The Vermont courts took a $730,473 cut this year as part of the rescission and other belt-tightening measures this year. To meet the target, the court system has kept three judge vacancies open, or 9 percent of the justices on the bench.
As a result of the temporary cut, the chief justice of the Vermont Supreme Court and members of the Vermont Bar Association say there have been delays in court hearings at all levels that could impair the courtโs ability to meet its constitutional obligation to adjudicate cases in a timely manner.
Now the Shumlin administration is asking the judicial branch of government to permanently reduce spending by $500,000, and that may mean positions on the court may remain open for some time.
The judiciary branch would have little choice in the short term but to increase vacancy savings or consider staff furloughs that would further exacerbate court delays, according to Paul Reiber, the chief justice.
Reiber says the courts are already managing reductions in fiscal year 2015 with โextraordinary vacancy savings,โ including savings from a delay in filling the three judicial vacancies that are impairing the courtโs ability โto adjudicate cases in a timely manner, especially in light of the increase in juvenile child protection filings.โ
โThe reduction and vacancy savings response will disrupt our operations and may well impact the timeliness with which the courts can meet the needs of Vermonters who rely on the court system,โ Reiber wrote in a letter to lawmakers earlier this month.
Complaints from the judicial branch that the cuts could result in a back up of cases in the courts are falling on deaf ears.
Jim Reardon, the commissioner of the Vermont Department of Finance and Management, says the judiciary must do its part to help close the budget gap. All government departments have been asked to find savings to help the state permanently reduce state spending.
Reardon says in order for the administration to permanently eliminate the budget gap, all branches of state government must make shared sacrifices.
The judiciary argues that a $500,000 reduction is a sizable percentage of the overall budget for the courts. The judiciary budget is $40.9 million, and the expenditures are largely for personnel, sheriffs fees and facilities costs; the courts bring in about $25 million in fees.
When Gov. Peter Shumlin gave his budget address on Jan. 15 the gap was $94 million. Last week the stateโs economists downgraded revenues another $18.6 million for fiscal year 2016. The total amount budget writers say the total hole, after applying budget adjustment savings, will be $112 million. It is the biggest gap the state has faced since the Great Recession.
Word came down regarding the budget cuts not in the fiscal year 2016 budget proposal, but in a paragraph near the end of the proposed budget adjustment act. Section 70 says courts must come up with a plan for the savings by the end of March. Rep. Willem Jewett, a member of the House Judiciary Committee, called it โa shot across the bow.โ
Reardon says the $500,000 in savings is small in relationship to the budget gap, and the judiciary would have 15 months from March onward, to achieve the savings through June 30, 2016.
While the House Appropriations Committee may strip the bill of the language when it approves the budget adjustment act today, the specter of the $500,000 reduction in 2016 is not going away.
Rep. Mitzi Johnson, D-Grand Isle, and chair of Appropriations, has asked the courts to work with community partners to โidentify systemic changes to service delivery to assure timely access to justice and facilitate savings.โ The plan, she says, can include short term savings and efficiencies that could have a longterm impact.
Reiber says in his letter to lawmakers that the courts are willing to consider structural changes that would result in reductions in base spending. The stateโs judicial operations and processes would require a collaboration of all state justice community partners, he wrote, including the Vermont Bar Association, the Vermont Stateโs Attorneys, the Vermont Sheriffs, the Vermont Department of Corrections, the Defender General and the Vermont Department of Children and Families. The judiciary would be willing to work with the Legislature to identify policy and statutory changes that could produce significant reductions in funding.
The courts were reorganized in 2010 to create more efficiencies. At the time, the Vermont Legislature decided not to close remotely located courthouses.
Several individual members of the Vermont Bar Association have written letters to the Legislature and the bar, spurred by concerns about ongoing vacancies on the bench and in the court system.
Frank Kochman, a Burlington lawyer, says in a letter sent to lawmakers that the court doesnโt plan to replace the outgoing manager of the environmental division of the Superior Court, and this will deal a โcrippling blow to the functioning of that court.โ
The three unfilled judicial vacancies that will go โunfilled for an indeterminate timeโ has already led to significant delays for several of Kochmanโs clients, as a result of โthe erosion of judicial efficiency brought on by the scarcity of resources.โ One client has waited 15 months for a hearing after a trial, Kochman said, and in another case it has taken 11 months to get a decision on a motion to limit evidence in a trial.
โThe judiciary should not be a competitor for funds as if it were an executiveรขยยจagency,โ Kochman wrote. โIt is one-third of the Constitutional government. Properly perceived, it is not merely one priority clamoring for attention among others of equal standing. It is a structural priority. Delay and inefficiency in the administration of the courts does more than cause inconvenience or disappointment โ such as, for example, the inconvenience and disappointment caused by a delay in a public worksรขยยจprogram. Rather, untimeliness and inefficiency in the courts undermines confidence in the law itself. As important as the macro-economy is, and as compelling as oneโs concern for the welfare of the body politic as a whole may be, it is case-by-case individual justice that is the hallmark of the common law and the belief in its availability that is the backbone of civil order in a democracy. A failure of individual justice cannot be โmade upโ in later years.โ
CORRECTION: The judiciary budget is $40.9 million, not $31 million for fiscal year 2016, as originally reported.
