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Thursday, Mar 28, 2024

Court Closures Spark Debate in Legal, Business Circles

“Don’t call them furloughs,” said Northwest District Supervising Judge Richard Kirschner during a recent interview with the Business Journal. Referring to the cost-cutting move of closing all branches of the state’s Superior Court system every third Wednesday of each month, Judge Kirschner was adamant about accurate characterization of the courts’ new schedule. “They’re court closures,” he said. “There’s a distinction. Furloughs mean some employees are given a day off, but the courts stay open.” Either way, for non judicial employees at all of the region’s superior court locations, including Chatsworth, Van Nuys, San Fernando, and Valencia, as well as local attorneys and their clients, the end result is less pay, less convenience and, according to Judge Kirschner, decreased access to the justice. To him, the role of the courts is so vital in all aspects of society, including the economy, that furloughs or complete closures of courthouses one day per month (which began Sept. 16) may actually be more costly in the long run than the amount of money saved in the near term. “That vital role is not furthered by closing the courts,” Judge Kirschner said. Local attorneys agree fewer court days mean less justice, but none were found who said the one-day-per-month closures pose an immediate threat to their practices or their clients’ wellbeing. “Well, first we try to stay out of court in family law as much as possible,” said James Reape, partner at the Reape-Rickett Law Firm in Valencia. “Anyone who enters a courtroom for one of these cases when there’s a sufficient venue alternative for mediation is out of their mind.” But when there is no alternative, Reape’s cases usually go to San Fernando or downtown Los Angeles, because of the fact that the Valencia Courthouse only handles certain types of civil cases, family law not among them. “I guess it’s just part of an economic reality,” he said. “I would definitely say family law was already somewhat underserved, however. There should be a greater level of resources, given the magnitude of the decisions that are being made.” But, just as he has long accepted a lack of money at the courts for his particular practice area, Reape stands ready to now accept cutbacks for court operations overall. “There’s just no money,” he said. “On one hand, one day a month is not a big deal; it’s basically a legal holiday.” But, on the other hand, said Reape, when dealing in the high-stress-filled arena of family law, where issues as extreme as domestic violence and parental abduction of children can occur quickly, there will be tragic individual repercussions. “In the case of domestic violence, a police officer can always get an emergency protective order even when the courts are not open,” he said. “But in the case of abductions, it’s basically a matter of going to court to get a custody ruling after the fact, the next day the court is open.” Quality of review is more important to Reape than quantity of days a court is open. “The problem I see will be in how different bench officers will approach the added pressure and work load,” he said. “It’s already a very, very difficult job, and I just worry about how much time individuals will be able to spend looking at each case before they decide.” Shuttering all but a handful of the most critical operations, the court closures will be treated as holidays for the purposes of scheduling hearings and calculating filing deadlines. Further, there are no plans to have drop boxes for the purpose of filing documents when the courts are closed. Indeed, the recent advent of monthly court closures has already cost law offices on rescheduling. Although he has had to do some rescheduling of court dates – a move that has delayed certain appearances by a matter of months, Reape does not believe there will be a significant overall slowdown in court operations for a while. However, Judge Kirschner said there is an alternative to closing the courts, which will also save money in the short term. He would like to delay some bond-funded construction projects and use that money to end the closures. “The Judicial Council approved the closures; it was their way of addressing the budget crisis,” he said. “(But), it is my hope that the legislature will reexamine the situation and consider diverting a revenue stream that could be used to keep the courts open (five days a week) for the foreseeable future.” SB 1407 is a bond measure passed to finance court construction. “It generates $50 million per year in Los Angeles,” Judge Kirschner said. “We could temporarily divert it from construction to court operations.” Kirschner said he would not want to see any court construction projects cancelled, but, he said, extreme times call for extreme measures. Robert Scott, director of the think tank, the Mulholland Institute, and principal at the Civic Center Group, a Calabasas-based consulting firm, worries about the long-term, cumulative impact of court closures on the local economy. “Justice delayed is justice denied,” Scott said. “We don’t want to see ourselves going back to the era of five-year trial calendars, as we saw in the past.” Scott credits the courts with having responded to problems in the past, by turning around the once-nagging problem of what he and many others saw as a painfully slow court system. “The courts demonstrated a willingness to speed things up,” he said. “That has saved businesses and individuals countless millions. Moving the workload around with furloughs or closures could back things up again.” That, said Scott, would hurt businesses far beyond the just legal profession. “It could have a ripple effect.” But, for at least one probate attorney, that impact will be delayed. “The effect hasn’t been much for us, because probate matters are handled Tuesdays and Thursdays,” said Woodland Hills attorney Gerald Curry. “But, it will start to spill over to affect us as the court’s third-Wednesday work starts to accumulate and spill over into Tuesdays and Thursdays.” Both Curry and Reape are taking a wait-and-see stance on the monthly court closures for the time being.

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