Budget deficit raises tensions at local courts.

L.A. Superior Court has become a place of bickering and anxiety -- and none of it involves an actual trial.

The decision to furlough employees for budgetary reasons -- followed four days later by an announcement that they would not be furloughed -- is among the signs of an already overloaded institution that must come to grips with an unprecedented budget shortfall.

"There are tensions around this budget issue," said John Clarke, executive officer of the L.A. Superior Court. "It is driven by our size and our complexity, but it is also driven by the fact that we're talking about addressing a historic budget crisis. In that kind of environment, there will be some uncertainties and some miscommunication that happens,"

But union officials say the, disagreements are rooted in a recent political shift of authority from L.A. to Sacramento and closed-door decision-making.

"The judges of the L.A. Superior Court and John Clarke have a private world here;' said Sandra Stewart, director of special districts division of the Services Employees International Union Local 660, which represents court employees involved in legal processing at the L.A. Superior Court. "They run L.A. like this is their court. It's about control and power. It's a dysfunctional relationship."

The acrimony came to a head after L.A. Superior Court, looking to cut $8.2 million from its current fiscal year budget, announced on April 3 that it would furlough all employees for up to eight days beginning this month. The budget cuts were part of a state directive for courts to cut an additional 1.3 percent from their budgets for fiscal year 2002-2003, which ends June 30.

Furlough backtrack

Union leaders, legislators and consumer attorneys objected to the decision and appealed to the Judicial Council of California's Administrative Office of the Courts -- the entity that administers California's courts.

On April 7, the AOC convinced L.A. Superior Court administrators to scrap furlough plans and go back to the drawing board.

"There's certainly a difference of opinion, a conflict, between the overall goal I repeated and the initial action taken by the L.A. Superior Court," said Ronald George, California Chief Justice and chairman of the Judicial Council. George said. last month that closing courthouses should be a last resort for administrators facing budget cuts.

George added that while L.A.'s administrators and judges have the authority to make budgetary decisions, state officials have the right to step in if their decisions interfere with the right to a fair judicial process.

Among the options now being considered are offering court workers time off without pay and eliminating overtime pay by shortening court hours to the public. The AOC is also considering a loan of $4 million from the state to help out L.A. Superior Court. No decisions have yet been finalized.

Because L.A. is the largest court system in the state, a 1.3 percent cut forced the court to make drastic decisions that smaller courts could avoid. L.A. Superior Court, with an annual budget averaging $600 million, comprises 28 percent of the state's judiciary budget.

The financial crisis has been complicated because L.A. Superior Court just spent $96 million for the recently opened Chatsworth Courthouse and Clarke says the state is now balking at paying the bill. The Chatsworth Courthouse is considered an un-funded man date because its construction was deemed necessary by Superior Court officials to maintain service to the public.

Another complication is a decision three years ago to join 24 separate municipal courts with the L.A. Superior Court system.

"Each of these different courts had not only their own histories and traditions but their own human resource systems, their own software, their own way of doing things," said William MacLaughlin, assistant presiding judge of the L.A. Superior Court. "No other county had anything that comes close to that."

'Growing pains'

In 1998, the state began to manage the bulk of court budgets, shifting the responsibility away from California's counties. As the AOC gradually gained authority over court budgets, the local courts lost some control, said Sen. Joseph Dunn, D-Garden Grove, who is a member of the Senate budget and finance review committee.

Dunn said these "growing pains" have lead to a general mistrust, particularly between the AOC and L.A. Superior Court.

Union officials say much of the conflict over budget decisions arises because the L.A. Superior Court's internal discussions are largely private.

Clarke said an executive committee that includes Presiding Judge Robert Dukes and MacLaughlin, the assistant presiding judge, makes budgetary decisions. The executive committee receives suggestions from the personnel and budget committee, which reviews budget suggestions from all administration department heads throughout the court system.

Meanwhile, administrators in the human resources department negotiate with officials of the two unions representing most of L.A. Superior Court's employees, the SEIU Local 660 and American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) District Council 36, which represents court clerks.

Damian Tryon, business representative for AFSCME District Council 36, said the most recent labor negotiations included representatives from the court's human resources department and William Mitchell, deputy executive officer of administration at L.A. Superior Court. But trying to obtain financial information from any court representative was like "pulling teeth," he said.

"It's a constant source of frustration on our part," Tryon said. "We sit across from reps from HR and it seems as if they have no authority about making the decisions."

Clarke said the court has no obligation to obtain union approval of its decisions. Asked why he wasn't at the labor talks, Clarke said he never participates in those discussions. "We had the right people at the table," he said.

Meanwhile, union leaders are monitoring a bill recently introduced by Sen. Martha Escutia, D-Montebello, that would open up executive committee meetings at local courts to the public.

When the counties ran the courts, everyone knew the budget decisions because they knew the budget situation in the county, said Gloria Ochoa, counsel to the Senate Judiciary Committee. Since the state took control of court budgets, the public discussions take place in Sacramento while local court meetings are kept private.

Ochoa said recent events surrounding L.A.'s furloughing decision could have been avoided with more open discussion about the budget situation.

"That's one of the problems with L.A.," she said. "They made their own decision, they didn't get authorization, they didn't have the reserves to back up their decision and they had to back off of it when the ax came down."