County Magazine

Across Texas, people who cannot afford legal representation sit in county jails. Each is waiting for a court-appointed lawyer who may be hours away, stretched thin across dozens of cases, or simply unavailable. In the most rural corners of the state, the wait can stretch for weeks.

It is a quiet crisis playing out in Texas county courtrooms, and it is getting worse.

A strain on county budgets

The Sixth Amendment guarantees every person accused of a crime the right to an attorney. What it does not guarantee is that the attorney will be easy to find. In Texas, the responsibility for providing and largely funding indigent defense falls on counties, not the state.

In fiscal year 2025, Texas counties spent $534.9 million on indigent defense services. The Texas Indigent Defense Commission, the state agency charged with improving access to counsel, contributed $39.4 million in grants — about 7.4 cents for every dollar spent. County budgets covered the remaining 92.6%.

That gap has widened steadily. County expenditures on indigent defense grew by $296.9 million between 2015 and 2025, while state grant funding increased by only $9.3 million during the same time period. This is driven largely by expanded public defender infrastructure and rising attorney costs.

The attorney shortage

Funding alone does not solve the problem. There have to be attorneys willing and available to take cases.

Between 2014 and 2024, the number of attorneys accepting indigent defense appointments in Texas dropped by 24.5%. The consequences show up in the data. In fiscal year 2025, 32 Texas counties had more than half their court-appointed attorneys carrying caseloads beyond recommended limits. Twenty-nine of those 32 counties had populations under 50,000. Six counties, all rural, had no attorneys left who were not overburdened.

In counties like those served by the Concho Valley Public Defender’s Office, which covers a wide stretch of West Texas including the San Angelo area, a single attorney may handle cases across multiple courts and drive hours between appearances.

The consequences for defendants are real. A 2025 Texas Tribune investigation found that more than half of rural Texans accused of misdemeanors are left to represent themselves each year, five times the rate of defendants in urban areas.

What the Legislature has done, and what remains

The 89th Legislature took meaningful steps to address the issue of indigent defense costs for counties. TIDC received additional funding, and new investments were made in rural public defender infrastructure. However, the uneven cost share between the state and counties remains.

TIDC has estimated that its current budget shortfall prevented it from funding more than $7 million in counties’ documented indigent defense needs in the most recent reporting year alone. The Fair Defense Account, the dedicated fund that supports TIDC grants, has seen revenue fall about $45 million below historic levels since 2019, driven by declining court cost collections and a collapse in jury service fund contributions.

Meanwhile, the attorney pipeline problem will not solve itself. Without sustained investment in recruitment, rural public defenders, and competitive compensation for appointed counsel, the roughly 24% decline of the past decade could continue.

Counties have developed creative solutions to address these challenges, including regional public defender’s offices that help manage caseloads and expand access to representation. Although tight budgets continue to create obstacles, continued collaboration among counties, state partners and legal professionals offers opportunities to strengthen these systems and better serve Texans.