Judge ‘Dismayed’ at Gov’s Allegations; Demands Evidence

February 15, 2013 By
Yikes! When Gov. Brown questioned the objectivity of a court-appointed “special master” to oversee the treatment of mentally ill state inmates, he certainly got the attention of a federal judge who is effectively telling the governor to put up or shut up. U.S. District Court Judge Lawrence Karlton ordered the state to consider withdrawing the complaint, which he actually called “a smear.”
 
It gets worse: The Associate Press reports that Judge Karlton wrote in response to a court filing that “… defendants’ [the state’s] attack consists of a raw assertion of unethical conduct, with no supporting evidence nor even any hint that defendants actually believe the attack they make,” Karlton wrote. He added later that “the court can only be dismayed by the cavalier manner in which defendants … level a smear against the character and reputation of the Special Master.” Later, the AP reports, the judge even said the complaint may violate a court rule that allows sanctions for court filings that are intended to harass or are without any evidence.

Here’s the AP story via a San Jose Mercury News edition.

Filed Under: Community

Straight Talk On Unbalanced State Budget

February 14, 2013 By
The Sacramento Bee journalist Dan Walters built a reputation for covering state government and politics in print, but he also has a video blog worth monitoring. A post this week puts the state court budget into simple language, noting how the system shifted from local to state funding years ago – with unintended and ironic results. He also scoffs at the “balanced” state budget, identifying the courts as one of the non-sustainable cuts that create that “balance.”
 
Here’s the Walters link.
 
Filed Under: Community

Somewhere Near Barstow, Budget Cuts Kicked In

February 13, 2013 By
They were somewhere near Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the state courts budget crisis kicked in, literally; Barstow is among those communities losing its court as California balances its budget amid justice system cuts. The Press-Enterprise newspaper is reporting that San Bernardino County Presiding Judge Marsha Slough told the Assembly Judiciary Committee this week that “… we will have five facilities left to service 20,000 square miles and more than 2 million people.”
 

Closures include some significant cities: Chino, Redlands, Barstow, Needles and Big Bear. You can read more here.

Filed Under: Community

Video notes court budget impacts: most needy hurt the most

February 12, 2013 By
The folks at California Courts have some of the better video focused on court budget issues, and here’s one worth a look. It details impacts on some of the most needy users of the courts, like tenants seeking help with landlord disputes and family law cases involving kids. How would you like to be a parent waiting six months just to see if you’re allowed to see your children? Even “emergency” issues involving domestic disputes are taking two weeks.
 
California Courts is operated by the state judicial branch, and its website also offers a bunch of self-help information, which unfortunately may become more and more important as the courts scale back on paid public assistance. 
 

View Video: http://www.youtube.com/user/CaliforniaCourts?feature=watch

 
Filed Under: Community

Letter From Ventura: Court Access Being Denied

February 6, 2013 By
News outlets statewide are documenting the installment-plan crisis that is California courts funding, including a recent report by Raul Hernandez in the Ventura County Star. Presiding Judge Brian Back and Michael Planet, the Superior Court’s executive officer, told a lunch gathering in Oxnard that their “rainy day fund” is virtually gone, going from $7 million to around $300,000 while dealing with cuts, the paper said.
 
Ventura County is noted as the 14th largest court system in the state and eighth in terms of cases filed. It is first in civil cases under $25,000. How dire is it getting? Among the “solutions” being considered, they say, is cutting juries from 12 people to six. And those running the courts make it clear that access to justice is being denied as self-help programs and other access programs are being dismantled.
 

The Star story is here.

Filed Under: Community

Paper: Move to Electronic Court Reporting

February 4, 2013 By
The Sun-Star newspaper in Merced is among those calling for electronic court reporting for California, an idea not exactly popular with human court reporters. In an editorial, the paper notes that “… court reporters are a strange hybrid of government employee and private entrepreneur. Even though they are paid by the court to make the official court record, once that record is produced, they own it. The court or the parties involved in litigation have to purchase it from them at a price (85 cents per 100 words) set in statute.
 
The report also notes thatCalifornia courts spend $24 million to purchase trial court transcripts from their paid employees (and) “… the union that represents court reporters argues that these trained stenographers are cheaper and more reliable and accurate than electronic recordings. Strong evidence and real court experience dispute that.”

At issue are non-civil cases. Civil actions already require that the parties involved pay for their recorders. Read the entire Sun-Star position here.

Filed Under: Community

State court cuts called on in HuffPo

January 29, 2013 By
A major national story by Joanne Doroshow on the Huffington Post Politics blog is a bit sarcastic toward Gov. Brown and laments the “Slow Death of Justice in California.”  The writer, who has a day job with the Center for Justice and Democracy at New York Law School, virtually scoffs at the governor’s priorities, writing that Brown is “… so excited… about the state’s budget situation that in his State of the State address, he spoke starry-eyed about ideas that suddenly seemed possible, like a new high-speed rail.”
 
The story is an important counter-narrative to the Brown administration’s attitude that the state has somehow managed to create a surplus and can now begin spending on certain projects while looking the other way on court shortfalls. Read it here.
 
Filed Under: Community

Be Alarmed, Be Very Alarmed

January 28, 2013 By
The Sacramento-based Capitol Weekly, which focuses on state government, is quoting the chief of California’s Senate Judiciary Committee sounding an alarm. “We should all be alarmed. Every single one of us,” says Sen. Noreen Evans, who chairs the committee. The newspaper outlines some of the impacts of budget cutting: “Resolving a divorce, a custody tussle, a contract dispute, a landlord tenant fight, an unpaid debt or any number of multimillion-dollar or small claims civil issues takes longer and costs more than it used to.”
 
And the Weekly adds some numbers we’ve not seen before. After reporting that a day in court will become “… even more time-consuming, experts say, because of the steady diet of state budget cuts force fed to the courts in California, the nation’s largest judicial system” the story notes that “… since June of 2009, the state general fund’s share of the court’s $3.1 billion budget has fallen from 56 percent to 20 percent.
 

The story is written by Greg Lucas, who is a contributing editor of the Weekly but also host of TV’s “Politics on Tap” that shows on the California Channel. Read the story here.

Filed Under: Community

Times Editorial Adds to Courts Chorus

January 24, 2013 By
It’s hard to know exactly how much an L.A. Times editorial still matters these days, but the paper is taking a strong stand against the governor’s planned court budget cuts while framing the issue quite clearly. It’s especially important to note that the LAT got it spot-on by noting that the justice system is more than just another government program. It also does a good job of pointing out exactly who will lose the most if the cuts continue.
 
For the courts community, it’s not to be missed…read story here.
 
Filed Under: Community

Rationed Justice: Sac Bee latest to lament court budgets

January 22, 2013 By

The Sacramento Bee continues to bang the court-crisis drum, pointing out that San Joaquin County has stopped bothering to set hearings for small-claims cases and thousands of other civil cases are backlogged as budget cuts force California courts to ration justice – in effect, choosing winners and losers from the funding cutbacks.

Notes the Bee in story this week: “California’s Penal Code mandates that criminal cases get precedence, civil cases have borne the brunt of pared-back staffing and hours. That has forced courts to choose which types of cases are priorities and which can wait…”

The paper says that “… years of general fund cutbacks – about $1.2 billion total since 2008, including $475 million from trial courts – have already forced courts to recalibrate. While California does not keep comprehensive statewide data on the impact of court funding, a county-by-county breakdown in a judicial branch website reveals a litany of reduced hours, vacant positions, shuttered courthouses and eliminated programs for handling domestic violence and family law.” Read the entire story, part of a push-back effort from judges, here.
Filed Under: Community
«Older Posts
Newer Posts»