D.C.'s public transportation system, locally called Metro, contracted with Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld and Munger, Tolles & Olson to defend against a lawsuit challenging advertisement policy. Credit: Jay Mallin

The District of Columbia's public transportation system anticipates spending more than $1 million on outside lawyers to defend its refusal last year to allow the Archdiocese of Washington to purchase and run a Christmas advertisement on buses, according to records obtained by The National Law Journal.

The Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, or WMATA, issued purchase orders authorizing nearly $800,000 in legal fees for the law firm Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld and nearly $300,000 for Munger, Tolles & Olson.

The amounts identified in the purchase orders reflect an estimate of the total cost of the defense work, not payments that have already been made to the two firms, said Sonia Bacchus, WMATA's chief counsel for customer service and regulatory affairs. “It is the calculation of what we think it will cost,” she said.