Willful blindness is a method to subconsciously write your own epitaph when the weight of the ignored eventually takes its toll. It also serves as a legal term in which you should have known, you ought to have known but you willfully disregarded all of the signs as they presented themselves. Most everyone who reads this site is involved with the law in one capacity or another. Most of our comments are originated by those that don’t suffer from willful blindness. Many of our legislators suffer from willful blindness which is why little has changed at the judicial council and the AOC.
Attorneys statewide also are suffering from willful blindness when AOC funded local bars spread the word to other attorneys while avoiding glossing over the issues we discuss here openly and candidly.
Nearly every courthouse and county court system from the Oregon border to the Mexican Border is taking an official position of willful blindness while many of the judges in those same courthouses either fall on the “you must be blind and trust leadership” side of the fence which appears to be the prevalent official position or “there is a foul smell emanating from Baghdad by the bay that warrants further attention” which consists largely of those who choose to not be willfully blind. Choosing not to be willfully blind does not necessarily make you a whistleblower but it can go miles into addressing the issues that concern us most. A perfect example of a group that chooses to not be willfully blind can be found in the Alliance of California Judges. But because the fine line of judicial ethics comes into play, these voices are muted from what they really want to say to what they’re permitted to say or suggest within the boundaries of judicial ethics. Even if there were a crook among us caught red-handed, legal ethics precludes them from expressing that conclusion. And herein lies a quandry.
Submitted for your consideration: I submit that those who advocate willful blindness do so not because it is best for the branch but because they fear the truth being known. This represents the judicial council power brokers who out of fear keep re-appointing cronies that will tow the party line to leadership positions. This fear of the truth being known was expressed by Ronald George when he considered a democratically elected judicial council an act of war. And war it is, ladies and gentlemen, make no mistake about it. It is a war for the truth. It is a war to keep our justice system alive. It is a war to preserve your job serving the public. It is a war to restore the dignity of the California courts not through willful blindness but through transparency and accountability.
Years ago we did a post on the The AOC, Enron & Dr. Stanley Milgram that we consider one of the most important articles in assisting you in understanding the magnitude of willful blindness in all of us. Today, Sharon Kramer sent us a link to a speech about willful blindness that is sobering and continues this conversation while being entirely accurate.
Wendy Darling
August 13, 2013
Willful blindness =’s “Speak With One Voice.”
Long live the ACJ.
MaxRebo5
August 13, 2013
Wonderful post! This is exactly what we have going on in CA Courts. Many judges and thousands of trial court employees don’t want to take responsibility for changing the administration at the AOC who are arrogant and self serviing. The AOC leaders are all about their pensions, their friends, their perks, and also their image. In reality they have thrown hundreds of CA Court workers under the bus in the last five years because they pushed for new courthouses instead of recognizing during a massive recession that the branch should have lived within it’s means and maintained what it had. The AOC leaders got billions for buildings which they use now to justify the expansion of AOC staff but that has left no moneyto save the jobs of loyal employees in the trial courts or to keep the small courts around the state open. They also botched the implementation of CCMS and expanded the AOC’s size dramatically for over a decade and these actions have greatly hurt the branch’s reputation because the people of CA can’t afford such mismanagement. The Chief says the branch is being cut unfairly and is being marginalized. Not true entirely. There is blame within the branch for the priorities, the scandals, and values of the Judicial Council. She takes no responsibility for the mistakes made. This Chief (like the last) controls the JC and is resistant to changing it.
Thanks for the link JCW. I hope many other listen to it and think about getting involved and becoming responsible. I wish there were many thousands of court employees and 1000 judges feeling safe enough and informed enough to speak out for a better run CA Courts.
katy
August 13, 2013
Here’s the post from Katy’s Exposure Blog that was sent to JCW “Whistleblowers & Willful Blindness”. It tells a bit about Margaret, her background, etc. TED looks like a good group to support. http://wp.me/lYPz
courtflea
August 13, 2013
willfull blindness = chickenshit. Its contagious.
I personally believe it has been part of the organizational culture of courts for many years, even before the AOC aquired total power. The culprit? Judges being elected rather than appointed. Too worried about keeping their jobs, rather than rocking the boat. Another culprit simply put, ego. Wanting that appointment to the next level: trial court, appellate, supreme court, feds you name it. Or wanting to play with the big boys at the state level. On the one hand, who can blame them. on the other, shame on them.
Wendy Darling
August 13, 2013
Speaking of those who are brave enough to stand up and tell the truth . . . published today, Tuesday, August 13, from the Metropolitan News Enterprise, by Kenneth Ofgang. Judge McCoy, you will be dearly missed.
Former Presiding Judge Charles ‘Tim’ McCoy to Retire
By KENNETH OFGANG, Staff Writer
Former Los Angeles Superior Court Presiding Judge Charles W. “Tim” McCoy told the MetNews yesterday he is retiring.
The jurist, who is on vacation, said he would not be returning to the bench, but will officially retire when he runs out of accrued leave at the end of the month.
“It’s time for me to move on and give other great judges the opportunity to have the great assignments that I have had,” McCoy said. “Serving on the bench has been the highlight of my professional career and I think all of the judges feel that way.”
McCoy, 67, has been a member of the court for more than 20 years. He served as assistant presiding judge in 2007 and 2008, and as presiding judge in 2009 and 2010, and never drew an opponent for either position.
He also served on the state Judicial Council from 2005 to 2008.
The MetNews honored him as “Person of the Year” in 2008.
McCoy is a Washington, D.C. native who graduated from Purdue University in 1968. He then spent four years in the U.S. Marine Corps, earning the rank of captain, and received the Navy Commendation Medal for his service in Vietnam.
He graduated from the University of Texas School of Law in 1975 and was admitted to the State Bar later that year. He joined the Los Angeles office of Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton that year as well, and was at the firm for 17 years, being made a partner in 1982.
He left to become chief deputy and chief of staff to Matthew Fong, with whom he had worked at the firm prior to Fong being named to the State Board of Equalization by then-Gov. Pete Wilson. McCoy left that post when Wilson named him to the Superior Court, which he joined in January 1993.
He received an initial assignment to a felony trial court, and also became immersed in administrative and budget issues, serving on the court’s Executive Committee in 1994 and 1995.
He later moved to a fast-track civil assignment downtown, then became one of the first judges to serve in the complex litigation courts. He went on to serve as supervising judge of complex litigation, and then as supervising judge of the civil departments, before becoming assistant presiding judge.
But his “most rewarding and enjoyable” assignment, he said, was the one that he received after serving as presiding judge—juvenile delinquency.
One of the perks of serving as presiding judge, he explained, is that you can choose your next assignment when you leave office. “I always wanted to do” delinquency cases, he explained.
The juvenile courts do a great job, he explained, as indicated by statistics showing that a majority of those who go through the system will not commit offenses as adults.
What he “did not enjoy,” he said, was “the ever decreasing budget of the court during my time.” He was an outspoken advocate for funding, clashing openly with then-Chief Justice Ronald George in 2010 after McCoy proposed that funds earmarked for construction projects be redirected to trial court operations.
McCoy said at the time that the Judicial Council was risking ”catastrophe” by not redirecting the funds. George told the Los Angeles Times that McCoy was taking a “Chicken Little approach.”
The council overwhelmingly rejected McCoy’s proposal, and hundreds of Superior Court employees were laid off and the rest forced to take furlough days.
The problems have only gotten worse, McCoy noted yesterday, but he said “it’s likely that we’ve hit bottom and the courts will now slolwly recover.” That recovery “is going to take a long time and a lot of patience and I wish ….[Presiding Judge] Dave Wesley..and the chief justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye…my very best.”
McCoy declined to discuss future plans—saying it would be appropriate to do so only after he is officially retired—other than to say he was looking forward to spending more time with his six grandchildren.
http://www.metnews.com/
Long live the ACJ.
sharonkramer
August 14, 2013
Seems like what could help immensely is if a retired judge would write a tell all book, preferably before the upcoming mid-term elections.
unionman575
August 14, 2013
http://www.pe.com/local-news/riverside-county/menifee/menifee-headlines/20130814-menifee-city-selected-as-preferred-site-for-new-courthouse.ece
MENIFEE: City selected as ‘preferred’ site for new courthouse
A state subcommittee has picked Menifee to be the preferred site for a new courthouse to replace an aging facility in Hemet, above.
BY TOM SHERIDAN
Published: August 14, 2013; 06:58 PM
A subcommittee charged with finding a replacement for the Hemet courthouse has recommended a Menifee location as the preferred site, according to state officials.
The Judicial Council of California’s Administrative Office of the Courts announced
Wednesday, Aug. 14, that a parcel near Haun and Newport roads is its first choice as the site for a new courthouse to replace the aging facility in Hemet.
“As the mayor of Menifee, I was kind of hoping that was what their decision would be,” said Scott Mann.
The choice, however, was not good news for Hemet, which had worked to retain the facility.
“My reaction is sheer disappointment,” said Hemet Councilwoman Linda Krupa. “That’s devastating.”
Krupa said she had been led to believe that the prospective site in Hemet — between Devonshire and Oakland avenues, north of the Simpson Senior Center — had a good chance to be selected.
The current Superior Court of California, County of Riverside courthouse in the region is located at 880 North State Street. It was built in 1969 and is slated to shutter its doors when the new courthouse is completed.
“The AOC has their way of doing things,” Krupa said. “I do not agree with the decision at all.”
AOC Spokeswoman Keby Boyer said negotiations with the Menifee landowner are underway, but a final decision will not be made by the State Public Works Board until early 2014.
“Hemet is very strongly in the running as an alternative site,” Boyer said.
Mann touted the Menifee location – just west of Interstate 215 — for its ease of access and logistical advantages. He admitted he thought it would come down to a choice between Menifee and Hemet.
“It was 50-50, touch and go,” Mann said.
According to Boyer, advantages of the Menifee site also included being situated in the county’s growing population center, its central location in the court’s coverage area. The landowner, Boyer wrote, has also expressed a willingness to donate the land.
In the meantime, Boyer said the AOC will continue to research the alternative sites.
“If there are no glitches, they’re planning to be finished (with their investigations) by the end of the year,” Boyer said.
Krupa acknowledged that Hemet will continue to press its case until a final decision is made.
“So long as they haven’t put pen to paper, we’re still in the ballgame,” she said.
Lando
August 15, 2013
I am looking forward to my impending retirement. It will give me a chance to commit substantial time to organizing recall campaigns against HRH-2 and her enforcer J Hull and to write and speak about the tyranny of unelected government . The erosion of our democracy is something I have watched and been concerned about for years. The evolution of the California Judicial Council and AOC along with the CJP and their respective abuses need to be brought to light. We have lost sight of the fact that judges are constitutional officers elected by the public they serve. The Judicial Council has no constitutional authority to dictate to and manage the trial courts of this state. The AOC a creation of the Judicial Council represents all the worst of an out of control bureaucracy. The book I plan to write will be fair and objective and will hopefully form the basis of a campaign to rebalance and reform the governance structure of the judicial branch.
Wendy Darling
August 15, 2013
Well, the current state of judicial branch administration shouldn’t come as any surprise, considering Hull replaced Huffman, who was the enforcer for Ron George, and HRH-2 is just Ron George in a skirt.
Demonstrating, once again, that the more things “change” at 455 Golden Gate Avenue, the more things just really stay the same.
Long live the ACJ.
The OBT
August 15, 2013
I will be right there with you Lando. Please add Justice McConnell to your recall list. There is a wealth of material available to present to the voters about the JC, AOC and all the huge amounts of taxpayer money they have wasted.
Agent 99
August 15, 2013
Lando, I’m with you too with plenty of behind the scenes truths about the abuses of power within the judiciary. The story needs to be told again and again in as many different forums as possible.
JusticeCalifornia
August 15, 2013
A novel way to wake people up to public corruption.
http://www.nbcsandiego.com/news/local/Charter-Loophole-Could-Oust-Mayor–219809701.html
The OBT
August 15, 2013
Justice California, great you are back ! I have missed your compelling insights .
Delilah
August 16, 2013
I second OBT’s emotion! It’s great to see you back, JusticeCA.
Also, lately I’ve been missing wearyant. Shout out.
Wendy Darling
August 16, 2013
The stink of CCMS continues to waft over Sacramento. Published today, Friday, August 16, from The Sacramento Bee, by Dan Walters:
Dan Walters: Time to improve California’s spotty record of overseeing big projects
By Dan Walters
Published: Friday, Aug. 16, 2013 – 12:00 am | Page 3A
Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg’s personal investigative staff issued a scathing report this week on a new state payroll system that so far has cost a quarter-billion dollars, but remains inoperable.
The Senate Office of Oversight and Outcomes report used uncommonly harsh language to describe the debacle.
“Unlike other big state computer failures, the 21st Century Project collapsed not once, but twice, despite multiple layers of oversight designed to spot trouble early and keep the complex and massive undertaking on track,” it said.
“A review of hundreds of pages of documents and interviews with many of those involved show the project suffered from lapses in due diligence, a failure to resolve core issues raised early and often, chronic turnover in leadership and what may have been unrealistic expectations.”
The report basically accuses Controller John Chiang’s office of misleading the Legislature and the public. Chiang finally canceled the project.
Singling out Chiang’s project for very critical verbiage, plus a lengthy hearing in the Senate Thursday, may have been political payback for Chiang’s decision two years ago to cut off legislators’ salaries because of a late state budget – an act that made him very unpopular in the Capitol.
Payback or not, the report is damning – but just as easily could have been written about a number of other very expensive, just-as-flawed exercises in upgrading the state’s digital tools.
The list of technology projects-gone-bad is very long. Recently, to cite another example, the State Judicial Council pulled the plug on a failed project to create a statewide court case management system that had cost hundreds of millions of dollars.
One of the great mysteries of California is why the home of the globe’s most brilliant technology innovators has failed so miserably to digitize state government functions.
While we may shake our heads in amazement or disgust at such waste, it’s a vitally important issue.
First, the state must upgrade its obsolescent, often incompatible computer systems because operating with them is becoming increasingly difficult.
More importantly, however, the abject inability of officials to implement technology is indicative of a broader deficiency in the management and delivery of big public projects.
There is an indirect, but unmistakable, relationship between costly and dysfunctional computer projects and, for instance, the Bay Bridge project, which has cost five times its original estimate, is a decade late and has serious defects.
And with other big projects in the works, such as twin water tunnels and a bullet train, improving managerial competence should be the first order of business before we waste even more billions of taxpayers’ hard-earned dollars.
http://www.sacbee.com/2013/08/16/5655294/dan-walters-time-to-improve-californias.html
Long live the ACJ.
unionman575
August 16, 2013
Wow!
😉
R. Campomadera
August 16, 2013
Dan Walters says “…improving managerial competence should be the first order of business before we waste even more billions of taxpayers’ hard-earned dollars.”
Right on. If the State Controller has wasted $250 Million on a computer system that doesn’t work, and that points to a lack of “managerial competence”, what does the Judiciary’s wasting more than double that on CCMS say about its management ranks?
Wendy Darling
August 16, 2013
Speaking of managerial incompetence. Published today, Friday, August 16, from Courthouse News Service, by Maria Dinzeo. Lunch was catered in:
Union Gripes Trail Court Budget Meeting
By MARIA DINZEO
SAN FRANCISCO (CN) – A budget meeting for California’s courts on Wednesday was trailed by complaints from union representatives saying they did not receive timely notice and were shut out of the proceedings when an audio system failed.
Legislative staffers were also cut off when the audiocast went down due to an unexplained “system failure.”
While the Administrative Office of the Courts set up a conference line for a few committee members, there were not enough lines for the legislative aides and labor reps who wanted to hear how big chunks of the courts’ budget are being divided.
“We have a vested interest in trial court funding; how the funds get distributed and what purposes they are establishing priorities around,” Michelle Castro with the Service Employees International Union said in an interview. “We’re at a very critical juncture in the trial courts. We are going through extreme amounts of cuts on the backs of court workers.”
The advisory committee for trial court budgets approved roughly $72 million for programs supporting the trial courts and technology projects. The allocations included $18 million to maintain interim versions of the now-defunct Court Case Management System and the Arizona server that hosts it.
An additional $6.9 million request to update the network infrastructure for several courts was deferred until October, along with a $600,000 request from Orange County Superior Court to upgrade its telecommunications network.
“We are all going to be relying more and more on technology but we have to approach these things with care and caution, and make sure these types of expenses are what we should be doing,” said committee member and Santa Clara head clerk David Yamasaki.
Earlier this year, the Legislature approved $60 million in additional funding for the trial courts, with specific instructions that it be spent on keeping courthouses open and saving court jobs. The union representatives and legislative staffers wanted to listen in on Wednesday’s discussion to see if those instructions were being followed.
Libby Sanchez, a lobbyist for the Laborers’ International Union of North America, reported in a letter to the committee that ten new layoffs had taken place in Riverside County since the extra $60 million was given to the courts by the Legislature, and one of its courts had closed for two work days.
“Our big issue is the Legislature said this $60 million was directly supposed to go to making sure the court doors were open. Is that really happening?” Sanchez said. “We can’t wrap our head around the fact that, with the funding we got, why there still has to be layoffs and a two-day court closure in Blythe.”
“If it’s not being allocated appropriately to ensure what the Legislature intended, that’s our problem. That’s why we’re concerned,” she added. “That’s why we were frustrated this meeting wasn’t really a public meeting.”
During Wednesday’s committee meeting, which was open to any members of the press who made their way to the court administrative office headquarters in downtown San Francisco, judges and bureaucrats grappled with a list of funding needs to present to lawmakers in budget proposals for fiscal year 2014-15.
A survey among the state’s 58 trial courts, discussed at the meeting, shows that employee benefit increases are a top priority for courts. The committee agreed to recommend that California’s court rule-making body, the Judicial Council, pursue those benefits with the Legislature.
Castro from the SEIU called the focus on workers “refreshing,” but was skeptical.
“At the end of day the money doesn’t get passed down to the employees. Our members have picked up a lot of the increased costs of employee benefits. When they ask for money for employees it should be used for that, and that hasn’t always been the case,” she said.
Wednesday’s slices of budget came from two major funds, the Trial Court Trust Fund and the Improvement and Modernization Fund, which AOC finance director Zlatko Theodorovic warned will soon be in the red.
“This fund has an imbalance. It spends more than the revenues that come in,” he said. “So we’re going to have some difficult decisions to make for the 14-15 fiscal year,” he said.
He also noted that most of the allocations remained unchanged or were reduced from last year.
But technology issues dogged the session, both the large amount necessary to sustain an outdated case management system abandoned after costing California a half-billion dollars — and the collapse of the system for broadcasting audio through the AOC’s website along with a simultaneous streaming transcript.
That failure exacerbated what Castro said was inadequate notice.
“We found out the day before and went online and looked at the agenda and saw they were talking about fiscal year 2014-15 priorities, the distribution of funding and their allocation methodology,” she said. “We’re trying to be informed. They allege they’re trying to be inclusive. But when we’re not afforded that opportunity to participate, it’s really frustrating.”
The breakdown could not have come at worse time for the AOC and Judicial Council.
In this year’s budget bill, lawmakers allocated extra money for the courts on condition that all meetings held by the Judicial Council’s plethora of committees, subcommittees, working groups, advisory groups and task forces be open to the public. The council was also supposed to work it out so that those who could not attend in person could still hear the discussions.
Governor Jerry Brown blue-penciled, or vetoed, the open-meeting requirement after Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye lobbied against it. She said at the time that she planned to open more meetings in the coming year.
According to current Judicial Council rules, any committee meeting can be opened at the discretion of the committee chair. But that prerogative is rarely exercised.
“The Chief Justice said the whole purpose of making the advisory committee open to the public was to make sure the public was able to be more participatory in the process,” Sanchez noted.
The union representatives also argued that the timing of the budget meeting made it difficult to attend in person.
“It’s right in the middle of the legislative workweek and is a big hearing day for some people,” said Castro. “Staff and lobbyists were not able to participate in person, but at minimum people were thinking they could listen in and be informed on what the discussion is,” she said.
She noted that the technology for setting up conference calls is very common and easily arranged.
“Some are frustrated for the fact they couldn’t set up a conference line and I found that pretty surprising,” she added. “I have been in state Department of Education calls where there are literally hundreds of people on the call. So there’s a way to control those calls so big calls aren’t a free for all. It’s so surprising the AOC can’t do the same.”
An AOC spokesperson explained through email that the meeting could not wait.
“We set it up to accommodate the schedule of the presiding judges and court executives who would be making the recommendations,” said spokesperson Peter Allen. “This had to be done quickly, as committee members had to get their recommendations to the Judicial Council before the council meeting next week.”
“Unfortunately, the low-cost vendor we have for streaming live video made technical changes in its product and couldn’t provide a reliable signal. Staff discovered the problem during routine testing the afternoon before the meeting,” Allen added. “The meeting room could not accommodate a listening-in line. We had no time to set up something different.”
The full Judicial Council is set to review the committee’s recommendations next week, but the audio system failure makes it unlikely the meeting will be broadcast.
http://www.courthousenews.com/2013/08/15/60336.htm
Long live the ACJ.
wearyant
August 16, 2013
“Unfortunately, the low-cost vendor we have for streaming live video made technical changes in its product and couldn’t provide a reliable signal … ”
More proof the beleaguered nitwits at the AOC simply can NOT handle anything digital, electronic — or within the construction industry, for that matter. They should stick solely to their “bureaucrating.” Anything worth doing should be done right — stick with official court reporters. Where was this streaming live video coming from — Phoenix AZ, the new land of billV and ronO?
Hey, back at ya, Delilah. The excellent posts here have kept me mum, a recent one of yours included 🙂 I’m in lurk/pounce mode …
unionman575
August 17, 2013
http://www.lao.ca.gov/reports/2013/supp_report/Supplemental-Report-1314.pdf
Legislative, Judicial, and Executive
Item 0250-101-0932—Judicial Branch
1. Open Working Groups. Not later than January 1, 2014, the Judicial Council shall
submit to the Joint Legislative Budget Committee a report on the implementation
of an open meetings rule in accordance with the following:
(a) The rule shall apply to any committee, subcommittee, advisory group,
working group, task force, or similar multimember body that reviews issues
and reports to the Judicial Council.
(b) The rule shall provide for telephone access for requesting persons.
(c) The rule shall establish public notice requirements for any meeting of a body
described above.
For each fiscal year beginning with 2014-15, the report shall include the rule for
that fiscal year and specific detail on amendments to the rule adopted in the prior
fiscal year.
😉
Michael Paul
August 17, 2013
Since the AOC has multi-member bodies that reviews issues and reports to the council (such as conducting studies and the like) I’m looking forward to some anemic implementation where everyone can say they did their job.
unionman575
August 17, 2013
wearyant
August 17, 2013
Regarding that self-serving comment from the crystal palace in San Francisco about utilizing a “low-cost vendor” …
Hundreds of tax-paying citizens who were interested in the recent budget meeting had to be disappointed when the audio system choked. Once again the AOC bureaucrats preferred to save a buck in their streaming choice for the folks, thus delivering poor service — AGAIN. Are these bureaucrats familiar with the term “personal responsibility”? Will they ever — EVER — admit what they chose was wrong?
What about their choice for their highest class digs in beautiful SF? The SEC advised a move to Sacramento. Anyone seeing that happening anytime soon? And don’t the top dogs at the AOC get their retirement fully furnished with public funds? You’d think with those high salaries those people “earn” they could afford to fund their own retirement. Also, isn’t it true these lavishly paid elitists also have new luxury cars provided via public funds? It is said that one woman once refused one of those cars because the color offended her and she was instantly provided a replacement of her choice. Interestingly enough, this was the woman with the huge ego who plowed ahead with CCMS in the face of credible warnings to stop and ended up wasting a half a billion dollars of taxpayer dollars. And it took an act of the legislature to stop money from flowing to her misguided CCMS program.
Only the best for the elitist bureaucrats; low-cost resources for the hundreds of citizens interested in the California justice system.
Once again, filet mignon and lobster for the AOC bureaucrats; hot dogs for the folks funding their choices. Now the tax-paying citizens can’t even get into a courtroom. What kind of access to justice is that? Get that insipid motto off of their business cards, letterhead and walls of the crystal palace — “Serving the courts for the benefit of all Californians.” Wendy Darling has it right: Serving themselves at the expense of all Californians.
unionman575
August 17, 2013
“Once again, filet mignon and lobster for the AOC bureaucrats; hot dogs for the folks funding their choices.”
All the unemployed CA Trial Court workers can’t even afford hot dogs.
wearyant
August 17, 2013
You’re so right, Unionman575. I was thinking, they’d be thrilled to have a hot dog — and maybe some more for their families they’re trying to provide for. I’d love to see an AOC bureaucrat dumped per 10 trial court employees returned to work! More bang for our buck. By that formula, dump 100 AOC bureaucrats and return 1,000 valued trial court workers to our courts! This is not sarcasm. It is doable. Hear that, fat cats?
R. Campomadera
August 17, 2013
No, W, the JC/AOC fat cats won’t hear it, because in addition to “willful blindness”, they suffer from an equally noxious condition: willful deafness. The unions, the media, and the public be damned…we won’t hear you…now go away or we shall taunt you a second time.
wearyant
August 17, 2013
From “One Legal Blog” …
http://community.onelegal.com/bid/101030/California-s-Smallest-Courts-Have-Taken-Brunt-of-Budget-Cuts
courtflea
August 17, 2013
same old same old shit excuses: we could not wait, it has to be done quickly and now. BS I tell ya, BS. Why did this committee wait until the last minute to discuss such important issues? same old bullshit.
unionman575
August 18, 2013
http://www.sierrawave.net/26028/state-budget-cuts/
State budget cuts limit Inyo court services
By News Staff on August 17, 2013 in Gov
NOTICE OF CHANGE OF SUPERIOR COURT OF CALIFORNIA, COUNTY OF INYO TELEPHONE AND COUNTER/OFFICE HOURS
EFFECTIVE OCTOBER 17, 2013 (PRESS RELEASE)
Due to severe, permanent budget reductions and a reduced work force, the Superior Court of California, County of Inyo will decrease available hours of public counter/in-person access as well hours for public phone calls. Through attrition, the court clerks’ office staff will be reduced by 40% as of December 2013, with no replacement staff being hired due to fiscal constraints. However, the number of filings that the court has received has remained constant. These permanent service reductions, described are necessary for the Court to continue to provide continued and effective court operations amidst the fiscal crisis that was imposed upon the Judicial Branch. The adjustment of office and telephone hours will allow staff to eliminate backlog that has accrued in multiple areas of the court and give necessary time to process paperwork. Therefore, we regret to inform the public that access to the Superior Court of California, County of Inyo will be limited as follows as of October 17, 2013:
TRAFFIC AND PHONE CALLS. Traffic calls will be answered in the afternoon only, between the hours of 1-4 pm. A message will greet court users who call in at alternate times directing them as to when to call back, or how to access the Court via email. Court users will be alerted, in the Court’s call tree, that these reduced telephone hours are due to staffing reductions and court service operational limitations.
COUNTERS. Counters/public will be served from 8:30-12 and 1-4, with the following exceptions:
The counters/clerk offices will be locked from 8-8:30 AM, 12-1 PM, and 4-5 PM when clerks are unavailable. Appropriate signage will be visible to the public.
A document and payment drop box will be provided at all locations to receive documents during the hours that the court is closed to the public. All drop boxes will be checked throughout the day and at 8 AM and 4 PM each court business day. Documents and payments will be received and filed and entered the day they are dropped. However, any document or payment dropped after 4 pm will be received and filed or applied to the account the following court business day.
Department 4 (Bishop) will close their counter from 12 noon to the close of business each and every FRIDAY.
Department 1 and Department 3 (Independence) will close their counters from noon to the close of business each and every WEDNESDAY.
Payments and document processing will be delayed. Payments, traffic school, and citations may take up to 10 business days (from the date received by the citing agency) to enter. Courtesy notices, the court’s phone tree, and the court’s website will reflect an idea of how long processing is taking, which is a frequent question of the public.
Public comments regarding the above action are welcome and may be submitted by mail, fax, or e-mail to:
Tammy L. Grimm, Court Executive Officer
Superior Court of California, County of Inyo
301 W. Line Street
Bishop, CA 93514
HYPERLINK “mailto:tammy.grimm@inyocourt.ca.gov”
😉
NewsViews
August 30, 2013
Reblogged this on News and Views Riverside Superior Court and National Family Law Abuse.