Low-Income Tenants Face Harm In State Budget Cuts

March 12, 2013 By

You can add “low-income tenants” fighting eviction among those being disproportionately harmed by the Los Angeles County Superior Court reaction to state funding cuts that will cause a massive reorganization of the justice system. The impact will come from reducing how many courts handle landlord disputes: From 26 to five.

That means long travel times and the Los Angeles Times notes that in some cases that will mean a 32-mile journey. For some, the paper reports, “… the trips could take several hours using public transportation and include transfers on multiple trains and buses.” The paper quotes Neal Dudovitz, executive director of Neighborhood Legal Services of Los Angeles County, who also noted that he travel time is of particular concern in eviction cases because the courts move quickly, he said.

See the full story in the LA Times. 

 

Filed Under: Community

California Firm Named In WSJ Asbestos Fraud Investigation

March 11, 2013 By
 
A small Northern California law office this week will test that old saying that “any publicity is good publicity.” In a front-page Wall Street Journal story, an apparently bogus claim leads into an extensive investigation. After noting lax review of trust funds, the WSJ reported… “so when a beneficiary of one David E. Knight came to the trust saying the former seaman had succumbed to the deadly cancer mesothelioma, the administrators didn’t blink. Within five weeks, the claimant received a check for $26,250. The only problem: There was no such Mr. Knight. Police say the claim was phony, filed by an employee of a law office specializing in extracting payouts from asbestos bankruptcy trusts. California prosecutors are investigating.”
 
The paper used the case as an example of lax overview. The legal center involved says it was an employee acting on their own. The employee has left the firm and did not comment for the story. But the story illustrates the mess that is asbestos litigation. (Los Angeles County was recently named a “judicial hellhole” for asbestos cases by a national business group.)
 
Connect some dots by reading the full WSJ story here.
Filed Under: Cases

It’s Getting Real: Courts Begin Shifting Cases Away From Communities

March 5, 2013 By
The dismantling of Los Angeles County’s once-praised community court-access system is getting under way, with small claims cases filed at the Torrance courthouse being handled in Inglewood and many personal injury cases, perhaps thousands of them, being moved from local courts to the Stanley Mosk Courthouse in downtown L.A.
 
The Daily Breeze newspaper is among those documenting the shift. “We do not take these actions likely,” Torrance Superior Court Judge Stuart Rice told the Daily Breeze. “They break our heart, but for the lack of funding this would not be happening.” Under the county court plan to create “hubs” where cases are heard, collections matters will be scheduled in the Chatsworth and Norwalk courthouses, and South Bay landlord-tenant disputes will be set for the Long Beach courthouse.
 
Read about these and other major shifts in the paper’s story here.
Filed Under: Community Tagged With: , , , ,

Stronger Rhetoric Used In Courts Funding Crisis

March 4, 2013 By
The usually judicious advocates for increasing funding to California courts are using increasingly heated terms for the situation, with the state’s Chief Justice getting a lot of Internet buzz after saying the results will be “… the dismemberment of the judicial branch.” And chief justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye was not addressing some obscure civic group but the high-profile Public Policy Institute.
 
In published reports, she said that: “In the last five years, $1 billion has been taken from the judicial branch… according to the latest proposed budget, it looks like the judicial branch will receive one penny of every dollar of the General Fund, which is an incredible bargain for what we provide. So we do that without raises and without broadening our scope and without more judges… all the while our caseload remains the same. We continue to provide a forum for justice on an ever-shrinking, minuscule slice of the pie. For California, it means disparate access to justice, and in some it means no access to justice.”
 
San Bernardino County continues to be a poster child of the cutbacks. The chief justice explained that a San Bernardino resident, to get his or her day in court, has to travel 175 miles one way; you have to assume they have transportation, that they can leave work to spend the day in court. Then they have a 175-mile trip back.

Link to the report in The Courthouse News here.

Filed Under: Community Tagged With: , , , , ,

County Jails Strain to ‘Balance’ State Budget

February 28, 2013 By
 Another way to get to a “balanced” state budget? Shift prison costs to county jails. And a new Associated Press report documents that California counties are now housing more than 1,000 inmates with sentences of a year or more that would have been in state facilities before Gov. Brown’s new policies.
 
The state’s sheriff’s association is pushing back, noting that costs are not just for housing but recreation, health care and education formerly provided by the state. And the L.A. County Jail is holding 35 percent of those long-term prisoners, many for violent crimes and/or drug convictions. Along with other agencies, you can add this to the trend of local officials pushing back against state cuts that only shift costs to county and municipal jurisdictions.
 
See the story here.
 
Sheriffs also must provide the inmates with education, treatment programs, rehabilitation services and recreation, which adds to their costs. – See more here.
Filed Under: Community Tagged With: , , , , ,

Counties Begin Push For Courts Funding

February 27, 2013 By
In the wake of state legislative hearings on budget cuts hitting California courts, counties are starting to formally push back. One example is the San Bernardino County supervisors adopting a resolution to support efforts to increase funding. It’s a good example, because the county has long been considered under-funded for courts and has documented its lower-than-average number of judges. It also faces closing courts in communities like Big Bear and Needles at the same time mass transit cutbacks will limit resident access to other courts.
 
Officials from SB County who testified to state lawmakers in Sacramento recently said those meetings were “productive.” See more details about their testimony and situation here.
 
The San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors are expected to vote Tuesday on a resolution supporting efforts to adequately fund county courts. See more here. 
Filed Under: Community

No Room In Jails, Sex Offenders Disable Tracking, Walk Away

February 26, 2013 By

Call it a great example of ripple effects from rationing justice: The state cuts expenses by shuffling sex offenders from state prisons to county jails, then county jails cut expenses by parole and rely on GPS tracking devices (ankle bracelets), and then the sex offenders simply disable the devices and walk away. The L.A. Times’ Paige St. John is reporting this week that state corrections officials are “expressing concern” and the “problem may be larger than they believed.”

Reports St. John: “Officials in the Department of Corrections had stated for months that such cases numbered in the hundreds. Then, earlier this month, they said they knew of 3,200 cases from October 2011 through December 2012. On Monday, department spokeswoman Deborah Hoffman said that because that tally included only cases in which parole revocation hearings were held, the actual number of incidents may be larger.” It seems more than 400 convicted sex offenders may have escaped the system and remain at large.

If state officials are admitting this much already, this is a scandal to monitor. Read the story here.

Filed Under: Community

Common Sense Report Echoes Statewide

February 22, 2013 By
One problem with sounding the alarm on state courts funding cuts is that each crisis usually exists in isolation, at least outside political and policy circles. So it’s good news that a new report from the Common Sense group is getting some “legs,” including fueling a major editorial in the Orange County Register.
 
That report (see previous post) notes that the state’s “balanced” budget simply ignores some realities. It also notes that the increased tax revenue is not going so much for services as other expenses, like retirement commitments. Notes the OC Register: “Despite more tax revenue, proposed spending is significantly lower in key areas in 2013-14 than in 2007-08, the analysis found. Funds for social services declined 14 percent; universities, 14 percent; courts, 16 percent; and transportation, 31 percent. State spending on K-12 education is expected to be no higher than in the 2007-08 proposed budget.”
 

In contrast, spending on health care services is up 62 percent; employee compensation, up 16 percent; retirement benefits, up 25 percent; and debt service, 24 percent. “General obligation and retirement benefit debt has grown substantially – 55 percent and 25 percent, respectively,” the report says.

See the Register opinion here.

Filed Under: Community

Report Outlines Court Spending

February 20, 2013 By
An important new report from California Common Sense outlines one reason that California’s courts are facing cutbacks: increased spending on public employee salaries and health care, especially when seen as a percentage of the state budget.
 
The L.A. Times has a good report, including this: “Think of the state’s proposed budget as a pie. Compared to 2007-08, the overall pie is larger, but social services, K-12, universities, courts, and other services are now smaller slices,” said a statement from Autumn Carter, the executive director of California Common Sense. “On the other hand, health care services, employee salaries, retirement benefits, and debt service are all larger slices.”
 
The story includes a graph that illustrates the trends. Find it here.
 
Filed Under: Community

Another Judge Retiring in L.A. County

February 19, 2013 By
 
The woman credited with being the first openly lesbian judge in Los Angeles County is retiring, according to news reports. MetNews has a good recap on the career of Superior Court Judge Stephanie Sautner, 65, who admits she feels “kind of guilty” leaving the job amid its current financial troubles, but the New York City native wants to split her time between California and the East Coast, where she still has family ties.
 

The judge said that, after taking time off, she would like to sit on assignment in criminal courts in Los Angeles or Riverside counties. Find the MetNews report here.

Filed Under: Uncategorized
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