Opening Remarks made by Bob Bray at the Court Fee Committee Meeting on December 8, 2004.
It’s just fees – How did we get here?
1954 POAB started it all
Cookie cutter legislation
No consistency or uniformity of application
or calculation
No information resource, no training no mentoring|
Also, no public scrutiny,
no accountability, no oversight
For 50 YEARS
An Overview of Court Fees and Court Operations
Court Fees Performance Audit of 2001 (A time-bomb ready to explode)
AOC Study 2002
Field experience – folks it’s a big mess
Clerking is no longer
a menial, recordkeeping task and requires higher knowledge, education
and skills
The situation now is worse instead of better
Examples of the problem
Libby Law Library Fee
Cherokee County Clerk keeping funds separated
by utilizing 16 accounts
City of Atlanta – money collected, but
Finance Dept was not disbursing
Fulton County Superior Court – BSITF
not even on the sentencing sheet
Merging into the Fast Lane – Things
are happening at a rapid pace!
HB 1EX has hardly been implemented and we stand at the threshold of another
Round of legislation
To avoid the economic impacts of fee collections, courts and municipalities are exploring dangerous solutions – charging violations as city or county ordinances rather than as state offenses. Imposing “court costs” without any ordinance or local legislation to establish such a levy. And even if a law is created, not determining if that law was proper to enact.
Now to the mix of confusion, we have included fear. ( Ex. City of Varnnell a volunteer, 1 officer now 10, she manages partial payments, 100 cases to 1000 cases – and she’s not paid!!!).
Probation companies assess monthly supervision fees to probation cases and also to monitor a payment plan! By monitoring a payment plan as “probation” it necessitated the collection of the $9.00 CVEF monthly fee.. On a total fine of $250.00, the defendant who initially had to pay $50 a month for five months now has to pay $89 a month and over 5 months will have paid $445. A defendant that has available discretionary funds pays $250 on the spot. Those who do not have discretionary funds must be placed on a payment plan. As an attorney or even a friend, no one would ever recommend that a client take out a $250 loan, payable over 5 months at an interest rate of 78%. The law not only allows it but requires it. Of course, this is an example – in reality, as Donald Trump would say – “look at the bottom line” and it says, you won’t even collect the $250. Partial payments are allocated under a priority schedule. The retirement funds will be paid, police officer/prosecutor training will be paid, indigent defense will get money, but the county and city are vulnerable and could be left holding the bag as well as beneficiaries like Brain and Spinal, Crime Victims.
Let’s talk a minute about court processes involving bonds and bond forfeitures. Looking at a cash bond for a DUI first offense, courts add the same fees that apply to a fine, to the initial amount of the cash bond. That way, when the bond is forfeited, the fees may be backed out and properly disbursed. The problem is that the law does not impose all of these fees on bonds to be disbursed upon bond forfeiture. Additionally, many courts do not even take the fees into account on the bond and when a bond of $500 (vs. $725) is forfeited the fees are taken out of the $500 and may even be calculated off of the $500 and not the base amount of the bond so fees are being overpaid as much as they are being underpaid.
There 1092 trial courts in Georgia, some meet every day, all day long, some meet twice a year, even a few meet only when a ticket is issued and that was in 1993!
The process of judicial sentencing is not followed consistently even within the same court. One judge announces the base fine and lets other court personnel disclose to the defendant the total amount owed. Other judges impose the total fines and fees which require a different, algebraic calculation to determine fees. Software programs cannot distinguish from a batch of partial payments which fees to assess since the determination of fees are based on the date of offense and a batch may contain mixed dates of offense such as on FTA tickets. One Superior Court Clerk openly acknowledged: “I will have to hire 3 people to manage the partial payment process.” Such a statement points to the enormous workload added to the court staff, but it is unlikely that such additional personnel will be allowed during the annual budget process.
There are extremely few guidelines on the court operations of court fee practice. These laws are not the type where parties initiate a law suit that come before the appellate courts for better interpretations so where should the courts look for that guidance: The judicial branch or the executive branch? Are there conflicts? The term “court costs” has different meanings in the various levels of court specifically in criminal cases application. There are courts that charge “court costs” on DISMISSED tickets in contradiction to the Constitution of Georgia and the statutes.
By creating this committee, the judicial branch acknowledges its need to be actively involved in these issues and determine what role it should play in this practice and process of court operations. It is the judicial branch that court managers look for guidance, policies and interpretations – and yet the legislature placed this area of court practice with an Executive Branch entity.
There are 377 municipal courts in this state, by far the largest group of trial courts who have not been able to participate in critical decision making because they are constitutionally not a part of the state system of courts. However, when statutes gave jurisdiction to handle certain violations of state law to municipal courts, they became significant partners with the courts of the state system. Court fee practice is a major and significant process in these courts that collect the most fees for state and county programs on general and marijuana offenses; and second to State Courts on DUI offenses. The staffs and management of these courts need training on the same areas of court business practices as the other courts and more frequently because of the turnover in personnel. In July and August of 2003, we called every city, town, village in the forest and hamlet in the shire to find out if they had a municipal court and compiled the first database of municipal clerks and municipal courthouse addresses. In just a year, 10% of that information is no longer valid.
The focus has always been on fines and not the collection of filing fees. The costs of civil litigation rise like all other commodities and must be tempered with an individual’s access to his/her courts. But, fines are imposed as punishment, and fees are like taxes calculated off of the fines. The legislature continues to place the obligation for these fees on the shoulders of the “criminal”. Is your 86 year old mother, who misses the Stop sign that she has stopped at for the past 65 years, all of a sudden a criminal?
It’s not just about fees, but about the criminal procedures, its about sentence enforcement and compliance with the sentence, its about fine collections, its about bond forfeitures, its about separation of powers, its about court operations, its about fairness and access to the courts, its about accountability, its about good governance and good government and its about improving the quality of justice that we provide the citizens of our communities. When the fine is unpaid, and at least 40% are on a national level, what lesson have we taught? Did we teach accountability for one’s actions? Did we make a financial impact for a person to do some self realization and alter a behavior? Does the defendant get the impression that court is a serious concern? If one can escape the consequences of justice at one level, will it apply at other levels too? Was the goal of meeting out justice achieved?
As a group, we must determine what the mission of this committee shall be. We must make the individual commitment to pursue this mission. Vince and I will provide the passion, and you must commit to recommend the solutions. The work of this committee is not ad hoc because the issues, strategies and legislation will be with us as long as fees are added to cases.
In conclusion, it is MUCH more than just about fees and if we are not alert, we will be following the parade instead of leading it.
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