On November 5, 2009, the Senate passed its Commerce-Justice-Science (CJS) Appropriations bill for Fiscal Year 2010, which includes a repeal of the most onerous of the federal funding restrictions on Legal Services Corporation grantees, the so-called "non-federal funds restriction."

Since a 1996 effort by the Gingrich Congress, a set of restrictions has been applied to LSC grantees, prohibiting them from using some of the most effective tools when representing their clients, including seeking attorneys' fee awards, participating in class actions, and initiating advocacy before legislative and administrative
bodies. Also included were limits on the eligibility of certain groups of people for federally funded legal aid. Not only were these restrictions applied to LSC grantees' federal funds, but a "poison pill" restriction applied the entire set of substantive restrictions to all the money that a legal services program may receive from state and local governments, private donors, and Interest on Lawyers Trust
Accounts once the program receives its first dollar of funds from LSC. Nationally, these non-federal funds account for more than half, or 53 percent, of LSC grantees' total funds.

Language in the Senate-passed CJS Appropriations bill would roll back this non-federal funds restriction, allowing LSC grantees to use their non-federal dollars to participate in most of the currently restricted activities. The Senate's language would keep in place the prohibition on LSC grantees participating in
abortion-related litigation and representing prisoners, with any of their funds. No changes were made to restrictions on the use of federal funds, nor were changes made to underlying restrictions included in the federal statute authorizing LSC.
Additionally, the Senate's bill would appropriate $400 million in funding for LSC for this fiscal year, $10 million above the total funding level for FY09.

The House passed its FY10 CJS Appropriations bill in June, but the bill only went so far as to lift the restriction on seeking attorneys' fee awards, leaving the application of all other of the legal services funding restrictions on non-federal
funds intact. The House appropriated $440 million in funding for LSC.

The two chambers' bills will now be reconciled through a conference committee. A schedule has yet to be set for the conference committee, but informal negotiations have already begun. The Senate's conferees are: Mikulski, D-Md., Inouye, D-Hawaii, Leahy, D-Vt., Kohl, D-Wis., Dorgan, D-N.D., Feinstein, D-Calif., Reed, D-R.I., Lautenberg, D-N.J., Nelson, D-Neb., Pryor, D-Ark., Shelby, R-Ala., Gregg, R-N.H., McConnell, R-Ky., Hutchison, R-Texas, Brownback, R-Kan., Alexander, R-Tenn.,
Voinovich, R-Ohio, and Murkowski, R-Alaska. The full list of House conferees has yet to be named.