Source: https://judicialcouncilwatcher.com/2014/09/12/hundred-grand-meeting-canceled-this-afternoon/
Timestamp: 2019-04-25 12:38:32+00:00

Document:
Our little bird informed us this afternoon that the senior leadership of the ‘judicial council staff offices’ pooled together their brain cells just enough to release some cranial flatulence. They decided that having everyone travel to hear a consultant speak in Sacramento for one hour was probably not the best use of public funds.
They ordered all travel plans canceled and indicated that said consultant would meet with these managers and supervisors in regional meetings at a later date. Said little bird thanked the influential role that Judicial Council Watcher plays over the money-wasters…. but the real thanks goes to the many little birds that populate the judicial council staff offices who aren’t afraid to make their case to us when their management goes sideways which is an everyday occurrence.
← The one hour judicial council meeting that costs a hundred grand?
JCW deserves a lot of credit for averting a huge waste of taxpayer dollars. The other great story of the week is the closing of the first ever ” regional ” courthouse. It was of course HRH-1’s and Vickrey’s vision to breakdown local county control of the courts at every level so they would have more control. Regional courthouses fit right into their plan. They used Judges like Ira Kaufman to implement their scheme. Kaufman in turn as President of CJA played a major role in diminishing the power of local trial Judges. Now it looks like it didn’t work out too terribly well for King George, Vickrey, or Kaufman. Their vision ? An incredibly expensive “regional” courthouse that is now closed to the public but needs to be maintained at huge taxpayer expense. The ultimate insult to the taxpayers is that Kaufman and the “AOC” or I mean “Judicial Council staff” want another new courthouse built in tiny Plumas County. Hopefully the voters of Plumas County will see through all this and vote Kaufman out of office at the next opportunity.
yes, way to go JCW. Speakin of regional places, are the regional offices of the agency formerly known as the AOC still open now that the “RADS” (with the noteable exception of Mz.. Patel) are long gone? if so, what are all those employees doing? telecommuting? Talk about a big taxpayer expense.
The Court of Appeal for this district yesterday held that a suit against the Judicial Council and the Administrative Office of the Courts was barred because the plaintiff presented her statutory tort claim to the wrong agency.
Div. Five granted a writ of mandate directing entry of summary judgment in favor of the defendants and against Mari Bean, who claimed that she was injured when an elevator malfunctioned at the Foltz Criminal Justice Center in downtown Los Angeles. The defendants moved for summary judgment on the ground that Bean did not present a proper claim within six months of the alleged injury.
Bean presented a claim within the statutory period. But it was sent to the Victims Compensation and Government Claims Board, which handles claims against the state.
The defendants moved for summary judgment on the basis of Government Code §915(c) and (e). They cited §915(e)(4), which requires that a claim against the Judicial Council or the AOC be served by “[d]elivering or mailing it to the Secretariat of the Judicial Council,” but that even if mail or delivery is not accomplished, the presentation requirement is satisfied by actual receipt of the claim by the secretariat.
In support of the motion, the defendants presented the declaration of the AOC administrative coordinator. She explained that she was the employee of the secretariat responsible for logging all claims, summonses and complaints, and other legal process directed at the Judicial Council or the AOC.
She detailed the processes for receiving and logging all such documents, and declared that she reviewed the log and could find no claim on behalf of Mari Bean.
The plaintiff responded that timely mailing to the claims board satisfied the introductory provision of §915(e), providing that a claim is deemed presented “if any of the following apply,” and §915(e)(2), which provides that one of the circumstances in which a claim is deemed to be presented is if it is “actually received at an office of” the claims board.
Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Daniel Buckley denied the summary judgment motion, but Presiding Justice Paul A. Turner, writing yesterday for the Court of Appeal, said it should have been granted.
Turner, reviewing the legislative history, said the clear intent of one of the 2002 amendments to §915 was to require that claims against the Judicial Council and AOC be presented to the secretariat and not to the claims board.
Attorneys on appeal were Sarah L. Overton of Cummings McClory Davis & Acho and Douglas J. Collodel of Sedgwick LLP for the Judicial Council and AOC, and Roger L. Gordon and Vincent Vallin Bennett of Gordon, Edelstein, Krepack, Grant, Felton& Goldstein for the plaintiff.
The case is Judicial Council of California v. Superior Court (Bean), 14 S.O.S. 4140.
Just four years after it opened, the Plumas-Sierra regional courthouse in Portola is scheduled to close Nov. 3.
The $4.7 million courthouse, which won several awards for its state-of-the-art design, is a victim of state budget cuts to the judicial branch.
While multiple courthouses have been closed throughout the state over the past four years, Plumas County has now lost three of its four court facilities.
The Greenville court closed in 2012 and Chester’s court was shuttered last year.
All cases in Plumas County will now be processed and heard at the Quincy courthouse.
Budget cuts will mean reduced court hours at the Quincy courthouse as well. Beginning Nov. 3, the court will be open from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. Phones will be answered from 8:30 a.m. to 3 p.m.
Norrie said no jobs would be lost due to the closure. The Portola clerk will be moving to the Quincy courthouse.
Norrie said judges have made calendar changes scheduled to be announced soon. The changes “will allow everyone to have their time before the court,” she added.
The Portola courthouse is owned and managed by the judicial branch, not the county. “They will maintain the building and make decisions on how it might be used, or not used, in the interim,” Norrie said.
The Plumas-Sierra courthouse in Portola was the first multi-jurisdictional courthouse in the state.
Rather than constructing a traditional-looking courthouse, the architects (Nacht & Lewis of Sacramento) crafted a building that fit into the mountain community setting.
The 6,500-square-foot building won design awards from McGraw-Hill’s California Construction Magazine and the Distinguished Project Award from the Western Council of Construction Consumers, among others.
When it opened in June 2010, the courthouse held court at least four days per month and employed two clerks.
Today it has one clerk and holds court one just one day per month.
After Nov. 3, all of the Sierra County cases will be processed at the Downieville courthouse.
Anyone who has questions may call the Plumas court at 283-6263 or the Sierra court at 289-3698.
Instead, members narrowed their focus to the two pro-rata 2014-15 base allocation scenarios.
Adoption of the second scenario means a 2 percent increase for San Diego, San Francisco, Santa Clara, Santa Cruz, Siskiyou, Stanislaus, Tehama, and Tulare counties over the first scenario.
Several brutal years of ongoing budget cuts meant that courts continued to eke by in the first six months of 2014, until approval of a $60 million budget boost in July.
In April, the Judicial Council had directed its staff to submit a finance letter for fiscal year 2014-15 to the state Department of Finance (DOF) requesting $70 million from the General Fund to address the shortfall in Trial Court Trust Fund revenues that sustains courts base distribution for operations.
A sharp decline in projected revenues stemming from the decline in paid, initial paper civil filings, as well as court operations evaluation on criminal convictions, primarily caused the shortfall.
In May, Gov. Jerry Brown revised the proposal to provide $30.9 million to backfill the impending loss of revenue leaving the courts with an expected $22.7 million deficit.
During its July meeting , after considering the four recommendations of the TCBAC, the Judicial Counsel decided against addressing the projected $22.7 million shortfall. The council instead will send the DOF a request at the end of September to address any deficiencies.
Also during its July meeting, the Judicial Counsel decided how it would allocate the $22.7 million shortfall with the option exercised today to have the TCBAC propose a different allocation method for consideration during its October meeting.
The results of today’s decision means that the Judicial Council will proceed with its adopted allocation method, based on a pro rata share of the 2014-2015 base allocation, minus individual court’s 2011-2012 non-sheriff security allocation.
In unanimously agreeing not to develop a policy on how to allocate funding reductions in the future, the TCBAC found that its members should be able to consider the unique circumstances and the type of reduction involved.
No one addressed the only comment from the public because someone submitted it in writing five minutes before the meeting started.
The meeting was only the second afforded public access after Gov. Brown axed a provision initiated by the state Legislature earlier this year to open up all of the council’s advisory committee and subcommittee meetings.
The only thing that is transparent is pleas for cash. Maybe the state legislature will take up the open meeting every year until any governor signs it.
Critics of the state’s courts plan to march to the California Judicial Council on Friday to protests lax oversight of a system they say is broken.
Organizers argue that many Californians are being “denied lawyers, court reporters, and effective relief from biased judges and corrupt branch officials,” and little is being done to change the status quo.
Representatives from the Center for Judicial Excellence and California Protective Parents Association, who organized the event jointly, are expected to be joined by lawyers and advocates at the event to speak out against their claims of judicial wrongdoing. This is planned for outside the State Building across from Civic Center Plaza.
The rally starts at noon and will last until 3 p.m. The event will include a “Wall of Shame” listing the alleged wrongdoings.
The Judicial Council’s headquarters is 350 McAllister St.
More information on the rally can be found at http://www.centerforjudicailexcellence.org.
The state’s judicial council, headed by Chief Justice Tani Gorre Cantil-Sakauye, implements policy for all the state’s courts, from superior courts up to the Supreme Court.
We were told to go to the Judicial Council, we are going to the Judicial Council.

References: §915
 §915
 §915
 §915
 §915
 v.