Those 149 New Hampshire lawyers who signed on as members in the NHBA·CLE "CLE Club" program last year knew they had a good thing going. Their good financial judgment and foresight has just been confirmed by a survey taken by the Association's CLE Department of other state bar CLE programs. The bottom-line: No other state bar association CLE provider offers a discount program as good as that which New Hampshire bar members can enjoy.

The New Hampshire Bar's CLE Club is an exceptional value. The terms are simple. A bar member pays an annual club subscription fee of $149. The bar member is then entitled to attend any of the 60-plus NHBA regular continuing legal education programs offered during the next year at a deeply discounted rate. CLE Club members attend full-day programs (6 CLE credit hours courses) for just $49 instead of the usual $135; half-day programs (4 credits) for $45 instead of $110; and, two-hour breakfast forums for $35 instead of the full-fare rate of $45 to $75.

The CLE Club deal is even better for new lawyers in practice for three years or less. Their annual club subscription fee is just $119. But younger bar members seem to have shunned the opportunity for lowest cost, homegrown CLE. Of the 149 CLE Club enrollees in 2001-2002, only 19 were young lawyers under the Club's qualification terms.

Bar member Laura Games of Nashua recently summarized the value of the CLE Club to young lawyers, a value too many apparently fail to grasp. Attorney Games comments," The CLE Club is extremely important for young lawyers to belong to. The reason for this is not just the economical one. New lawyers should take as many CLEs as they can to give them a broad exposure to New Hampshire law as well as to interface with the established New Hampshire lawyers." We couldn't agree more.

Of the states responding to the New Hampshire survey, most offer no discount programs similar to the CLE Club. One state, New Mexico, allows attorneys to plead for a 50 percent reduction in CLE program registration costs. The attorney must submit an affidavit to the bar association asserting that his or her annual income is less than $38,000 to be considered for reduced rate admissions. In New Hampshire, of course, CLE Club membership is open to all without any declaration of financial need. And the effective discount in New Hampshire is 63 percent, some 13 points better than the New Mexico program.

A number of jurisdictions, including New York, Michigan, Maryland, Missouri, Washington, Oregon, North Carolina and Wisconsin, offer "Passport" or "Season Pass" programs in which attorneys pay for a booklet of program passes that allow admission to a set number of CLE programs. The savings from these programs are not remarkable. In Michigan, the attorney pays $285 for a three- program pass. That works out to about twice the per program cost that New Hampshire CLE Club members pay. In Maryland, the attorney may attend as many MICPEL programs during the course of the year as he or she wishes. But the cost for the individual "Passport" is $1195. Wisconsin and New York offer 5 program passes for $695 and $500 respectively.

Other jurisdictions, like Texas, allow attorneys to qualify for membership in a CLE College. But the price of admission is high. One has to complete 45 hours of full fee CLE programs before membership in the Texas Bar's CLE College is earned. And then, the discount that College members enjoy is just $25 off the usual $275 price of a CLE program.

CLE courses are "free" in a few jurisdictions. But Kentucky is a good example of how "free" isn't really free. There CLE programming is not self-supporting. That is, it is run as a program of the bar association and funded, in part, out of the dues paid by members. Annual bar dues in Kentucky are $695 a year.

Bar associations in the New England states have inconsistent approaches to discounts for CLE programs. While none of the other states in this region has a deal as good as the New Hampshire CLE Club, one comes close. Vermont and Connecticut make no attempt to offer discount values to their CLE program patrons. Massachusetts awards a 50 percent discount to new lawyers, but limits the definition of a new lawyer to one admitted in the previous year only. Rhode Island also acknowledges new lawyers with a 20 percent CLE program discount and gives a three-year definition to the new lawyer designation.

Only the Maine State Bar Association has a program that directly parallels New Hampshire's CLE Club, but Maine's prices are modestly higher than ours are. Maine charges an annual membership subscription for their CLE Club (they even use the same name as we do) of $170, an amount 14 percent higher than the corresponding New Hampshire CLE Club fee. In Maine, the full-day program rate for a Club member is $60, a 23 percent higher rate than the New Hampshire program registration fee.

The New Hampshire Bar Association CLE Club discount program bests not only the other New England bar association's efforts, but also has no peer in terms of value anywhere else in the country.

Current New Hampshire CLE Club members will receive an invoice/subscription renewal form in late April. New members may sign up via an e-mail message containing your name, address and bar number sent to the NBHA CLE Registrar, Cheryl Moore, at cmoore@nhbar.org or by completing the form below and faxing it the Bar Center at (603) 224-3729.

Total CLE Club memberships for the 2002-2003 CLE season beginning in July will be limited to 175 enrollees. To assure your membership, please register as soon as possible and respond in timely fashion to the invoice that you will be sent. All CLE Club memberships must be pre-paid before program discounts will be applicable.

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