LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – As a result of California's continuing struggle to make financial ends meet, courts across the state are facing deep budget cuts, which is leading to concerns about sustaining essential services at the heart of the justice system.
At it July 22 meeting, the Judicial Council of California allocated a $350 million reduction for fiscal year 2011-12, which the Administrative Office of the Courts reported is the largest budget cut in state court history, and is expected to have a dramatic impact on judicial branch services for the public.
The state's overall funding cuts translate into a 6.8 percent cut in funding for the 58 California trial courts, a 9.7 percent cut in funding for the California Supreme Court and the six Courts of Appeal, and a 12 percent funding reduction for the Judicial Council and its staff organization, the Administrative Office of the Courts said.
The Judicial Council also approved $122.4 million in offsets to lessen the impact of budget reductions on the trial courts.
As a result of the council's actions, the Lake County Superior Court is facing a funding reduction of $300,000 for fiscal year 2011-12 – a roughly 6.7-percent reduction over the prior year – according to county Court Executive Officer Mary Smith.
It's a big cut for the small court, which Smith said has an annual budget that totals just over $3.6 million for the current year, excluding grants and reimbursements.
The budget cuts to the state's judicial branch this year are “profound and deep and ultimately unsustainable,” San Diego County Superior Court Judge David Rubin, president-elect of the California Judges Association, told Lake County News.
“The projected cuts for next year are much worse and we are doing everything we possibly can to engage our branch partners and legislators in the governor's office around these cuts,” he said.
Rubin said the impact on all courts – no matter what size – is profound. “You're talking about our ability to deliver services, and when I say services I mean justice.”
The cuts resulted in part because the state “borrowed” $310 million from the state judicial branch's State Court Facilities Construction Fund, which is meant to raise funds for courthouse building projects such as the new courthouse proposed to be built in Lakeport, according to the state judicial branch. Thus far no delays to the Lakeport project have been announced.
Rubin said nobody envied the decisions the Judicial Council had to make.
He said the California Judges Association stands with California Supreme Court Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye, who became chief justice Jan. 3 only to face the catastrophic cuts. Rubin said Cantil-Sakauye is working as hard as she can to make sure all courtrooms in the state stay open.
Because the Judicial Council offset some of the $350 million reduction through one-time fund transfers and other one-time solutions, the Lake County Superior Court will not see the full impact of cuts until fiscal year 2012-13, Smith said.
It's then that the courts could face what Smith said would be a devastating 15 percent reduction.
“It's getting to the point that we think those things may come true,” said Smith.
Just how the courts will deal with that greater funding challenge isn't certain, she added.
“I'm not optimistic these days,” Smith said.
Said Rubin, “Whether you are a judge serving a small community in a small county or whether you're a judge in a much large community in a very large county, it is disturbing to have the level of service that we can deliver to the citizens in these communities undermined by these budget reductions.”
The California Judges Association and the Alliance of California Judges both lobbied the Judicial Council to take options other than allocating the reductions to the trial courts.
Kern County Superior Court Judge David Lampe, president of the Alliance of California Judges, had asked the council to use its full legal authority to fully cover the cuts and allow reserves to be applied over a three-year period so that the trial courts could gradually implement structural changes and avoid devastating cuts.
He also lobbied for not funding the California Court Case Management System. The Administrative Office of the Courts said the computer-based case management system will allow jurisdictions statewide to electronically compile and share information, and give judges and law enforcement agencies real-time access to court information.
However, the program has been strongly criticized for its cost, which the Administrative Office of the Courts said is $315.5 million over the nine years of its development.
The council did agree to transfer $56.4 million from the case management system, which will result in a one-year delay in deployment activities for that program.
But critics of the program like Lampe wanted the Judicial Council to go further. Lampe pointed to a state auditor's report that found the Judicial Council was implementing the program without an appropriate cost benefit analysis. As a result, it's estimated the program actually will cost between $1.9 billion and $3 billion to fully roll out.
“They continue to spend as we speak on that project while the trial courts go without services,” said Lampe.
And there are more immediate challenges, with that 15-percent cut that's anticipated for 2012-13.
“We've now been informed that revenue projections are lower than anticipated in passing this budget,” said Rubin.
If the budget picture continues to worsen, Rubin said other budget reduction triggers will be pulled and there may be further reductions this fiscal year.
“We're not out of the woods yet,” he said, noting the budget picture won't become clearer until next spring.
Ongoing cuts, challenges
According to Smith, the Lake County Superior Court has had its budget reduced by 12 percent since the 2009-10 fiscal year. Since then, four jobs have been cut, reducing court staff from 43 to 39, a nearly 10-percent reduction.
Smith said the courts are avoiding layoffs this time around because the court's employees are working with the court to implement cost saving measures.
The court met with its employee groups, which agreed to 13 unpaid furlough days in fiscal year 2011-12, Smith said.
Smith said those furlough days will coincide with dates that the court is proposing to be closed to the public – the week of Thanksgiving, the week between Christmas and New Years, and the first Friday of each month, January through June.
On closure days the court will have a skeleton crew available to process the in-custody criminal arraignment calendar, arrest warrants and any other emergency matters, said Smith. As the court proceeds with the closure days, it will take into account public input submitted during a month-long comment period that ended Sept. 7.
Staff has agreed to forgo salary and benefit increases since 2008, and agreed to 10 unpaid furlough days in fiscal year 2009-10, Smith said.
Also in the 2009-10 fiscal year, the state implemented a court closure on the third Wednesday of the month, which ran through June 2010. Court employees and the judges agreed to take the closure days as unpaid furlough days, which amounted to a 4.6-percent pay cut, as Lake County News has reported.
In the midst of all of the reductions, Smith said court employees are continuing to work hard to provide the public with the best service possible.
Smith, who has been with the courts for 20 years, said of the budget constraints, “I haven't seen anything this bad.”
The courts have seen previous tough economic times, Smith said. “It kind of gets a little uncomfortable and then it gets better, but this has been a pronounced low period that doesn't seem to be ceasing, or getting better.”
Rubin agreed, noting that over the years there have been both lean times and good times. However, “No one's seen cuts on this scale,” he said.
While the Lake County Superior Court has implemented significant cost reductions since 2008, Smith said the courts don't have the reserves to absorb the current budget cuts without reducing services to the public.
At an Aug. 24 meeting in San Francisco, presiding judges and court executives from around the state told the state Judicial Council about the steps they've taken to manage the cuts – from measures to go paperless, eliminating cell phones and juror lunches – according to a report from the Administrative Office of the Courts.
The consensus at the meeting was that the state's trial courts can't continue to sustain the cuts indefinitely. The Administrative Office of the Courts also reported that the group agreed that the Legislature and governor must be convinced that the courts can't survive if such massive cuts continue.
The Judicial Council followed up with a vote at an Aug. 26 meeting to consider new statewide fees or fee increases that could be recommended to the Legislature to help offset the budget reductions.
In some corners, the severity of the cuts are such that the Judicial Council has opted to take special action.
On Sept. 9, the council unanimously approved an emergency one-time $2.5 million allocation from Trial Court Improvement Fund reserves for the San Francisco Superior Court.
As condition of accepting the funds, the court had to agree to keep open 11 courtrooms identified for closure, repay the funds – interest-free – within five years and submit written reports to the Judicial Council on how it will use the funds.
The allocation was in response to a strongly worded Aug. 22 request from San Francisco County Superior Court Presiding Judge Katherine Feinstein – daughter of U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein – who asked for $20.4 million over three years to cover the court's deficit.
Feinstein warned that her court was facing the loss of 177 employees – nearly 40 percent of the San Francisco County Superior Court staff – the dismantling of its civil division and the closure of 25 courtrooms.
She said the court had been prepared to lay off 122 employees last year but it “mistakenly” followed the Administrative Office of the Courts' guidance and didn't issue layoff notices.
The Administrative Office of the Courts had told San Francisco's court leadership that laying off the employees could endanger a pending $230 million legislative package that promised new revenues and redirected branch funds to backfill prior cuts, according to Feinstein.
However, that budget package didn't materialize, and the judicial branch actually suffered more cuts, according to Feinstein.
To protect the funding the Legislature allocates to the trial courts, the Alliance for California Judges is sponsoring AB 1208 by Assemblyman Charles Calderon, Lampe said.
Lampe said the bill would make sure that state funds go directly to the courts and can't be put to other uses.
The group also believes that the size of the Administrative Office of the Courts is disproportionate to its function, Lampe said.
While the judicial system is decentralized, the Legislature coupled that decentralization with allocating all of the money to the Administrative Office of the Courts, which he said leads to an institutional tension.
“I think ultimately that has to be resolved,” he said.
Lampe added, “We’re optimistic that the dire circumstances we find ourselves in is an argument in favor of our position to directly fund the trial courts.”
E-mail Elizabeth Larson at
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