Retaining Prosecuting Attorneys: A Collective Problem, a Jefferson County Sore Spot

JEFFERSON COUNTY, WA — In July, across 10 jurisdictions, approximately 3,318 applicants registered for the NextGen Uniform Bar Examination (NextGen UBE). On the first day of exams, the Yakima Convention Center experienced problems with local connectivity and bandwidth infrastructure that prevented applicants from logging in, leaving 645 applicants in Washington unable to test.

The Supreme Court issued an order on August 6, after the technological failure at Yakima Convention Center stating, “applicants, employers, law schools, and the broader community need clarity and resolution without undue delay in admitting new attorneys to the Washington State Bar Association.”

Their intermediate solution has been to offer applicants who have not previously sat for and failed the exam to either accept a waiver, meaning they do not have to pass the bar exam in order to be licensed, or to transfer their July 2026 bar exam application to either the September 2026 or February 2027 without paying the exam fees. Those that have sat for the exam but did not receive a passing score were offered to reschedule their exams without an application fee. 

Jefferson County competes across the state for attorneys. With a significantly smaller tax base than neighboring Kitsap and Clallam counties, competitive compensation is compounded with the county’s high cost of living.  

Prosecuting Attorney James Kennedy said that this misfortune in Yakima could mean there are no new applicants by September when the bar results typically come back.

“I haven’t lost an attorney (that I can think of) to other prosecutor offices but I have lost them due to the expenses and rarity of childcare,” Kennedy said in email correspondence with the Beacon. “We have had prospective hires in the past back out once they took a look at housing costs here. Since I have been in office, every job advertised has netted fewer and fewer applicants.”

Kennedy also said that unlike in past years, he is not having as much luck with recruitment as he prepares for child sexual assault expert Holly Graham’s upcoming maternity leave, and recently hired Jeff Chalfant’s impending September retirement.

With an average attorney age of 46, there will likely be a wave of retirements in the near future without the ability to replace everyone. This, in turn, will drive up demand and make it even more difficult for places like Jefferson County to compete.

Kennedy offered an AI generated table of housing affordability problems among the 39 counties in Washington state.  According to this table, Jefferson County is the second most unaffordable county, after San Juan. The Association for Prosecuting Attorneys shows what counties are paying their attorneys.

County   Median Household Income  Median Home Price   Price-to-Income Ratio

1  San Juan       $84,800                         $903,287                  10.65x

2  Jefferson       $74,048                                  $611,000                  8.25x

3  Whatcom      $81,784                                  $579,000                  7.08x

Based on the County's current budget position, Jefferson isn’t in a position to increase deputy prosecutor wages, leaving the office in a certain deficit of working attorneys.