In a rural county that lacks lawyers, no one seemingly wants to buy a successful law practice
The most highly populated county in Iowa has over 2,500 attorneys. Ringgold County has only two, and one of them would like to retire.
However, as James Pedersen and his wife pondered a possible move to Colorado, “I put my practice up for sale,” he told the Des Moines Register. “I got no responses whatsoever. None.”
Pedersen, 66, also serves as the county’s judicial magistrate.
Debt-laden law graduates tend to congregate on the state’s urban areas, where they may expect to make more money, or simply are more familiar with the opportunities for practice, observers say.
Phil Garland, who heads the rural practice committee of the Iowa State Bar Association, hopes a summer clerkship program will encourage more new law grads to practice outside Iowa’s major cities, by familiarizing them with opportunities elsewhere.
“To think about living in a town that has as many people as their high school graduating class, that’s really strange,” Kay Oskvig, who did a clerkship with Garland’s law firm, told the newspaper. “It’s really a culture shock.”
Related article:
ABA Journal: “In rural America, there are job opportunities and a need for lawyers”
