Sorry I didn’t get to report anything yesterday but it was a full day both in and out of committee. A lot of what happens in the statehouse of curse happens away from the witness chair in the committee rooms. For example, I met with Judge Davenport about H. 533, the military parental rights act. I learned that she had met with legislative council and worked on a new draft of the bill. After circulating that draft to Amber, Penny and Lt. Col. Abbott, I immediately heard their objections. So that started me on a three way negotiation process where, since I had previously offered to work with all parties, got me back in the witness chair this morning to present what I think is an agreement or at least is close to an agreement pending some drafting changes. The bill is due back next Tuesday for, I hope, final action by the House Judiciary Committee. I expect swift floor action with rules suspensions and messaging of the bill to the Senate.
The rest of yesterday was spent following the judicial reorganization testimony in House Judiciary. Morning testimony from Court Administrator Bob Greemore covered the staff impact of consolidation. Without being too specific and where cuts will be made or who will be cut, the number of court staff will shrink from 210 positions to 175. I do have a chart of a draft proposal for what it’s worth or will be worth when this bill is done. I was also quite interested in another spreadsheet he distributed which showed the savings from the consolidation of probate judges down to five full time positions. The savings is about $714,000 (down from $1.3M today). If fourteen judges were retained but were to be compensated on a percentage basis of the Chittenden Probate Judge, the savings would be about $503,000. For example, since the Addison caseload (here I’m just using the first county on the list) is 36% of the Chittenden caseload the salary of the Addison Probate Judge would be 36% of that of Judge Fowler. OK, so this does little to encourage people to run for probate judge especially in the smaller counties. But it keeps 14 judges, one in every county. Good idea; bad idea?
The VBA met with Judge Davenport to express its concerns over language in the bill itself and will be presenting a memo to both the committee and the court early next week. Bob Pratt, Chair of the Probate and Trust Section, has reworked the probate districts from 5 to 7. That will also be provided to the committee next week. one thing I found quite interesting is the Bob Greemore did tell the committee that he would not have drawn the five probate districts the way the Commission did. Although he and others have told me that privately I remain a bit surprised that he testified to it. That fed right into the hands of those committee members that are having that same issue.
Now while all of this is going on in the House, the Senate has been active doing other things. For example, the Senate Finance Committee has approved S. 173, the technical corrections bill to the Vermont Trust Code. The Senate Judiciary Committee voted out S. 165, the so called act relating to eliminating the statute of limitations for felonies. Well, it’s not exactly that. Here’s what the bill now says:
Sec. 1. 13 V.S.A. § 4503 is amended to read:
§ 4503. PROCEEDINGS BEGUN AFTER TIME LIMITATION
(a) If a prosecution for a felony or misdemeanor, other than arson and
murder, is commenced after the time limited by section 4501 or 4502 of this
title, such proceedings shall be void.
(b) If a defendant knowingly and voluntarily waives the statute of
limitations in writing and with the consent of the prosecution, the court shall
have jurisdiction over the offense and the proceedings shall be valid.
Subsection b is new language proposed to be added to the present 13 VSA 4503. That bill is on the Notice Calendar, along with S. 173, for action next week.
For those of you who may be interested in weighing in on the budget process here is notice of a public hearing to be done by interactive television:
PUBLIC HEARING
Joint Public Hearing on Fiscal Year 2011 budget
o n Vermont Interactive Television
Appropriations Committees
Monday, February 8, 2009, 4:30 - 7:00 p.m. – The House and Senate
Appropriations Committees will hold a joint public hearing on Vermont
Interactive Television (V.I.T.) to give Vermonters throughout the state an
opportunity to express their views about the state budget for fiscal year 2011.
All V.I.T. sites will be available for the hearing: Bennington, Brattleboro,
Castleton, Johnson, Lyndonville, Middlebury, Montpelier, Newport,
Randolph Center, Rutland, Springfield, St. Albans, Waterbury, White River
Junction and Williston. V.I.T.'s web site has an up-to-date location listing,
including driving directions, addresses and telephone numbers,
http://www.vitlink.org/.
For information about the format of this event, interested parties may call
the House Appropriations Committee office at 802/828-5767. Requests for
interpreters should be made to the office by 12:00 noon on Friday, January
29, 2010.
Returning to judiciary issues, the retention process is set to begin with an organizational meeting of the Joint Committee on Judicial Retention next Wednesday, January 27th at 5PM. There are three judges standing for retention this year: Judge Durkin, Judge Howard and Judge Toor. The fourth, Judge Reiss, is of course now on the federal bench. By the way, I recently heard that the governor does want to fill her seat as well as the seat of Judge Joseph who has announced his retirement effective June 30, 2010. If the judicial branch was looking for some vacancy savings there, they need to look elsewhere. Rep. Tom Koch, who replaced Peg Flory on the House Judiciary Committee, is also replacing her on the retention committee. After next week’s meeting I’ll post the schedule of interviews and public hearing dates if you want to testify.
Thanks for reading. Have a nice weekend.
No comments:
Post a Comment