Board readies for Tallahassee meeting.

The Board of Governors will get a variety of rules for final action when it meets in Tallahassee January 30.

Perhaps the most notable is an amendment to Rule Regulating The Florida Bar 1-3.8 which would require any Bar member who is the only lawyer responsible for protecting a client's interests to identify an inventory who can take over if the lawyer becomes incapacitated.

The inventory attorney's name would have to be provided to the Bar, but the rule also says the attorney would be under no obligation to serve.

Another change made throughout the rules replaces references to disciplinary resignations with "disbarred on consent."

The board will also get a proposed amendment to Rule 4-5.4 clarifying that bonus payments to nonlawyer employees cannot be based on the generation of business or clients or calculated upon the percentage of fees received by the lawyer or law firm. Those actions, according to the rule, would constitute the sharing of legal fees with a nonlawyer, which is prohibited.

A new proposed Rule 4-5.8 sets guidelines for allowable client contact by lawyers and law firm when a lawyer is leaving a law firm, or a law firm is being dissolved. That issue has been a sensitive one for the Bar and lawyers for several years.

Also going to the board is an amendment to Rule 6-9.1 on real estate certification, which includes a compromise presented to the board last month. Out-of-state Bar members had objected to the change, saying it would require all real estate experience in certification to involve Florida transactions, which would hinder out-of-state members seeking certification. (See story in the January 1 News.)

On other matters, the board will appoint two lawyers for three-year terms on The Florida Bar Foundation.

And the day before the meeting, board members will participate in the annual pro bono awards ceremony at the Florida Supreme Court.