduation.⁷

Public service lawyers, like prosecutors and public defenders, will generally make less money than those in for-profit practice.⁸In 2023, the median first-year salary for a lawyer at a mid-sized firm (51-100 lawyers) was $155,000, compared to, in 2023, a median first-year salary of $69,608 for public defenders.⁹ Other reports found that, in 2021, in cities, the median starting salary for assistant district attorneys was $64,000 and for public defenders was $63,638.¹⁰ Student loan debt has reportedly discouraged lawyers from taking these jobs.¹¹

But even those salaries are out of reach for many rural criminal lawyers. Part-time or contract practitioners—often the only service providers in rural areas¹²—contend with both low pay and responsibility for overhead costs. For example, in Indiana in 2018, the median annual pay for contract defense lawyers was $64,777, but after overhead costs, this effectively amounted to $10,322, or about $5.16 per hour.¹³ Overhead in North Carolina costs $21.72 per hour¹⁴ and in Michigan costs $65 per hour,¹⁵ but many states pay $60 per hour or less for misdemeanors.¹⁶ Research from Nebraska, Wisconsin, and Kansas has found that rural areas are the hardest hit by low hourly pay, such that courts must go through lists of dozens of attorneys or search across multiple counties to find a defense lawyer willing to take a case.¹⁷

Since pay tends to be lower in rural areas, lawyers working in those areas may have a harder time paying off debt. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), as of May 2025, the annual mean wage for lawyers was $185,840.¹⁸ In the five top-paying metropolitan areas, the mean wage was $231,710-$288,980 (above the national mean) while in the five top-paying nonmetropolitan areas, it was $160,590-$180,990 (below the national mean).¹⁹

Research from the Federal Reserve has shown how student loan debt and lower wages relate to rural “brain drain.”²⁰ The 2019 study merged data from credit reporting bureaus, the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and other agencies to track millennial student loan borrowers’ migration patterns. One year after entering loan repayment, borrowers who left rural areas moved to metropolitan areas with annual wages that were, on average, $9,467 higher, after accounting for cost-of-living differences.²¹ Higher wages may be especially motivating for people with more debt: after one year in repayment, only 49% of rural borrowers if the top quartile of debt stayed in rural areas, while nearly 83% of those in the lowest quartile of debt  stayed.²² The study also found that after three years, rural-to-metro movers paid back more than twice as much debt as those who stayed in rural areas (20.3% paid back by those in metro areas vs. 9.3% by those in rural areas).²³

BOX:

“If I’m from Harlan, Iowa, and somebody else is from Chicago, and we both take out student loans, guess what? Our student loans are the same, so I’m going to work in Harlan for pennies on the dollar compared to what they are going to make in Chicago or somewhere, so there’s just not a lot of incentive for us to go to a small town unless you have a gig ready to go, like I did.”- Susan Christensen, Chief Justice of the Iowa Supreme Court[xxiv]

Reshaping these financial incentives is necessary to make rural criminal legal practice viable.

1. Cost of Living is Not Uniformly Lower in Rural Areas

   Lower earnings in rural areas are not always counterbalanced by correspondingly lower costs of living. Recent studies have pointed to the societal trends driving up rural housing prices. One study of median home prices from 2010-2024 noted that the ten counties that experienced the greatest growth were all outside of large cities and suburbs. Around the Bakken oil fields in North Dakota and Montana and the Permian Basin of West Texas, energy development led to price increases ranging from 165-189% .[xxv] Another study showed that while house prices grew at relatively similar rates across urban and rural settings in the years before the pandemic, rural areas have seen especially rapid home price growth (36%) as compared to their urban counterparts (21%).[xxvi] Experts attribute this shift to the overlay of the growth of teleworking on pre-existing trends of migration from cities.[xxvii]

   Although food costs are often assumed to be lower in rural areas, studies have consistently complicated or outright undermined that picture.[xxviii] Studies have pointed out, for example, that travel to reach dwindling numbers of grocery stores or access healthful or high quality foods can increase expenditures on food.[xxix]

   Rural areas also shoulder disproportionate energy costs. Costs are driven in part by lack of access to larger electrical systems and reliable supply.[xxx] Rural areas’ burdens compare unfavorably to those of both their region and metropolitan areas.[xxxi]

   These costs compound the debt barriers to rural criminal legal work. Financial incentives must take account of the true cost of living in isolated places with low housing supply and longer drive times for childcare, healthcare, and work.

2. Financial Incentives for Medical Professionals Work

Financial incentives – including loan repayment assistance programs (LRAPs), scholarships, and stipends – have been used successfully to bring medical professionals to underserved areas. These models can be adapted for rural, criminal legal practice.

Like lawyers, doctors and other healthcare providers usually graduate with substantial student loan debt.[xxxii] The medical field has long used financial incentives to bring doctors to underserved areas. The National Health Service Corps (NHSC), for example, has, since 1972, provided loan repayment assistance (and, since 1979, scholarships) to attract doctors, nurses, and other clinicians to designated Health Professional Shortage Areas (HPSAs).[xxxiii] As of 2020, there were over 18,000 NHSC sites[xxxiv] and 44% were rural.[xxxv] NHSC now offers up to $100,000 in loan repayment assistance to clinicians who provide substance use disorder treatment for three years at approved rural sites.[xxxvi] Similarly, the Nurse Corps Loan Repayment Program pays up to 85% of nurses’ loans for three years of service in a shortage area or at a teaching facility (with 65% paid over an initial two-year service period and 25% for a third-year extension).[xxxvii]

As of 2025, there were over 22,000 clinicians supported by NHSC and the Nurse Corps, plus over 3,000 in student pipelines.[xxxviii] Data dashboards track program participants and show that 88% of those who completed the programs work in a HPSA or the community where they served, and 30% currently work in rural community.[xxxix] Studies speculate that high retention is due, in part, to high job satisfaction among NHSC participants (almost all surveyed said they felt they were doing important work).[xl]

The federal Health Resources & Services Administration, which runs NHSC, also runs the State Loan Repayment Program (SLRP), which provides block grants for state- and territory-run loan repayment programs for clinicians.[xli] It supports programs like those in Texas, which offers up to $180,000 over four years,[xlii] and Kansas, which offers $95,000 over five years, with an initial two-year service commitment[xliii] (SLRP and NHSC service periods may not overlap[xliv]). States can award clinicians up to $50,000 for two years of full-time service using SLRP funding and can add their own funding to increase awards.[xlv]

In addition to loan repayment, states have offered doctors financial incentives like scholarships and direct payments that are tied to service obligations. A 2004 study of 69 of these state-funded programs found that doctors with service obligations served needier and more rural populations, had higher job satisfaction, and stayed in their practices longer.[xlvi] Retention rates were highest for loan repayment programs, with a 66% retention rate in service sites after 8 years.[xlvii]

An example of a current state program is the University of Kansas Medical Center’s (KUMC) Kansas Medical Student Loan (KMSL) program, which provides tuition and a stipend (currently $2,000 per month) to medical school students who commit to four years of practice in underserved areas (all but the most-populous counties).[xlviii] According to a 2013 report, after their service period, 67% of 365 total KMSL participants stayed in Kansas and, of those, 67% practiced in the same county where they completed their service.[xlix] KUMC also offers the Kansas Bridging Plan (KBP), which provides $10,000 (and encourages an employer match) to medical residents who commit to three years of practice in an underserved area.[l]  Of the 407 residents who have enrolled in KBP, 80% have continued practicing in Kansas after three years.[li]  KMSL’s and KBP’s service periods can run concurrently.[lii]

States also offer incentives for allied health professionals; a 2019 study identified these programs in 43 states.[liii] Allied health professionals are not doctors; these programs supported therapists, dental hygienists, and paramedics, for example.[liv] States offered scholarships, loan repayment assistance, tax credits, and stipends to incentivize their practice in rural and underserved areas.[lv] The study interviewed 25 personnel from these programs, and all but one said the incentives were extremely important or fairly important for recruiting and retaining these workers.[lvi]  They also noted the programs’ limitations, such as difficulties in measuring service gaps; keeping up with rising costs in higher education; and preventing competition among states.

              BOX: Incentives for Teaching

Teachers also have significant student loan debt[lvii] and receive loan repayment incentives to attract them to high-need schools and specializations. The Teach for Texas Loan Repayment Assistance Program, for example, offers up to $7,000 per year for five years to teachers in critical shortage areas and teaching fields. The New Mexico Teacher Loan Repayment Program similarly offers $6,000 per year for two years for teachers working in high-poverty schools or teaching subjects like science and math.[lviii]

Teachers can also receive federal student loan forgiveness through Public Service Loan Forgiveness (remaining debt balance forgiven after 10 years), Teacher Loan Forgiveness (up to $17,500 after 5 years), or the Perkins Loan Cancellation for Teachers (100% over five years).[lix] The programs have different requirements about which teachers, loans, and schools are eligible; some require teachers to work at schools serving low-income families, for example.[lx]

There are features of these programs that can be adapted to create financial incentive programs for attracting lawyers to rural, criminal legal deserts:

• Most programs target high-need populations, specialties, and regions. As discussed in other sections of this paper, rural, criminal legal deserts are areas with urgent needs.
• An initial service period of around two years helps ensure that professionals have time to decide if they want to become embedded in communities. Optional renewal periods of an additional one to three years of service support professionals who want to stay in those communities, while not obligating those who do not.
• Options for pro-rated incentives for full- and part-time work allow healthcare facilities flexibility in recruiting different kinds of providers. Part-time providers should also be supported for criminal legal work in rural places.

1. Corps Programs Combine Financial Incentives and Cohort Support

   Corps Programs are an obvious model for recruiting rural professionals and packaging incentives, financial and otherwise. By building a brand, community, and network, and fostering a broader sense of purpose, Corps Programs may help generate awareness as well as encourage longevity in the field. Some corps originate in, or work in concert with, educational institutions, combining attributes of educational pipelines and financial incentive programs. For example:

   • Arizona State University’s Next Generation Service Corps provides four years of base tuition scholarships to undergraduates who are grouped into mission teams (such as immigration, sustainability, and equality & justice) and take courses, complete internships, and attend events related to their mission.[lxi]
   • New York’s Empire State Service Corps Program supports 1,000 paid community service internships through the State University of New York.[lxii]
   • The U.S. Department of Labor’s Job Corps trains young peoples (ages 16-24) in technical skills for up to three years, while helping them earn a high school diploma; providing them with housing, meals, healthcare, and a living allowance; and assisting them with transitioning into their careers.

   Two of the largest and most well-established programs are AmeriCorps and Teach for America.

   1. AmeriCorps

   AmeriCorps is a federal agency that supports 185,000 workers and volunteers who contribute to disaster relief, ecological conservation, veterans support, and more.[lxiii] The Corps includes over 7000 AmeriCorps’ VISTA program members, who work for one year (or a summer) at a nonprofit or public agency, typically in their hometowns (78%).[lxiv] Members are paid only a modest living allowance, but can receive moving, healthcare, and childcare benefits; education incentives such as loan forbearance or deferment; and special hiring status for federal jobs after they complete their service.[lxv]

   VISTA members can do other capacity-building work for legal services organizations.[lxvi] The Equal Justice Works VISTA program, for example, focuses on maintaining affordable housing and tenant advocacy.[lxvii] The National Legal Aid & Defender Association (NLADA)’s VISTA in Public Defense program currently places about AmeriCorps members in public defender offices each year to assist the offices with developing community partnerships and data systems.[lxviii] Thirty-two sites have hosted 66 members since 2018.[lxix] Members include both recent college graduates and mid- or late-career professionals exploring new fields.[lxx]

   1. Teach for America

   Teach for America (TFA) is a national public service corps, placing around 4,000 new college graduates each year. TFA is nonprofit that is mostly privately-funded.[lxxi] Corps members receive training over the summer, then teach in an underserved school for two years, during which time they receive additional training and most earn a teaching certification.[lxxii] They are paid by the school at which they teach and receive a $3,000 to $6,500 regional stipend, and can enroll as an AmeriCorps member to receive those benefits.[lxxiii] When TFA members finish their service period, they have access to TFA’s alumni network and job website, and its partnerships with graduate schools and employers.[lxxiv] About 44% of corps members continue to teach in their placement school after their initial two-year commitment, and about 15% stay for at least five years, usually leaving for the same reasons that drive teach turnover generally, like poor working conditions.[lxxv]

   There are state-based programs as well, such as the Arkansas Teacher Corps, run by the University of Arkansas, which has cohorts of about 40 teachers per year who teach in critical subject areas and geographical areas.[lxxvi] For three years, they teach and receive rigorous training, coaching, and peer support.[lxxvii] They receive transitional and completion stipends of $2,500 each.[lxxviii] A 2019 evaluation found that Corps teachers, compared to non-Corps teachers in similar roles, are more often people of color and who not hold a master’s degree.[lxxix] The same evaluation (which included classroom observations and surveys of about 3,000 students and 51 teachers) found similar performance between Corps and non-Corps teachers, with Corps teachers rated more highly in classroom practices like communicating with students and establishing routines.[lxxx]

    

2. Existing Incentives for Rural Lawyers are Limited

1. Loan Repayment Assistance Programs

   As noted above, public interest legal work tends to pay less, making it harder to pay back student loans. Loan repayment assistance programs make it more feasible. Targeting these programs to rural criminal law practitioners—and recognizing, as one scholar puts it, that “private practice legal work in rural areas is public interest work”[lxxxi] —can help recruit lawyers to these essential roles.

   Prosecutors and public defenders can apply for loan repayment assistance from the U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Assistance’s John R. Justice Program which is administered by state agencies. John R. Justice loan repayment assistance is capped at $10,000 per year over a minimum three-year service period, with a total lifetime cap of $60,000.[lxxxii] State allocations are based on populations,[lxxxiii] and support only a handful of attorneys in each state, with a total allocation of $2,529,819 in FY2024.[lxxxiv]

   BOX:

                 Federal Student Aid

   In addition to LRAP, there are various programs to assist federal loan borrowers. Income-driven repayment (IDR) plans scale payments to what borrowers earn and their number of dependents. Balances remaining at the end of IDR plan repayment periods may be discharged.

   Full-time prosecutors and public defenders qualify for Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) from the U.S. Department of Education, which forgives their remaining balance after ten years of public service and loan payments[HC1] .[lxxxv] PSLF has been in important recruitment tool for legal services providers: a 2021 survey of over 1,300 young lawyers found that 80% of respondents who were enrolled in PSLF took their public service job because of it[lxxxvi] and a 2017 survey of over 3,000 public defenders and civil legal aid lawyers found that 81% had been significantly influenced by PSLF to take their jobs.[lxxxvii]

   A 2018 study found that there were 24 state-based LRAPs for lawyers, almost all requiring participants to be in public interest work,[lxxxviii] though some were limited to civil legal aid.[lxxxix] Their structure varied in their definition of qualifying full-time work, assistance time span and amount caps.[xc] As of March 2023, 18 states (and the District Columbia) had LRAPs.[xci] Other LRAPs are available through employer- and school-based programs, and the federal government.[xcii]

   A limited number of current state programs target rural areas or criminal law practitioners:

• Nebraska’s Legal Education for Public Service and Rural Practice Loan Repayment Assistance Program awarded, for 2026, up $6,000 per year for full-time lawyers working at non-profits or working in a designated shortage area, defined as a rural area in a county of under 15,000 residents.[xciii] After an initial three-year commitment, lawyers can receive year-to-year assistance, for up to $42,000 total.[xciv] Pursuant to 2026 legislation, the program prioritizes attorneys who serve counties in which there are no other practicing lawyers, followed by those in which “three or fewer licensed attorneys [are] currently practicing.”[xcv]

• The Oregon State Bar’s LRAP provides up to $7,500 per year for three years to prosecutors, public defenders, and private public defense contractors, as well as rural practitioners and lawyers serving low-income populations.[xcvi] Part-time employees may receive pro-rated assistance.[xcvii]
• Ohio’s Rural Practice Incentive Program offers $10,000 per year for prosecutors and public defenders who practice in underserved areas. Service areas are those with more than 1,500 residents to every attorney maintaining an interest-bearing trust account.[xcviii] There is a three-year service commitment, and lawyers can request to work for four or five years, for up to $50,000 total.[xcix] To be eligible for program, a lawyer must have fewer than twelve years of experience and not be enrolled in other LRAPs or PSLF.[c]
• Kansas’ Attorney Training for Rural Kansas Act, signed into law in Spring 2026, provides a stipend of up to $3,000 per school year for tuition or expenses for up to three years to students who commit to practice law in a rural area for at least one year for each stipend year. The legislation also establishes the Attorney Training and Loan Repayment Program for Rural Kansas, which provides loan repayment of $20,000 per year for attorneys already in practice who work in a qualifying area for up to five years.
• Iowa has enacted HF 2770, an appropriations bill that funds an Attorney Loan Repayment Program and fund for public defense providers in rural Iowa. The program provides up to $10,000 per year, for up to six years. for attorneys providing public defense services in rural areas. The program prioritizes attorneys who went to law school or high school in Iowa.
• Oklahoma has enacted HB 3980, which creates the Rural District Attorney Loan Repayment Assistance Program. The Program will offer $5,000 per year in loan repayments to prosecutors working in qualified rural areas, up to a $50,000 maximum. The Legislature appropriated $2.5 million for the program.[ci] 

  Although several states have made creditable progress in crafting financial incentives that target student debt, they are still few and far between.

1. Other Incentives

   Financial incentives are not tied to student loans:

• North Dakota and South Dakota each have a Rural Attorney Recruitment Program that provides financial incentives for rural practice: $45,000 over five years in North Dakota[cii] and $62,568 over five years in South Dakota.[ciii] South Dakota’s program (established in 2013 as the first of its kind[civ]) is funded by the state, localities, and the state bar.[cv] The amount is based on the yearly cost of attending law school at the University of South Dakota, but the attorneys are not required to use the funds to repay loans.[cvi] Twelve of 31 program participants have stayed in the rural communities in which they served.[cvii]
• The Kansas Department of Commerce’s Rural Opportunity Zone (ROZ) program provides, over five years, $15,000 of student loan reimbursement assistance and 100% income tax relief for professionals moving into one of 95 participating rural counties.[cviii] Evaluations in 2020 and 2023 found that the program has not slowed or reversed rural population decline in most counties, but did slow losses or increase gains in 19 counties.[cix]In 2024, the Department of Commerce announced updates to the program that could increase participation of people who temporarily left a rural area to complete their education, or who came to a rural area for professional residencies.[cx]
• The New Mexico Office of the Public Defender’s Geographic Pay Differential offers additional pay – up to for $7,800 per year – for lawyers who work in rural offices.[cxi]
• Oklahoma’s HB 3981 establishes the District Attorney Locality Incentive Program. With an appropriation of $4.5 million, the program that will pay up prosecutors $10,000 annually, up to $50,000 total, for practicing in rural areas.[cxii] The program may make continuing incentive payments of $10,000 per year, in two-year increments, after the initial five year period.[cxiii]
• Introduced in 2024 and 2025 but not yet passed,[cxiv] the federal HIRRE Prosecutors Act would establish a grant program to assist with prosecutor recruitment, retention, and training, with preference explicitly permitted for “jurisdiction[s] representing a tribal, remote, or rural area.” Scholars have noted that while the HIRRE Act’s proposed $10 million per year fund will allow offices to offer modest financial incentives, it is ultimately too small to make a dent in the prosecutorial hiring and retention crisis.[cxv] The most strapped offices, they point out, will lack the staffing even to apply for a grant.[cxvi]

   

1. Key Takeaways: How to Expand Financial Incentives

The patchwork of existing financial incentive programs will not meet the needs of rural criminal legal systems. How can we scale the programs that have been created? And what lessons can we draw from the successes in the medical field?

1. Loan Repayment Assistance Programs for Rural, Criminal Lawyers

   A federally coordinated program like the National Health Service Corps (NHSC) would be a promising approach to bolstering rural criminal practice. NHSC has been effective in bringing healthcare providers to underserved areas and keeping them there: over 40,000 participants completed their service between 2012 and 2022, and 88% of tracked participants continued to work in a shortage area, with 30% in a rural area.[cxvii] The program supports over 18,500 providers working at 8,400 sites to serve 19.5 million patients.[cxviii]

   The program is run by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.[cxix] Recently the NHSC has been funded at around $400 million per year; it received a one-time appropriation of $800 million through the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) of 2021.[cxx] The ARPA amount included $100 million set aside for block grants to state-run LRAPs.[cxxi] In February 2026, under the Consolidated Appropriations Act, NHSC received $438 million through the end of the calendar year.[cxxii]

   A rural criminal legal corps program could support criminal lawyers in rural legal deserts through state- or federally-run loan repayment or forgiveness programs, or a combination of these approaches.

   1. State LRAP

   The federal government could provide block grants to state-run LRAPs for criminal lawyers, like the one-time NHSC State Loan Repayment Program for clinicians.[cxxiii] Currently, the John R. Justice (JRJ) program, run by U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Assistance, makes block grants to state-run LRAPs for prosecutors and public defenders.[cxxiv] State administering agencies apply for a JRJ formula-based grant; criminal lawyers apply to the state agency for loan repayment assistance; the state uses the federal grant money to pay the lender directly on the borrower’s behalf.[cxxv]

   In FY2010, its first year, the program awarded $9.9million.[cxxvi] By FY2024, it awarded only around $2.5 million.[cxxvii] As discussed above, per statute,[cxxviii] JRJ loan repayment assistance is capped at $10,000 per year over a minimum three-year service period, with a total lifetime cap of $60,000.[cxxix] Priority must be given to “borrowers who have the least ability to repay their loans”[cxxx] and state programs set their own evaluation criteria for this requirement.[cxxxi] They must also have an outreach strategy to inform prosecutors and public defenders about JRJ and other LRAPs.[cxxxii]

   Increasing JRJ’s appropriation and assistance caps would help support more prosecutors and public defenders generally. But only a significant increase would make a dent in the problem. A return to FY2010 funding levels  would likely support only a few thousand lawyers per year,[cxxxiii] with assistance of only a few thousand dollars per lawyer, compared to six-figure average debt amounts (and the maximum $105,000 available through NHSC). Establishing rural legal deserts as a priority area for awards would create an extra incentive to practice in those places. Rural legal deserts could be defined as places where, as evidence demonstrates, people have a lower ability to repay loans.

   States can and should continue to fund their own LRAP programs, with emphasis on expanding beyond civil legal aid. These programs should recognize the reality that rural practitioners often carry mixed caseloads, combining civil and criminal work.

   1. Federal LRAP

   Criminal lawyers in legal deserts could also apply directly to a federal agency for loan repayment assistance. Clinicians apply to HRSA for NHSC funding; prosecutors and public defenders could apply to the Bureau of Justice Assistance or a similar entity. As with NHSC, borrowers would be awarded money to put towards loan payments.

   Alternatively, borrowers could apply directly to the Department of Education for loan forgiveness, through modified Public Service Loan Forgiveness, an income-driven repayment plan that also accounts for rural criminal legal work, or a similar program.

   1. Policy Considerations

   An NHSC-type financial incentive program for criminal lawyers in rural legal deserts should be account for these policy considerations:

• Legal deserts should be defined and measured by a federal agency like health professional shortage areas (HPSAs) are defined by HRSA.
• Part-time prosecutors and public defenders are essential service providers in rural areas. Current loan repayment programs for lawyers, like JRJ and PSLF, require full-time employment. Like NHSC, a rural criminal legal program should provide funding for part-time employment.
• Lawyers have often have student loan debt over $100,000 and make less money in rural areas. Loan repayment amounts should be high enough to create a meaningful incentive for rural practice.
• Initial service periods should be long enough for a lawyer to establish proficiency and relationships in a rural area, but not so long as to discourage lawyers interested in a “try out” period. A two to three year period strikes the right balance. NHSC and JRJ have three-year service periods (NHSC also offers two-year programs) with options for extensions.
• Since legal deserts lack local professional communities, financial support should ideally be paired with professional support through the corps models described below. Improving new lawyers’ experience will likely improve retention and return on an LRAP’s initial financial investment.
• Programs should collect performance data: the backgrounds of the lawyers who participate; their rural education experiences, if any; how many lawyers and clients are served; and how financial incentives affect recruitment and retention.

1. Public Service Corps for Rural Criminal Lawyers

A Public Service Corps for Rural Criminal Lawyers would establish a brand and confer the benefits of prestige and cohort camaraderie. The benefits associated with the program would not be tethered to loans but rather would offer a range of financial and professional incentives. Drawing on the attributes of existing, successful programs, a corps should:

• Recruit law students from across the country to commit three years as a prosecutor or public defender in a rural area.
• Establish a transitional period for each cohort between law school and the start of employment. Use this time for additional training and support as they transition into their placements.
• Provide a stipend for their transition and relocation.
• Help them pass the bar exam.
• Assist with building a compensation and benefits package that is attractive (salary and benefits provided by employer, but program helps identify grants and loan repayment assistance available to corps members).
• Provide ongoing professional development opportunities that make the program attractive.
• Create lasting alumni benefits, networking, and employment assistance.
• Be funded with a mix of philanthropy and public funding.