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Gov. Rick Snyder speaks about the Flint water crisis during a press conference on Wednesday, Jan. 27, 2016 at City Hall in downtown Flint.

(Flint Journal file photo)



LANSING, MI -- Criminal cases against state employees charged with wrongdoing in the Flint water crisis are just beginning, but legal fees have already risen to more than $5 million for Gov. Rick Snyder and two departments in state government.

Snyder will tell the State Administrative Board on Aug. 30 that he is raising the spending caps on contracts for two law firms representing his office against civil lawsuits related to Flint water -- enough to cover $3.4 million in billings so far, the governor's press secretary said.

In addition, Department of Environmental Quality and Department of Health and Human Services representatives said they have spent an additional $1.6 million for lawyer fees related to Flint as of Aug. 1.

Those charges include fees for attorneys representing eight current and former state employees charged with criminal wrongdoing in cases that could be in their infancy.

The costs for the defense counsel is in addition to the $3.9 million already appropriated for Attorney General Bill Schuette's criminal investigation of the water crisis.

There has yet to be a single substantive hearing on the criminal charges brought by Schuette in district court. If prosecutors provide sufficient evidence to establish that there is probable cause to believe that felonies have been committed and that the defendants committed them, the cases will shift into Genesee County Circuit Court for more hearings and appearances.

DEQ's spending on attorneys isn't limited to defending employees accused of crimes.

The law firm of Clark Hill has billed the state nearly $600,000 to represent former director Dan Wyant and former spokesman Brad Wurfel, neither of whom has been charged criminally.

Both Wyant and Wurfel resigned in December after Wyant said his department mistakenly interpreted federal law in not requiring the city of Flint to treat water from the Flint River to make it less corrosive to lead in transmission lines and home plumbing.

DEQ spokesman Michael Shore did not immediately respond to questions from MLive-The Flint Journal about the spending, but a breakdown of billings for legal services from the department shows Wyant and Wurfel top the spending list, followed by District Supervisor Stephen Busch ($263,949) and Liane Shekter Smith ($119,199), former chief of the Office of Office of Drinking Water and Municipal Assistance.

Anna Heaton, Snyder's press secretary, said in an email Friday, Aug. 19, that the governor's office will notify the State Administrative Board of the rising legal fees, increasing caps on contracts for Barris Sott from $400,000 to $1.4 million and for Warner Norcross from $800,000 to $2 million.

The State Administrative Board has general supervisory control over the administrative activities of all state departments and agencies, including the approval of contracts.

"A huge portion of their costs were attributable to document review and production for the governor's office Web site, where we have posted more than 180,000 pages of emails and documents," Heaton's statement says.

Snyder said in April that it is the responsibility of department directors to decide whether to cover the cost of attorneys for employees who work for them but state Democrats blasted the governor in a news release Friday.

"Gov. Snyder is using $3.2 million of hard earned taxpayer money as his own private checkbook in an effort to skirt responsibility for the Flint water crisis," Michigan Democratic Party Chairman Brandon Dillon said in a statement. "It's deplorable that the Republican-controlled Legislature has refused, time and time again, to take a stand against this absolute abuse of public dollars."

Civil service rules say that an employee named in a civil lawsuit can request to be represented at the state's expense. The same rule also says the department "is not required to provide legal services at state expense in connection with prosecution of a criminal suit against an employee."

The governor has also said that payments for legal services may be reconsidered in the future.

Shore said the DEQ has been appropriated $4.5 million to cover the cost of legal fees related to Flint going forward.

In addition to the state paying the legal fees for employees facing allegations of wrongdoing in Flint, the directors of DHHS and DEQ this week restored the pay of employees who have been suspended because they are accused of felonies related to the water crisis.