Showing posts with label Administrative Office of the Courts (AOC). Show all posts
Showing posts with label Administrative Office of the Courts (AOC). Show all posts
Sunday, September 14, 2014
Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye's word of the day: "counter-majoritarian"
CA SUPREME COURT'S CHIEF JUSTICE TO SPEAK SEPT. 11 IN SAN DIEGO
East County Magazine
September 10, 2014
(San Diego)
California Chief Justice Tani G. Cantil-Sakauye will be the featured speaker at “Informed Voters—Fair Judges” , a special program on the critical role voters play in preserving our country’s fair and impartial legal system.
Commentary
Word of the day, "counter-majoritarian"
by Sharon Kramer
Yesterday, I attended a meeting [in San Diego] of which the subject matter was "Informed Voters -- Fair Judges".
Chief Justice Cantil-Sakauye was the keynote speaker. In fact, besides her introduction by Justice McConnell and the announcement by a gentleman from UCSD that it was time to mingle, Tani was the only speaker.
According to Tani, her courts are "counter-majoritarian" and must be, to keep the courts "fair and free". She claims that decisions in the branch are made independently -- not by majority rule. Thus, she is practicing "counter-majoritarian" in the name of democracy.
She also stated that Chief Justice Ronald George was a "wonderful, honorable, visionary" and that McConnell has worked with him for a long time to help keep the courts fair and free from outside interests influencing the courts.
[Maura Larkins' comment: Next we need to work on preventing INSIDE interests from influencing the courts. Insiders are able to exercise an extraordinary amount of arbitrary power, in my experience. The Chief Justice could begin to fix this by providing enough money to bring back court reporters for civil cases.]
Then she stated that McConnell also worked with the President of the Cal Chamber of Commerce on the project of ensuring impartial courts. (I laughed out loud at the irony and oxymoron of this statement. Fortunately, I don't think anyone besides those sitting next to me, heard me.)
This Emmy winning short video was played. "Fair and Free"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aTeFLkueTkQ
McConnell and an executive committee that she chairs, authored a pretty good little booklet to teach children of how the courts are suppose to work. Seems to me that it would be beneficial for many if she would also take the time to read it!
The CJ told an anecdotal story of a dinner she had with a legislator who she said would remain nameless. According to her, this legislator said that the trial judges report to the chief justice and the chief justice reports to the legislature.
Moans of sympathetic disgust went out in the crowd of the audacity of the statement by the imperialistic legislator. Parlaying on the audience favorable response, she then stated "and this legislator is a lawyer" and that after he said that, the dinner was over.
I got the impression that she was referring to Governor Brown and I seriously doubt that's what he actually said. I would envision it being more of "Get control of the fraud, waste and abuse in the judicial branch. The Judicial Council is not getting any more money from the legislature until you do."
Basically, it seemed like a cocktail party stop on the campaign trail to garner support for more money for the Judicial Council and their staff to control -- so they can be free to administer justice in the counter-majoritarian manner as taught by the wonderful, honorable, visionary Ron George.
Several San Diego judges and justices were in attendance including Justice Joan Irion, Nationwide Chair, Informed Voters—Fair Judges Project; and the appetizers were outstanding!.
Sunday, May 18, 2014
Vote in Carla Keehn in place of Lisa Schall for Judicial Office 20, and Brad Weinreb for Office 25, but keep Prager and Popkins
Update April 2016:
Original post:
Superior Court Judge; Office 9 • Ronald S. Prager
Superior Court Judge; Office 19 • Michael J. Popkins
Superior Court Judge; Office 20 • Carla Keehn: This race receives special attention. Keehn is running against the incumbent Lisa Schall. The problem with Schall is that during her term as judge she has been admonished three times by the state Commission on Judicial Performance. After 30 years on the bench it is time for a change. Vote for Keehn
Superior Court Judge; Office 25 • Brad Weinreb
Brad Weinreb, a state deputy attorney general for more than 20 years, was rated by the Bar as “qualified.” He has extensive experience in major criminal cases and claims one of the highest active caseloads in death penalty cases. He won the endorsement of Goldsmith, Gore, Chula Vista Police Chief David Bejarano, county Public Defender Henry Coker, numerous organizations and some 50 current judges. Both his opponents, Michele Hagan and Ken Gosselin, received the lowest rating of “lacking qualifications” from the Bar. And Gosselin has been accused of misleading voters about his education and experience.
Superior Court Judge; Office 44 • Joseph Adelizzi (SDER choice to replace incumbent Judge Jacqueline Stern)
Judge has been admonished three times
No jurist in the state has a less favorable record
By Greg Moran
U-T San Diego
May 12, 2014
The campaign website for San Diego Superior Court Judge Lisa Schall touts her three decades of experience on the bench, including assignments in every division of law, from criminal courts to probate matters and family law.
What it doesn’t talk about is Schall’s record of discipline with the state agency that oversees judges.
No other active judge among the state’s 1,827 judges on the Superior Court, appeals court and Supreme Court bench has been publicly disciplined more times than Schall has, a review of disciplinary records from the Commission on Judicial Performance shows. She has received two public admonishments and one private admonishment.
Only one other judge, in Contra Costa, has a similar record.
Schall said the record involves three incidents over a nearly-30-year career on the bench, that she has learned from her mistakes, and that her work record has earned her the continuing support of the legal community.
The record shows Schall has been publicly admonished twice, most recently in March 2008 when she pleaded guilty to an alcohol-related driving charge. A public admonishment is the third most-serious level of punishment the commission can hand out, behind only public censure and removal from the bench.
She was stopped while driving the wrong way on Centre City Parkway in Escondido in September 2007 and found to have a blood-alcohol level of 0.09. That is just over the legal limit.
The arrest came just months before she was up for re-election to her fourth term and was not made public at the time. Court records show the case was delayed for six months, and Schall pleaded guilty to a lesser offense — one week after the filing period for a candidate to run against her had closed.
Under state election law, if a sitting judge does not draw a challenger during the filing period, they are deemed automatically re-elected to the office for another term.
Both the judge and her attorney, William Wolfe, said she was not given any special consideration and that Schall did not seek to delay the disposition of the case until after the filing period.
Shall said this week she was dealing with a divorce and caring for her elderly parents at the time of the DUI arrest. She said that is not an excuse, and has apologized to colleagues and family since.
“I took ownership of that,” she said. “I didn’t try to hide it or cover it up.”
Schall was also publicly admonished in 1999 for abusing her power and not following the law when she jailed a woman for five days for contempt of court. The woman was disruptive in the courtroom during a hearing on a restraining order and was taken out of the courtroom.
When the woman said to Schall’s bailiff that she would “go off” if not allowed to tell her story, Schall cited her for contempt without holding a hearing or making factual findings — and when the woman was not in the courtroom.
In 1995 Schall received a private admonishment from the commission for what commission records describe as “her embroilment in a juvenile dependency matter.” Schall said during a child welfare case she was told an appellate lawyer for one parent had been revealing confidential testimony from the court proceedings. She held a hearing with the appellate lawyer and others to find out what had happened, and the commission concluded that was wrong.
...The disciplinary commission has doled out public admonishments just 75 times since 1995 to 22 judges, records show. Several judges who received two public admonishments either retired or were removed by the commission after the second...
Carla Keehn is challenging Keri Greer Katz, daughter of judge Michael Greer, in 2016 election for Superior Court Judge
Original post:
Superior Court Judge; Office 9 • Ronald S. Prager
Superior Court Judge; Office 19 • Michael J. Popkins
Superior Court Judge; Office 20 • Carla Keehn: This race receives special attention. Keehn is running against the incumbent Lisa Schall. The problem with Schall is that during her term as judge she has been admonished three times by the state Commission on Judicial Performance. After 30 years on the bench it is time for a change. Vote for Keehn
Superior Court Judge; Office 25 • Brad Weinreb
Brad Weinreb, a state deputy attorney general for more than 20 years, was rated by the Bar as “qualified.” He has extensive experience in major criminal cases and claims one of the highest active caseloads in death penalty cases. He won the endorsement of Goldsmith, Gore, Chula Vista Police Chief David Bejarano, county Public Defender Henry Coker, numerous organizations and some 50 current judges. Both his opponents, Michele Hagan and Ken Gosselin, received the lowest rating of “lacking qualifications” from the Bar. And Gosselin has been accused of misleading voters about his education and experience.
Superior Court Judge; Office 44 • Joseph Adelizzi (SDER choice to replace incumbent Judge Jacqueline Stern)
Judge has been admonished three times
No jurist in the state has a less favorable record
By Greg Moran
U-T San Diego
May 12, 2014
The campaign website for San Diego Superior Court Judge Lisa Schall touts her three decades of experience on the bench, including assignments in every division of law, from criminal courts to probate matters and family law.
What it doesn’t talk about is Schall’s record of discipline with the state agency that oversees judges.
No other active judge among the state’s 1,827 judges on the Superior Court, appeals court and Supreme Court bench has been publicly disciplined more times than Schall has, a review of disciplinary records from the Commission on Judicial Performance shows. She has received two public admonishments and one private admonishment.
Only one other judge, in Contra Costa, has a similar record.
Schall said the record involves three incidents over a nearly-30-year career on the bench, that she has learned from her mistakes, and that her work record has earned her the continuing support of the legal community.
The record shows Schall has been publicly admonished twice, most recently in March 2008 when she pleaded guilty to an alcohol-related driving charge. A public admonishment is the third most-serious level of punishment the commission can hand out, behind only public censure and removal from the bench.
She was stopped while driving the wrong way on Centre City Parkway in Escondido in September 2007 and found to have a blood-alcohol level of 0.09. That is just over the legal limit.
The arrest came just months before she was up for re-election to her fourth term and was not made public at the time. Court records show the case was delayed for six months, and Schall pleaded guilty to a lesser offense — one week after the filing period for a candidate to run against her had closed.
Under state election law, if a sitting judge does not draw a challenger during the filing period, they are deemed automatically re-elected to the office for another term.
Both the judge and her attorney, William Wolfe, said she was not given any special consideration and that Schall did not seek to delay the disposition of the case until after the filing period.
Shall said this week she was dealing with a divorce and caring for her elderly parents at the time of the DUI arrest. She said that is not an excuse, and has apologized to colleagues and family since.
“I took ownership of that,” she said. “I didn’t try to hide it or cover it up.”
Schall was also publicly admonished in 1999 for abusing her power and not following the law when she jailed a woman for five days for contempt of court. The woman was disruptive in the courtroom during a hearing on a restraining order and was taken out of the courtroom.
When the woman said to Schall’s bailiff that she would “go off” if not allowed to tell her story, Schall cited her for contempt without holding a hearing or making factual findings — and when the woman was not in the courtroom.
In 1995 Schall received a private admonishment from the commission for what commission records describe as “her embroilment in a juvenile dependency matter.” Schall said during a child welfare case she was told an appellate lawyer for one parent had been revealing confidential testimony from the court proceedings. She held a hearing with the appellate lawyer and others to find out what had happened, and the commission concluded that was wrong.
...The disciplinary commission has doled out public admonishments just 75 times since 1995 to 22 judges, records show. Several judges who received two public admonishments either retired or were removed by the commission after the second...
Wednesday, February 12, 2014
Legislator Calls for Audit of Court Administrative Office and Council
Legislator Calls for Audit of Court Administrative Office and Council
By MARIA DINZEO
Courthouse News Service
February 12, 2014
(CN) - Assembly member Reginald Jones-Sawyer on Tuesday asked the Legislature to audit the 800-strong, San Francisco-based bureaucracy of California's courts as well as the agency's boss, the Judicial Council. "I have a myriad of things that I want an outside audit to look at so we can stop rearranging the chairs on the Titanic," said Jones-Sawyer in an interview.
Jones-Sawyer, a Los Angeles Democrat, heads the budget subcommittee on public safety that recommends the overall budget for California's courts, a budget that has been subject to massive cuts in recent years. Los Angeles Superior Court, the largest court in the nation, has been forced into an extensive reorganization while the staff has been cut from about 6,000 to roughly 4,000 employees.
The assembly member requested an audit of the Administrative Office of the Courts, the controversial and powerful bureaucracy that sits over the local courts, by filing a letter with the Joint Legislative Audit Committee. Prior to sending the letter, Jones-Sawyer had been receiving visits and boxes of information from administrative office officials.
He said the first ever independent and outside audit will be aimed at the budgets of the Administrative Office of the Courts and the governing Judicial Council to make sure the agency and its leadership are making the most of every dollar.
"This is not a punitive or 'I got you' audit. There are a lot of people that have a lot of beliefs and an independent audit will put to bed what is really happening," Jones-Sawyer said. "The audit will help me find out a better way of spending the money. It's not about people making assumptions, it's about answering questions."
The audit was welcome news for state trial judges who have been meeting with Jones-Sawyer since budget hearings concluded last year.
"This all comes down to transparency," said Judge Susan Lopez-Giss in Los Angeles. "This is what we want to see, if in fact the money that is being allocated is being used in the appropriate way and maximized so that courthouses can stay open."
Judge Steve White in Sacramento said the priority for the use of public money should be the funding of the courts themselves that resolve the disputes and perform the many legal functions that affect the lives of Californians.
"If there ever as an operation that screamed out for an audit, it's the continued current level of funding for the administrative operations of the branch, the AOC and the Judicial Council," said White. "Neither the legislature or the Department of Finance has any clear understanding of how the AOC administers its funding internally.
If the legislative audit committee accepts Jones-Sawyer's request, the audit will be conducted by State Auditor Elaine Howle, who three years ago found extensive fault with the AOC's mismanagement of a massive statewide software project for the courts, called the Court Case Management System.
Trial judges for years had attacked the enormous amounts of public funds -- totaling more than a half-billion dollars -- being spent on the software project, while the courts were in the middle of a financial crisis. The Judicial Council pulled the plug on the CCMS project in 2012.
But the administrative office and the Judicial Council that worked with the bureaucracy had developed a spendthrift reputation with the Legislature based on a series of policies. The administrative office had ballooned from a small corps of support staff for judges to a 1,000-strong behemoth that seemed to have its own agenda, high salaries, recurrent raises, well-appointed offices, an insular and opaque process and what trial judges characterized as an arrogant attitude towards the local courts.
Among the policies that brought censure from the Legislature was a pension system that rewarded the top 30 employees with a 22% pension contribution from public funds with no match on top of already bloated salaries, criticized in a report by an evaluating committee of judges.
While the courts were in financial crisis and laying off staff, a large majority of administrative office employees were given a 3.5 percent pay raise in 2010 and another 3.5 percent raise in 2013.
The staff size has been trimmed in the last couple years but, according to statements at a Judicial Council meeting in 2012, still numbered more than 800.
The Legislature also criticized the lack of transparency at the administrative agency and the council evidenced by an attempt last year to impose a $10-per-file fee on any member of the public or press who wanted to research court records, as well as the secrecy with which the council conducts committee meetings that make policy recommendations.
Jones-Sawyer says the AOC so far has largely cooperated with his requests for financial documentation and internal audits.
"I'm looking at eight binders of Judicial Council audits and legislative reports," he said. "They've been really helpful in giving me all the audits that have been done on a regular basis. From what I can tell they've been hitting the mark on being in full compliance so far, based on a criteria they are supposed to meet."
He said a decision by the Legislature in 1997 unifying California's trial courts under one statewide-funded system may be a fundamental part of the problem.
"We're locked into these state governmental bureaucracies. Is that inhibiting then from doing their best work? Do we need to look at the structure of the AOC and the Judicial Council, is there a better way of managing it? If you look at how we put this together, the courts were put at a disadvantage," Jones-Sawyer said.
"We consolidated all these courts and brought them up to the state level," he concluded. "We did it overnight and I don't think we thought it all the way through."
Lopez-Giss in Los Angeles pointed out that Jones-Sawyer's district in South Los Angeles had suffered directly from the budget cuts and his constituents have a great interest in how the courts are funded.
"We have enormous respect for his desire to keep courts open," the judge said. "His district has been hit hard. All the funds that could be available to every county should be available and he understands that. We have confidence he's going to time this and do this in an appropriate way."
In Sacramento, White said the court bureaucracy's budget has been anything but transparent and is highly deserving of a careful audit.
"The budgets for the AOC and the Judicial Council are rather conclusory and general by way of title and it's unclear on what money is being spent on and what the priorities are," said White who is president of the Alliance of California Judges. "Even if there wasn't evidence of bad practices and mismanagement in the AOC, which there has been, this would be a smart thing to do at this time."
He added that many of the legislators, when they confer with the leadership in both houses, express concern with funding for the trial courts. "Getting resources to the courts, not the AOC, not the Judicial Council, is on their top three list. It's way up there. One way to address that would be to get an audit."
On behalf of the Alliance, White sent a letter last month to Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye, urging her to support an audit. While he did not hear back from the chief justice, she did meet with Jones-Sawyer.
"I had some initial discussion with the chief justice," said the assembly member who applauds her three-year plan to restore $1.2 billion to the judiciary. "I love her three-year plan, it's a great beginning."
But he also said the audit will determine whether the judiciary actually needs a full $1.2 billion or if money can be saved by looking at the administrative office budget.
"Part of it is accountability, most of it is transparency," Jones Sawyer said. "We just can't throw money at it. We have to use this money wisely and efficiently so we get the most bang for our buck."
"If it's status quo, and you're just rearranging the chairs on the Titanic, you're not making it better," he continued. "Whatever we give you, what efficiencies will you get from that? The only way both the legislature and the governor's office will buy into that is if they come back with specific, tangible results as to what that money will actually be used for."
White said the absence of an independent audit of the AOC is unusual for a state agency, but that lean financial times demand a departure from the status quo.
"State departments generally would never get away with the superficial and non-transparent accounting of expenditures like the Judicial Council and AOC does," said the Sacramento judge. "The reason why it has been different is we are a separate branch of government. And in flush times, before the recession, nobody much cared because there was money to appropriate."
"But when it became clear there wasn't enough money to run the courts, then it mattered," White concluded. "I would say it always mattered, but it matters in a compelling way when you have people driving four to five hours to get to a courthouse because of closures."
By MARIA DINZEO
Courthouse News Service
February 12, 2014
(CN) - Assembly member Reginald Jones-Sawyer on Tuesday asked the Legislature to audit the 800-strong, San Francisco-based bureaucracy of California's courts as well as the agency's boss, the Judicial Council. "I have a myriad of things that I want an outside audit to look at so we can stop rearranging the chairs on the Titanic," said Jones-Sawyer in an interview.
Jones-Sawyer, a Los Angeles Democrat, heads the budget subcommittee on public safety that recommends the overall budget for California's courts, a budget that has been subject to massive cuts in recent years. Los Angeles Superior Court, the largest court in the nation, has been forced into an extensive reorganization while the staff has been cut from about 6,000 to roughly 4,000 employees.
The assembly member requested an audit of the Administrative Office of the Courts, the controversial and powerful bureaucracy that sits over the local courts, by filing a letter with the Joint Legislative Audit Committee. Prior to sending the letter, Jones-Sawyer had been receiving visits and boxes of information from administrative office officials.
He said the first ever independent and outside audit will be aimed at the budgets of the Administrative Office of the Courts and the governing Judicial Council to make sure the agency and its leadership are making the most of every dollar.
"This is not a punitive or 'I got you' audit. There are a lot of people that have a lot of beliefs and an independent audit will put to bed what is really happening," Jones-Sawyer said. "The audit will help me find out a better way of spending the money. It's not about people making assumptions, it's about answering questions."
The audit was welcome news for state trial judges who have been meeting with Jones-Sawyer since budget hearings concluded last year.
"This all comes down to transparency," said Judge Susan Lopez-Giss in Los Angeles. "This is what we want to see, if in fact the money that is being allocated is being used in the appropriate way and maximized so that courthouses can stay open."
Judge Steve White in Sacramento said the priority for the use of public money should be the funding of the courts themselves that resolve the disputes and perform the many legal functions that affect the lives of Californians.
"If there ever as an operation that screamed out for an audit, it's the continued current level of funding for the administrative operations of the branch, the AOC and the Judicial Council," said White. "Neither the legislature or the Department of Finance has any clear understanding of how the AOC administers its funding internally.
If the legislative audit committee accepts Jones-Sawyer's request, the audit will be conducted by State Auditor Elaine Howle, who three years ago found extensive fault with the AOC's mismanagement of a massive statewide software project for the courts, called the Court Case Management System.
Trial judges for years had attacked the enormous amounts of public funds -- totaling more than a half-billion dollars -- being spent on the software project, while the courts were in the middle of a financial crisis. The Judicial Council pulled the plug on the CCMS project in 2012.
But the administrative office and the Judicial Council that worked with the bureaucracy had developed a spendthrift reputation with the Legislature based on a series of policies. The administrative office had ballooned from a small corps of support staff for judges to a 1,000-strong behemoth that seemed to have its own agenda, high salaries, recurrent raises, well-appointed offices, an insular and opaque process and what trial judges characterized as an arrogant attitude towards the local courts.
Among the policies that brought censure from the Legislature was a pension system that rewarded the top 30 employees with a 22% pension contribution from public funds with no match on top of already bloated salaries, criticized in a report by an evaluating committee of judges.
While the courts were in financial crisis and laying off staff, a large majority of administrative office employees were given a 3.5 percent pay raise in 2010 and another 3.5 percent raise in 2013.
The staff size has been trimmed in the last couple years but, according to statements at a Judicial Council meeting in 2012, still numbered more than 800.
The Legislature also criticized the lack of transparency at the administrative agency and the council evidenced by an attempt last year to impose a $10-per-file fee on any member of the public or press who wanted to research court records, as well as the secrecy with which the council conducts committee meetings that make policy recommendations.
Jones-Sawyer says the AOC so far has largely cooperated with his requests for financial documentation and internal audits.
"I'm looking at eight binders of Judicial Council audits and legislative reports," he said. "They've been really helpful in giving me all the audits that have been done on a regular basis. From what I can tell they've been hitting the mark on being in full compliance so far, based on a criteria they are supposed to meet."
He said a decision by the Legislature in 1997 unifying California's trial courts under one statewide-funded system may be a fundamental part of the problem.
"We're locked into these state governmental bureaucracies. Is that inhibiting then from doing their best work? Do we need to look at the structure of the AOC and the Judicial Council, is there a better way of managing it? If you look at how we put this together, the courts were put at a disadvantage," Jones-Sawyer said.
"We consolidated all these courts and brought them up to the state level," he concluded. "We did it overnight and I don't think we thought it all the way through."
Lopez-Giss in Los Angeles pointed out that Jones-Sawyer's district in South Los Angeles had suffered directly from the budget cuts and his constituents have a great interest in how the courts are funded.
"We have enormous respect for his desire to keep courts open," the judge said. "His district has been hit hard. All the funds that could be available to every county should be available and he understands that. We have confidence he's going to time this and do this in an appropriate way."
In Sacramento, White said the court bureaucracy's budget has been anything but transparent and is highly deserving of a careful audit.
"The budgets for the AOC and the Judicial Council are rather conclusory and general by way of title and it's unclear on what money is being spent on and what the priorities are," said White who is president of the Alliance of California Judges. "Even if there wasn't evidence of bad practices and mismanagement in the AOC, which there has been, this would be a smart thing to do at this time."
He added that many of the legislators, when they confer with the leadership in both houses, express concern with funding for the trial courts. "Getting resources to the courts, not the AOC, not the Judicial Council, is on their top three list. It's way up there. One way to address that would be to get an audit."
On behalf of the Alliance, White sent a letter last month to Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye, urging her to support an audit. While he did not hear back from the chief justice, she did meet with Jones-Sawyer.
"I had some initial discussion with the chief justice," said the assembly member who applauds her three-year plan to restore $1.2 billion to the judiciary. "I love her three-year plan, it's a great beginning."
But he also said the audit will determine whether the judiciary actually needs a full $1.2 billion or if money can be saved by looking at the administrative office budget.
"Part of it is accountability, most of it is transparency," Jones Sawyer said. "We just can't throw money at it. We have to use this money wisely and efficiently so we get the most bang for our buck."
"If it's status quo, and you're just rearranging the chairs on the Titanic, you're not making it better," he continued. "Whatever we give you, what efficiencies will you get from that? The only way both the legislature and the governor's office will buy into that is if they come back with specific, tangible results as to what that money will actually be used for."
White said the absence of an independent audit of the AOC is unusual for a state agency, but that lean financial times demand a departure from the status quo.
"State departments generally would never get away with the superficial and non-transparent accounting of expenditures like the Judicial Council and AOC does," said the Sacramento judge. "The reason why it has been different is we are a separate branch of government. And in flush times, before the recession, nobody much cared because there was money to appropriate."
"But when it became clear there wasn't enough money to run the courts, then it mattered," White concluded. "I would say it always mattered, but it matters in a compelling way when you have people driving four to five hours to get to a courthouse because of closures."
Tuesday, January 15, 2013
Court executive salaries released by the AOC
This story was published 3 years ago. The salaries are most likely higher at present, and hopefully so are the ethical standards in places like Placer County.
Survey says: Pay for state's court executives released
By Greg Moran
SDUT
DEC. 3, 2009
As the head of the San Diego Superior Court, Executive Officer Michael Roddy runs the second-largest court system in the state, with 154 judges and judicial officers and 1,709 full time employees.
For his efforts, Roddy is paid $223,953, with another $41,000 in benefits per year.
Though San Diego’s court trails only Los Angeles in size, Roddy’s salary is not the second highest for court executives in the state.
He might consider the job in Contra Costa County, far smaller than San Diego with 38 judges and 428 employees. The chief executive there makes $229,338 per year, and another $37,000 in benefits. That's the highest paid court executive salary job in the state, surpassing even Los Angeles County, with 441 judges and 5,540 employees. (The CEO there makes $220,980 per year but gets the most in benefits -- $75,388, pushing the total compensation ahead of Contra Costa).
Or Santa Clara County, with 79 judges, 889 employees, and a chief executive who earns $225,528 per year.
In tiny Inyo County, with two judges and 21 employees, the chief executive there is paid $139,869 —more than half of what Roddy makes in San Diego overseeing a system dozens of times larger in terms of judges and employees.
These wide disparities in pay and benefits among the state’s 58 court chief executives are laid out for the first time in recently-completed survey by the state Administrative Office of the Courts.
Unlike state court judges, whose salaries are the same regardless of where they serve, the pay and benefits of the court systems top executives are set on a county-by-county basis. Each county has its own policy for setting and modifying salaries of court executives.
That patchwork system is a vestige of the time when individual counties funded the courts. That all changed 12 years ago when the state took over trial court funding.
Individual Superior Courts, however, remain the employers for all court workers. Court executive officers are employees of their individual courts, reporting to the presiding judge for each court system.
All of that has led to a spectrum of pay and benefit policies, and some controversy.
The survey done by the AOC was sparked by revelations that the salary of the former chief executive in Placer County increased 11 times in seven years, rising from $162,000 in 2002 to $304,0000 in 2008. A special audit conducted by the AOC said that for many of the increases there were no records showing who approved it.
This month the Judicial Council, the policy making arm for the state courts, is expected to review the survey and propose policies and guidelines for setting pay for court executives.
The council can’t set individual policy and benefits for the state’s court systems, said Peter Allen, senior communications manager for the AOC. But it will be presented with a model personnel policy each court could use when setting CEO pay, he said. It will be interesting to see how widely that model is accepted in the current contentious environment between some trial court judges and the Judicial Council/AOC...
Survey says: Pay for state's court executives released
By Greg Moran
SDUT
DEC. 3, 2009
As the head of the San Diego Superior Court, Executive Officer Michael Roddy runs the second-largest court system in the state, with 154 judges and judicial officers and 1,709 full time employees.
For his efforts, Roddy is paid $223,953, with another $41,000 in benefits per year.
Though San Diego’s court trails only Los Angeles in size, Roddy’s salary is not the second highest for court executives in the state.
He might consider the job in Contra Costa County, far smaller than San Diego with 38 judges and 428 employees. The chief executive there makes $229,338 per year, and another $37,000 in benefits. That's the highest paid court executive salary job in the state, surpassing even Los Angeles County, with 441 judges and 5,540 employees. (The CEO there makes $220,980 per year but gets the most in benefits -- $75,388, pushing the total compensation ahead of Contra Costa).
Or Santa Clara County, with 79 judges, 889 employees, and a chief executive who earns $225,528 per year.
In tiny Inyo County, with two judges and 21 employees, the chief executive there is paid $139,869 —more than half of what Roddy makes in San Diego overseeing a system dozens of times larger in terms of judges and employees.
These wide disparities in pay and benefits among the state’s 58 court chief executives are laid out for the first time in recently-completed survey by the state Administrative Office of the Courts.
Unlike state court judges, whose salaries are the same regardless of where they serve, the pay and benefits of the court systems top executives are set on a county-by-county basis. Each county has its own policy for setting and modifying salaries of court executives.
That patchwork system is a vestige of the time when individual counties funded the courts. That all changed 12 years ago when the state took over trial court funding.
Individual Superior Courts, however, remain the employers for all court workers. Court executive officers are employees of their individual courts, reporting to the presiding judge for each court system.
All of that has led to a spectrum of pay and benefit policies, and some controversy.
The survey done by the AOC was sparked by revelations that the salary of the former chief executive in Placer County increased 11 times in seven years, rising from $162,000 in 2002 to $304,0000 in 2008. A special audit conducted by the AOC said that for many of the increases there were no records showing who approved it.
This month the Judicial Council, the policy making arm for the state courts, is expected to review the survey and propose policies and guidelines for setting pay for court executives.
The council can’t set individual policy and benefits for the state’s court systems, said Peter Allen, senior communications manager for the AOC. But it will be presented with a model personnel policy each court could use when setting CEO pay, he said. It will be interesting to see how widely that model is accepted in the current contentious environment between some trial court judges and the Judicial Council/AOC...
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