Cases involving indigent families in Philadelphia dependency court are unevenly distributed among court-appointed lawyers, leading to some attorneys handling around or in excess of 300 cases per year, while others handle fewer than 100. This has raised concerns about how these high-volume lawyers, paid flat fees, can effectively represent so many clients at once.

Indigent parents in cases dealing with custody, foster care and adoption are represented by the court-appointed attorneys who make up what is known as “the dependency wheel.” The wheel is supposed to function as its name implies: a client is paired with an attorney, the wheel rotates and the next client in line is paired with the next attorney in a pool of 75.