Nicole DeBorde recalls opening a package late last year that contained a letter on “fancy letterhead” mailed from the State Bar of Texas. The message asked DeBorde, president of the Harris County Criminal Lawyers Association, to persuade her organization’s members to vote yes in the Bar’s 2011 referendum on proposed changes to the Texas Disciplinary Rules of Professional Conduct.
But for DeBorde, the Bar’s correspondence backfired. “I was immediately offended because I knew that I had already received complaints from my members about the proposed changes and then I get this expensive mailing on my dime,” she says referring to the use of her Bar dues. “There are a lot of people who are very unhappy with the State Bar of Texas,” says DeBorde, a Houston solo.
