LFO Analyst: LaMonte

The Council on Court Procedures is responsible for reviewing the laws on civil procedure. The 23-member Council consists of judges, attorneys and a public member. At the beginning of each legislative session, the Council submits a report to the Legislative Assembly to recommend any necessary statutory changes.

The 1993 Legislature changed the funding for the Council to include up to $8,000 from the Oregon State Bar as travel reimbursement for Council members.

Staff for the Council consists of two part-time positions. The General Fund supports staff salaries, general office expenses and state government charges. The University of Oregon provides workspace for the Council's executive assistant.

The Governor's recommended budget funded the Council at the current service level, which was $6,426 above the 1997-99 estimate. The primary reasons for the increase were salaries and wages, general inflation and increased Public Employee Retirement System and state government service charges. The budget included Other Funds support from the State Bar for travel and meeting expense.

The legislatively adopted budget is $5,481 above the 1997-99 estimate and reflects increases for general inflation, salaries and benefits, and state government service charges. The legislature funded the Council at the current service level, but reduced the inflation adjustment to the $8,000 travel contribution from the Oregon State Bar.

LFO Analyst: LaMonte

The Judicial Department consists of the Supreme Court, Office of the State Court Administrator, the Court of Appeals, the Tax Court and circuit courts. District courts were abolished effective January 15, 1998 and circuit courts assumed jurisdiction for all state trial court functions. The Department is responsible for providing legal counsel to indigent persons at the trial court level and shares the responsibility with the State Public Defender at the appellate level. The Department also is responsible for providing court interpreters, for the cost of trial and grand jurors, and for administration of the Citizen Review Board.

The Appellate Courts and Administrative Operations program includes the Oregon Supreme Court, the Court of Appeals, the Tax Court, and the Office of the State Court Administrator. The Chief Justice is responsible for the administration of the Judicial Branch of Government. The Supreme Court consists of 7 justices elected to serve 6-year terms. The Court of Appeals consists of 10 judges who hear appeals from trial courts, agencies, and boards. Currently, there is one Tax Court judge who hears matters arising from Oregon tax law. Effective September 1, 1997 a Tax Magistrate Division was created, to replace the informal administrative tax appeals process conducted by the Department of Revenue. In 1999-01, the Tax Magistrate Division will have six magistrates.

The State Court Administrator serves under the direction of the Chief Justice. The State Court Administrator is responsible for certain centralized functions of the Oregon courts system, including legal counsel, internal audit, judicial and staff education, information systems, budget and finance, trial court program statistics, and personnel management. Administration of the Indigent Defense Program, education and training for Citizens Review Boards, and the Supreme Court library are also funded within the Office.

1999-01 estimates of Other Funds revenue include the sale and distribution of court publications ($1.4 million); fees charged for public access to the Oregon Judicial Information Network ($881,678); fees charged for the interpreter and short hand reporter certification programs ($250,076); and grants from the Children's Services Division of the Department of Human Resources for the Citizen Review Board ($719,611). Federal Funds are used for assessments of state foster care and adoption laws and judicial processes (306,977), and for the Klamath Falls Drug Court ($307,392).

The number of cases filed in the Court of Appeals for 1998 is projected to decrease by an estimated 225 cases over 1997. The 1998 filings are projected to be 4,407 compared to 4,632 for 1997. The Tax Magistrate Division had 3,347 cases filed in its first full year of operation. The number of cases submitted to the Supreme Court has remained stable over the last two calendar years. However, mandatory direct review cases have increased significantly and were 52% of 1997-98 case filings. Court of Appeals case terminations increased 16% in 1997.

The State Court Administrator and support staff continue with efforts to streamline and modernize court operations through ongoing implementation of improvements in automation and processes. Efforts include implementation of a data warehouse to enable staff and the public to query court data, development of a departmental website, and the reactivation of the Justice 2020 Committee to establish system-wide goals for the delivery of justice services and update the vision for the state court system. Other efforts include development of a uniform sentencing judgment and courtwide case calendaring system.

The Governor's budget funded the agency at $3.9 million above the estimated current service level, and did not specifically fund any of the Chief Justice's packages. Current service level adjustments included implementation of the Tax Court Magistrate Division, and changes in compensation and inflationary adjustments in services and supplies.

The Chief Justice budget included maintenance packages to fund appellate clerks, technology, staff in the Office of the State Court Administrator, and other areas, which were not specifically addressed in the Governor's Budget.

In the analysis of the Governor's budget, the Chief Justice budget request and new FTE associated with these packages were not allocated to specific operations program areas, but instead were centrally allocated in the Trial Court Operations budget.

At the request of the Department, based on legislative directions to centrally manage budget allocations, legislatively adopted adjustments to the Judicial Department operating budget were allocated to the Appellate and Administrative Operations program. The Department intends to distribute these adjustments to the appropriate program areas during the budget implementation process.

The legislatively adopted budget is an increase of $13.4 million General Fund and 49.64 FTE compared to 1997-99 estimated expenditures. The adjustments include:

• over $3.4 million in current service level rollup costs, including compensation and inflation adjustments and Emergency Board actions;
• $6.3 million in funding for technology, Adoption and Safe Families Act, workload and facilities;
• $3.7 million in Emergency Board appropriations for family and drug courts, workload, technology incentives and pro-tem judge support;
• $200,000 to implement a statewide interpreter certification program for administrative and judicial proceedings; and
• $100,000 to support a Public Defender Commission to evaluate the delivery of public defense services in Oregon and make recommendations to the next legislature.

Budget notes direct the Department to:

• prioritize planned expenditures;
• work with other public safety agencies on the Public Safety Data Warehouse Project;
• develop a plan for the statewide implementation of family and drug courts;
• provide centralized management and review of position and FTE allocations;
• establish a fee structure for electronic data that recovers costs from businesses that use the services; and
• develop a long-range technology improvement plan.

Emergency Board appropriations are contingent on reports related to these budget notes.

The legislatively adopted budget also increases Other and Federal Funds $474,025 compared to 1997-99 estimates, primarily as a result of the rollup of fee-supported costs for the Supreme Court Law Library.

Trial Court Operations includes the funding and operations of all state trial courts, which effective in 1998, are the circuit courts. The program also includes staff to verify the indigency of applicants for representation at state expense. There are circuit courts in each of the 36 counties, served by 163 judges. These courts adjudicate matters and disputes in criminal, civil, domestic relations, traffic, juvenile, small claims, violations, abuse prevention act, probate, mental commitments, adoption, and guardianship cases.

The division receives Other Funds from indigent defense recoveries ($1.4 million), and from Multnomah County delinquent parking ($577,153). Compensatory fines and restitution are also collected by the courts and held in trust prior to disbursement to individual victims. These funds are not accounted for in the budget. The program is estimated to receive approximately $128.7 million in filing fees, fines, costs and assessments, and other revenues that are disbursed to the General Fund and cities, counties and various agencies.

Case filings in 1997 increased 47,671 (8%) compared to 1996. Over the past three years, filings have increased at rates in excess of 5 percent per year, which adds significantly to the workload of the agency. The trend in cases filed per judge has increased from a low of 3,582 in 1994 to 3,893 in 1997. However, due to additional judgeships that have been created, total cases filed per judge have decreased from a peak of 4,342 in 1991 to the 1997 level of 3,893.

The Judicial Department's overall revenue projections for 1997-99 are expected to increase by 17.8 percent over 1995-97 (from $111.1 million to $130.9 million). Primary reasons for the increase are efforts of the Department to identify and refer past due collections to the Department of Revenue and the Department of Revenue's success in collecting on money owed the Department. Most Judicial Department revenues collected are transferred to other entitles, with 38.54 percent being transferred to the General Fund.

There is increasing need to use technology for case management to increase productivity of limited support staff. A key component of the budget is funding to support existing and expanded technology to ensure adequate resources are available for effective operations. The Court system has also been active in developing new methodologies for resolving disputes, including alternative dispute resolution programs, family law courts, drug courts, and improvements in the jury system and use of interpreters.

The 1997 Legislature created three new judgeships effective January 1, 1999 for Polk, Marion and Multnomah Counties. The 1999-01 roll-up cost for these new judgeships is approximately $1.8 million. The legislature did not adopt the recommendation of the Joint Bench/Bar Committee on New Judgeships on the creation of 16 new judges and 2 pro-tem judges for 1999-01. The estimated cost of adding these new judges and pro-tem judges and support staff was $13.6 million for a full biennium. As noted above, the Chief Justice was instead requested to develop a prioritized listing for the use of pro-tem judgeships and to request funding from the Emergency Board.

The Chief Justice's agency operations budget request included:

• $38 million and 264.77 FTE to fund 16 new judges, 2 new pro-tem judges, juvenile justice, family law, facilities and technology;
• $9.7 and 111 FTE for the Quality Workforce package that added staff to improve court service delivery;
• $3.15 million and 33.5 FTE for the Access to Justice package that adds foreign language interpreters and translation services and staffing for the Access to Justice for All Committee;
• $2.8 million and 29 FTE for the Family Law/Juvenile Justice packages to fund federal Adoption and Safe Families Act requirements, fund alternative dispute resolution efforts, staff existing family courts and expand the family court program;
• $8.2 and 25.8 FTE for court related technology, including new equipment and programming to improve the existing OJIN system, improved public safety system linkages, and expansion into new areas such as Internet and data warehouse efforts;
• $2 million for the Vision 2020 Enterprise account, to provide a flexible funding source to enable the Chief Justice to fund innovation in the trial courts; and
• $813,315 and 1 FTE to staff the joint County/Court Facilities Task Force that is developing a long range plan for court facilities.

The Governor's budget proposed an unspecified increase of $3.9 million ($3.5 million General Fund) and 268.61 unfunded FTE above the current service level budget estimate for the Department, and did not specifically fund any of the Chief Justice's budget packages.

The legislatively adopted budget is an increase of $10.2 million and 6.5 FTE above 1997-99 estimated expenditures. The increase is attributable to current service level adjustments for new judgeships, compensation increases, and inflationary adjustments in services and supplies. The budget for Trial Court Operations will be adjusted to reflect budget enhancements approved by the legislature as part of the Judicial Department budget implementation process.

The mandated payments category funds the cost of providing trial and grand jurors, court interpreters, civil appellate transcript costs for indigent persons, and Americans With Disabilities Act accommodation services. Juror payments represent approximately 79 percent of program costs and remain at $10 per day and eight cents per mile. Legislation passed in 1999 (in SB 1304) will increase per diem and mileage rates, at an estimated 2001-03 cost of over $9.6 million.

As of December 1998, expenditures were projected to be approximately $635,000 above budget. These cost increases were primarily due to increased jury costs, minority population growth, increased awareness of the right to access interpreters, and the recently established interpreter certification program. Increased juror cost primarily resulted from the need to summons larger juror pools to comply with the provisions of Senate Bill 936. The January 1999 Emergency Board allocated $633,753 to the Department for these anticipated costs.

The Chief Justice's request included:

• $185,352 to implement the One Day, One Trial jury service plan in Lane County;
• $2.8 million for increases in juror mileage and expense rates. This package required legislation;
• $5.1 million to increase per diem rates. This package required legislation;
• $201,396 to provide certification of interpreters in juvenile delinquency matters.

The Governor's budget funded the program at the current service level, and did not specifically fund any of the Chief Justice's budget packages.

The legislatively adopted budget is an increase of $1.9 million compared to 1997-99 estimated expenditures, primarily as a result of current service level adjustments for increases in the use of jurors and interpreters. Estimated expenditures for 1997-99 do not include the $633,753 Emergency Fund allocation for increased juror costs.

Both the U.S. and Oregon Constitutions guarantee the right to legal representation, at state expense, to indigent persons facing criminal prosecutions. Also, juveniles and adults facing involuntary civil commitment proceedings or proceedings in juvenile court involving allegations of delinquency and child abuse or neglect (including termination of parental rights cases) and other limited civil proceedings are entitled to state paid representation if they are indigent. In addition, indigent persons are entitled to representation at the appellate level. The State Public Defender is responsible for most of the criminal appellate work. However, the Judicial Department is responsible for the costs of all transcripts, and all appellate work that the State Public Defender does not handle, such as child abuse and neglect cases. The State Court Administrator primarily contracts with nonprofit public defenders, law firms, consortia, or individual attorneys to provide services to indigents.

The indigent defense cost increases are primarily due to caseload increases. The primary drivers of caseloads are the levels of resources available to law enforcement, prosecution, juvenile departments, mental health and alcohol/drug treatment, parole and probation services, and jail and prison space. Program funding for 1997-99 was based on an estimated caseload growth of 4.7 percent. The legislature placed an additional $2.0 million in a special purpose Emergency Fund appropriation to cover potential workload growth above that level during the biennium. However, in the first year of the biennium, actual caseload growth was 9.8 percent. In September 1998, the Emergency Board released the Emergency Fund reservation to address workload issues. Primary areas of growth in 1998 include felonies (4,413 cases and 13%), and misdemeanors (3,668 cases and 9%). Juvenile cases of all types are increasing at a rate in excess of 10 percent per year, and termination of parental rights cases have almost doubled since 1995 (from 434 to 855 cases)

Current projections of caseload growth of 4 percent per year during the 1999-01 biennium may be conservative. Also, raw caseload projections do not take into account the increasing complexity of cases arising from new laws and ballot measures. The Department has worked with contractors to implement cost and quality control measures and to establish comparability between service providers and contractors. However, there is statewide pressure to improve the rate of contractor compensation to more closely parallel those of government-funded prosecutors and the State Public Defender, and to increase the hourly rate paid to non-contract attorneys.

The Chief Justice's request included:

• $175,000 to provide counsel in certain guardianship cases;
• $10.1 million to increase the hourly compensation for contract and non-contract attorneys, to provide parity with the State Public Defender and Department of Justice attorney compensation rates; and
• $6.7 million for a contingent reserve in the Indigent Defense Account.

The Governor's budget funded the program at the current service level, and did not specifically fund any of the Chief Justice's budget packages. The Governor's budget was an increase of $24.6 million compared to 1997-99 estimated expenditures, primarily as a result of increased indigent defense cases.

The legislatively adopted budget is an increase of $24.6 million compared to 1997-99 estimated expenditures, primarily as a result of current service level adjustments to fund increased indigent defense cases. Estimated expenditures for 1997-99 do not include the $2 million Emergency Fund reservation that was allocated in September 1998 to fund the increased indigent defense caseload. The 1999 Legislature approved a temporary Public Defender Commission to evaluate the delivery of trial and appellate indigent defense services, including caseloads, compensation and the quality of services, and make recommendations to the 2001 Legislature. This will include evaluation of the pilot indigent defense verification projects in three counties, to be designated by the Chief Justice.

This budgetary division was established in 1997. The division includes General Fund support for enhanced court programs. It includes funding for trial court staff involved in collections, additional court referee and judicial support personnel, and Family Court specialists.

This division is used to separately fund program enhancements. It includes collections efforts that have resulted in an increase of 17.8% in collections, and the workload involved in establishing new Family Courts.

The Governor's budget funded the program at the current service level, and was an increase of $618,458 and 5.25 FTE to 1997-99 estimated expenditures.

The legislatively adopted budget funds the program at the current service level, and is an increase of $618,458 and 5.25 FTE compared to 1997-99 estimated expenditures. The adjustments reflect roll-up costs for the implementation of new programs.

LFO Analyst: LaMonte

The nine-member Commission on Judicial Fitness and Disability reviews and investigates complaints concerning the conduct of Oregon judges. If an initial investigation reveals a judge's conduct may warrant censure, suspension, or removal, the Commission will notify the judge of its intent to issue a formal complaint. Ultimately, a formal hearing is held. If the Commission finds good cause, it will recommend disciplinary action to the Supreme Court.

The budget funds a half-time Executive Director position, meeting expenses, and disciplinary proceeding expense, which generally includes investigator, attorney and court reporter costs. Due to ongoing workload and the cost of contract services, the April 1998 Emergency Board approved the establishment of a .25 FTE clerical support position, The legislatively approved budget includes funding sufficient to conduct two investigations or formal proceedings in each biennium. During the 1993-95 and 1995-97 biennia, an unusual number of complaints required investigation and formal action, resulting in higher than usual expenses.

The Governor's recommended budget funded the Commission at the current service level, which was $10,091 above the 1997-99 estimate. The primary reasons for the increase were general inflation and increased Public Employee Retirement System and state government service charges. The current service level calculation included one-time funding for moving and disciplinary action expenses.

The legislatively adopted budget is a reduction of $13,472 compared to 1997-99 estimated expenditures. The budget was reduced by $46,435 to eliminate one-time funding for disciplinary action and moving expenses. The legislature added funding to provide a $50,000 biennial base for disciplinary actions. The budget was also adjusted for reductions in Department of Administrative Services and Secretary of State audits assessments.

LFO Analyst: LaMonte

The State Public Defender is responsible for providing legal counsel to indigent persons at the appellate court level. The 1991 Legislature established responsibility for appellate representation, which has not been revised. The Public Defender was assigned biennial responsibility to represent defendants in: ten death sentence appeals; all but 204 felony appeals (the 204 have appointments through the Judicial Department Indigent Defense Program); all guilty plea, no contest plea and probation violation appeals; all parole appeals; and up to 318 misdemeanor appeals.

The General Fund supports the agency. The 1997-99 budget included one-time Other Funds revenue from the sale of surplus property. These funds were used for staff development.

The workload is driven by the number of criminal appeals filed by indigents and the legal complexity of the appealed cases. The 1997 Legislature approved an increase in staff and funding based on caseload growth during 1995-97 of 18 percent and projected increases in 1997-99. In addition to the caseload increases, the agency experienced an 11 percent increase in staff-intensive felony trial appeals. Statutory changes and ballot initiatives also affect the number of appeals that are filed.

The agency requested additional staffing in 1999-01 to deal with increased workload. 1997-99 projected caseloads on felony trial appeals were 39 higher than budgeted, felony non-trial appeals were 55 higher than budgeted and misdemeanor and parole appeals were 294 higher than budgeted. The established caseload standard per attorney is 46 felony cases a year and 7 misdemeanors per month. However, the agency has determined that this caseload is unachievable. As a result, the agency estimates that the accepted biennial caseload is 231 cases higher than can be appropriately handled. Reversion of these cases to less experienced counsel appointed by the Judicial Department creates additional workload for the Supreme Court and Court of Appeals, and is not a preferred option. Therefore, additional resources were needed to meet this workload.

The Governor's budget was $287,309 (6.2%) above 1997-99 estimates. The primary reasons for the increase were general inflation, and increases in employee compensation, Public Employee Retirement System costs, and state government service charges. The agency requested $1.4 million and 12.5 FTE in budget packages. The request included additional staff, salary parity for staff attorneys with the Attorney General, and improvements to technology, all focused on meeting additional workload demands. The Governor's budget, however, included only an unspecified increase of $107,138 and 12.5 unfunded FTE.