Volume 23, No. 5 February 2013 

E-SJI NEWS SJI NEWS

In this Issue 

2nd Quarter Grant 

Applications 

1 

Latest Executive Session Paper 1 

 

 

5th Appellate District of 

CA Streamlines Records Transfer 

2 

NCPJ Revised 

Probate Court 

Standards Available 

3 

Page 1 

SJI received 13 grant applications requesting a total 

of $553,143 for the 2nd quarter of FY 2013. Grant 

applications were received in all three grant types: 

Project Grants, Curriculum Adaptation & Training 

(CAT) Grants, and Technical Assistance (TA) 

Grants. 

SJI Receives FY 2013 2nd Quarter 

Grant Applications 

The SJI Board will meet on April 8, 2013 to finalize 

decisions on quarterly grant awards. SJI Grant funding remains available on a first-come, first-served, 

basis for grant applications that merit funding. 

Deadlines for the remainder of FY 2013 are as follows: 3rd quarter – May 1, 2013; and 4th quarter – 

August 1, 2013. 

The seventh paper of the SJI-supported Executive 

Session for State Court Leaders in the 21st Century is now available. This paper addresses a 

number of challenges and opportunities faced by 

state courts when working with internal and external partners. 

The National Center for State Courts (NCSC) 

Library has served as the official repository for the 

State Justice Institute since 2010. Its former Digital Archive is experiencing a major expansion and 

will now be referred to as the NCSC Library eCollection. This will continue to be the source for all 

SJI final reports and products produced by SJI 

grantees. The eCollection already hosts more than 

300 SJI-supported titles and plans to add another 

75 by June 2013. To search for titles check out 

the eCard Catalog. 

Latest Paper from Executive Session 

for State Court Leaders 

Now Available 

For the latest information 

on SJI projects, grant application deadlines, and 

updates. 

Get social with us by visiting our Facebook page 

and Twitter feed.
E-SJI News Volume 23, No. 5 February 2013 

Page 2 

5th Appellate District of California Streamlines 

Civil Case Records Transfer

Effective Fall of 2012, the California Court of 

Appeals, Fifth Appellate District (5DCA)

began receiving electronic clerk’s transcripts 

for civil cases from all nine of the trial courts 

within its jurisdiction. With an SJI grant 

award (SJI-11-N-151), the Court established 

the Transcript Assembly Program (TAP) for 

all trial courts within its jurisdiction. TAP is a 

software program that automates the trial 

court’s labor intensive process of compiling a 

civil clerk’s transcript and produces an electronic record that can be securely transmitted 

to the appellate court. 

TAP started as a pilot project (SJI-09-T-160) 

between the 5DCA and the Superior Courts of 

Fresno and Stanislaus Counties. The first 

grant enabled the 5DCA and these select 

courts to conduct an assessment and determine 

how to implement the TAP solution in the 

remaining seven trial courts. Using TAP, the 

pilot trial courts reduced their appellate case 

processing workload by approximately 50 

percent, partially offsetting their staffing reductions during this fiscal crisis. “It frees up 

clerks within our trial court’s appellate division to cross train and to work on other projects,” said Stephanie Kennedy, Operations 

Manager for the Superior Court of Stanislaus 

County. “We’ve been able to move some staff 

around to help other areas of the court that 

need backup and assistance, especially during 

these tough fiscal times when we have frozen 

positions within the court.” 

In addition to savings for the trial courts, the 

5DCA no longer receives lengthy, printed 

records that need to be mailed or photocopied. 

“With the push of a button, any size transcript 

can be delivered electronically to our court,” 

said Charlene Ynson, Court Administrator/

Clerk for 5DCA. “Electronic records provide 

the court significant savings. Otherwise we 

could spend thousands of dollars to store, retrieve, and move large records throughout the 

review process.” 

The results of TAP have been outstanding in 

the view of 5DCA and Courts. Since completion of the grant in October 2012, many of the 

trial courts are using this solution to electronically compile and file many other case types 

other than just civil cases. To date, just under 

500 electronic records have been filed 

throughout the jurisdiction. All trial courts are 

filing civil appeals electronically; several are 

filing criminal; in addition to some juvenile 

and dependency cases. The staff time savings 

has been significant for the trial courts. 

The trial courts estimate they save 50 percent 

of staff time using TAP to compile their civil 

transcripts. If the record requires correction, 

they save 100 percent of staff time because 

they no longer have to manually correct paper 

and reassemble, copy, and send – they can just 

make the correction, “re-tap”, and e-transmit 

the record. This results in a significant savings 

of time where multiple volumes are involved. Some trial courts have reported over 

80 percent time savings on dependency cases. 

The 5DCA continues to experience its greatest 

savings in terms of storage. While there has 

been some acclimation to working with an electronic record, court staff do not have to create 

file folders for upwards of 40 or more volumes 

of a record. Therefore, staff no longer has to 

send these records to storage at the end of their 

life cycle and the savings is significant. In a 

cost study recently completed by the 5DCA, a 

savings of 50 percent of staff time is realized 

when they were able to receive and store records electronically. 

The 5DCA and the Superior Courts of Fresno 

and Stanislaus Counties received the 2010-11 

Ralph N. Kleps Collaborative Award for Improvement in the Administration of the Courts 

for the successful deployment of TAP. The SJI 

grant helped support the deployment of TAP to 

the remaining seven trial courts within the 

5DCA’s jurisdiction: Kern, Kings, Madera, 

Mariposa, Merced, Tulare, and Tuolumne. 

The 5DCA hopes to expand the TAP program 

to all case types so it can redirect record storage 

savings into other areas of court operations. 
Page 3 

SJI Board of Directors

Chairman 

James R. Hannah 

Chief Justice 

Supreme Court of Arkansas 

Little Rock, AR 

Vice Chairman 

Daniel J. Becker 

State Court Administrator 

Utah AOC 

Salt Lake City, UT 

Secretary 

Gayle A. Nachtigal 

Judge 

Washington County Circuit Court 

Hillsboro, OR 

Treasurer 

Hernan D. Vera 

President & CEO 

Public Counsel Law Center 

Los Angeles, CA 

Chase T. Rogers 

Chief Justice 

Supreme Court of Connecticut 

Hartford, CT 

David V. Brewer 

Chief Judge 

Oregon Court of Appeals 

Salem, OR 

Jonathan Lippman 

Chief Judge 

New York State Court of Appeals 

New York, NY 

Wilfredo Martinez 

County Judge 

9th Judicial Circuit of Florida 

Orlando, FL 

Marsha J. Rabiteau 

Policy Consultant 

Rabiteau Consulting 

Bloomfield, CT 

John B. Nalbandian 

Partner 

Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP 

Cincinnati, OH 

Isabel Framer 

President 

Language Access Consultants, LLC 

Copley, OH

Jonathan D. Mattiello 

Executive Director 

The State Justice Institute is a federallyfunded, non-profit corporation established by 

federal law in 1984 to improve the quality of 

justice in the state courts. 

E-SJI News Volume 23, No. 5 February 2013 

Revised Probate Court Standards Now Available 

On November 16, 2012, the National College 

of Probate Judges (NCPJ) unanimously 

adopted a set of revised National Probate 

Court Standards made possible through a 

Technical Assistance grant provided by SJI

(SJI-10-T-180) and matching support from the 

Borchard Foundation Center on Law and Aging, the ACTEC Foundation, and the National 

Center for State Courts (NCSC). 

This volume is the product of a two-year effort 

by a Task Force of NCPJ leaders and representatives of the National Association for Court 

Management (NACM) and the American Bar 

Association (ABA) Section on Real Estate, 

Probate, Trust and Estates assisted by staff 

from the NCSC. 

Last month, the final document including the 

revisions to the standards, was endorsed by the 

Conference of Chief Justices. The revision 

effort was undertaken by NCPJ in recognition 

that there have been significant technological, 

legal, policy, procedural, and demographic 

developments that affect the way probate 

courts can and should operate since the early 

1990s, when the original National Probate 

Court Standards were developed (also with 

SJI support). Adding urgency to the need 

generated by these developments is the impact 

that the “Baby Boom” population bulge will 

have on the probate courts. 

The revised Standards are intended to be 

used by individual probate courts and by 

state court systems as: 

A source of ideas for improving the 

quality of justice, the effectiveness of 

operations, and efficient use of resources; 

A basis for requests for needed budgetary support; 

A tool for measuring progress; and 

A template for state standards. 

In addition to setting forth the principles for 

probate court performance, the revised standards address administrative policies, procedures, and practices for probate courts; decedent’s estates; and guardianships and conservatorships for both adults and minors. 

Although the Standards focus on the probate 

court, they are also generally applicable to 

any judge responsible for a probate matter. 

An electronic copy of the revised standards 

may be obtained online through the NCPJ 

and also on the NCSC’s probate court resource 

page. To obtain a printed copy, contact Shelley Rockwell at srockwell@ncsc.org.