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1) Re: 2009 Senate Bill 249 (Appropriations: 2009-2010 Judiciary budget )  by Admin003 on June 28, 2009 

 

Rep. McMillin, having reserved the right to explain his protest against the passage of the bill, made the following statement:

“Mr. Speaker and members of the House:

I voted ‘no’ because the spending in this bill does not even meet the ‘Revised House Targets’ of $152M in General Fund expenditure. We have to spend below the Revised House Targets in order to avoid spending to such a degree that we either have to use ‘stimulus money to fill budget holes’ or raise taxes. This bill authorizes spending above the Revised House Target.”

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2) Re: 2009 Senate Bill 249 (Appropriations: 2009-2010 Judiciary budget )  by laryholland on June 26, 2009 

Sanborn states from the Senate Roll 340:
With that being said, I would hope that you would tap into my
experience in that regard. I would have advised him that he could have
reviewed the State Court Administrator’s report that says Macomb County
is 3.8 judges short. So we should not decimate the circuit court by
continuing to further the backlog of cases. We should not jeopardize
the public safety in Macomb County
 
It should be pointed out that most of these judge increases are family court related and that most "public safety" issues of the misdemeanor type are with District Court Judges. If there is a commensurate jump in "felonies" requiring circuit court trial involvement, then there are other issues and solutions to contend with than putting into place more judges.

Government bureaucracy continues to continue at the expense of the taxpayers at both the State and the Federal levels. Focusing on judicial resources as a solution to the ills that are plaguing this state doesn't help. We need a complete reduction in all branches of government across the board and require our state bureaucrats to endure the same as the members of the general public. Our state government is becoming that of an elitist class, better benefits, better pay, better vacations than the 14.1% and climbing unemployed.

Lary Holland

Host and Producer of Get Your Justice Live

http://www.getyourjusticelive.com

 

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3) Re: 2009 Senate Bill 249 (Appropriations: 2009-2010 Judiciary budget )  by Admin003 on June 12, 2009 

 

Senator Switalski’s second statement is as follows:

In terms of cutting justices 10 percent, you know, I thought they should have been included in our resolution when we cut our own pay 10 percent. But let me just point out that that wouldn’t save the funding unit, the county, a single dime. The salaries of the justices—I am sorry I will address the justices in a moment. The salaries of the Judges are paid for by the state, so it would save the state money, but it would not save the funding unit, the county, a dime. Let’s review who is putting out what money here again.

For a judge in the circuit court, the county is putting out $1 million; the state is putting $140,000. So the real fix for the budget is for the local funding unit.

Now I do want to address the remarks of my learned friend, the Floor Leader, and he is quite right to point out the distinction between judge and justice. I appreciate that, and if he were willing to offer a friendly amendment to fix my wordsmith amendment, I would only be too happy to join him in that and perhaps my inelegant expression of the vacancy created when a judge ages out of this system. Maybe I could have said where the incumbent is ineligible to stand for the election due to the requirements of state law. Those are mirror phrases, inelegant choices of words where the policy that we are trying to reach at is clear. We are trying to get the opportunity for the people who are paying the bill the chance to delay filling spots that are becoming open.

I have learned from the experience of my learned friend from the Majority Floor Leader’s position that, you know, that it is very hard to eliminate judicial positions when you have an incumbent. It is almost impossible, and as soon as you propose such a thing, you will have the Judges Association and the various interest groups totally opposed to you on that, and you will end up with the result that his well-meaning legislation met, which was no result at all.

So I offer this as a practical way to get results because I’ve intentionally kept away from many judicial appointments so we would not incur the wrath of the Governor who would maybe lose the ability to appoint, a very valuable thing to hang onto. And I have also avoided openings where you had an incumbent who could run again, who had, who was in mid-career, and now you are going to take their job away. Those are very difficult to eliminate. So I have tried to pick the ones—there are nine of them around the state, and there is more next time that is actually capable of being accomplished.

Remember, this is coming from the locals and the State Court Administrative Office. They have to ask not to fill it. This is what they’re paying for. If they don’t want to pay for it, then they should have that right to delay filling it for two years.

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