Court boss asks Albany for $131 mil budget increase
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hief Administrative Judge Joseph Zayas testified before the State Senate and State Assembly on Thursday, Jan. 25, 2024 in support of his proposed $2.7 billion courts budget. Screenshot via NYS Senate
By Jacob Kaye
Leadership of the state’s court system asked lawmakers on Thursday to approve their proposed $2.7 billion budget, which comes in over 5 percent larger than their budget for the previous year.
Chief Administrative Judge Joseph Zayas, who has served as the second-most powerful judge in the state for a little under a year, appeared before both state senators and assemblymembers to plead his case for the $131 million increase, which he called “attempt to catch-up” after years of austerity budgets.
“The increase we are asking for, while greater than increases we have sought and received in recent years, is long overdue,” Zayas, who previously served as the administrative judge in Queens Supreme Court, Criminal Term, said in his written testimony.
“I want to emphasize that this year’s budget request should be seen as an attempt to catch-up — an effort to restore to the courts the resources they have been deprived of because of recent fiscal crises, and to provide them with funding for crucial programs that have, up to this point, been beyond our means to implement,” the chief administrative judge added.
Despite asking for a budget boost in a year in which a number financial watchdogs have warned of bleak fiscal futures, Zayas’ requests were met almost exclusively with support and applause from members of the legislature on Thursday. Zayas’ approach to the budget and his and Chief Judge Rowan Wilson’s approach to managing the court system was a welcomed contrast with that of the court’s previous regime led by former Chief Judge Janet DiFiore and former Chief Administrative Judge Lawrence Marks.
The increases in the budget request would be used to fund additional judicial positions created by the legislature last year, negotiated pay increases for nonjudicial employees and pay increases recommended by the 2023 New York State Commission on Legislative, Judicial, and Executive Compensation, which urged lawmakers to approve a 10.2 percent increase for the state’s judges.
The budget also called for funding for cost-of-living increases for legal services providers and $93.4 million for technology needs, including $15 million in new tech funding.
According to Zayas, the technology funding would aid the court system in its court modernization initiative, which reached a milestone in Queens last year – the Queens Criminal Courthouse, which Zayas used to oversee, was the first in the state to have each of its courtrooms outfitted with cameras, monitors and new audio equipment.
For many in the court system, the pandemic proved to be a necessary motivator to get court leadership to buy into technology upgrades. On Thursday, Zayas said that at this point, there’s no going back.
“Naturally, we anticipate even greater use of technology in the future,” he said.
Also, the judge requested $16.7 million for staffing the Unified Court System’s drug treatment parts – the funding request marks an 11.4 percent increase compared to current funding.
Additionally, Zayas requested $436 million in funds for the Judiciary’s Public Safety Program, which pays for the nearly 4,000 court-employed security staff and the over 250 contracted local law enforcement officers who provide security services to the courts. The funds would also support four new court officer classes, according to the chief administrative judge.
Zayas said the increased budget would go toward helping the UCS reform its long-struggling Family Courts.
In November, the State Senate held a hearing on the state of New York’s Family Courts. Those who gave testimony described a court system that has not been properly staffed or funded for years and is currently crushed under the weight of a massive backlog. Others described hostile courtrooms, where pro se litigants, unable to find an affordable attorney, had been pushed around by overworked judges. Some described a system that they believe unfairly and indiscriminately separates children from their parents and allows abuse to fester as cases languish.
The hearing, which WIlson and other court leaders attended, was referenced several times by lawmakers during Thursday’s budget hearings.
In response, Zayas reaffirmed his and Wilson’s commitment to reforming the courts – the pair decided not to move forward with former Chief Judge Janet DiFiore’s court restructuring plan and instead focus there efforts on making changes to individual courts, including, and primarily, Family Court.
“We want to desperately change the culture of Family Court and the backlog in Family Court,” Zayas told lawmakers.
His budget request included $20 million in funding for the courts, a 10 percent increase from the year prior. The increase would fund 13 new Family Court judicial positions.
In his budget request, Zayas also said that he was “seeking funding for 28 more Family Court judgeships and necessary staff, as well as funding to increase overall nonjudicial staffing levels, including in-part positions such as interpreters, senior court clerks, and court officers.”
At the heart of Zayas’ budget request was a desire to reset and rebuild the court system, the chief administrative judge said. But it wasn’t just the budget that appeared to be heading toward a fresh start.
For years, DiFiore and Marks clashed with members of the legislature and members of their own judiciary. DiFiore, an ally of former Governor Andrew Cuomo, was often criticized by the progressive members of the legislature not only for her conservative approach to running the UCS but also for her conservative rulings on the Court of Appeals.
Even last year, when the court system was represented by acting Chief Administrative Judge Tamiko Amaker at the annual budget hearing, numerous tense moments arose during questioning from lawmakers, including from State Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Brad Hoylman-Sigal and Deputy Majority Leader Michael Gianaris.
But Thursday’s hearing appeared markedly different.
“I want to commend you and the chief judge for your desire to turn the page and reset the relationship with the state legislature,” Hoylman-Sigal told Zayas at the start of the hearing. “I think we all have a great deal more confidence in your administration, just in the first year of it being launched.”
Even when Zayas’ budget request received scrutiny from lawmakers, tensions never appeared to come to a boil.
In his budget request, Zayas proposed reducing funds to the New York State Interest on Lawyer Account Fund, which helps low income New Yorkers receive civil legal services, by $100 million.
Several lawmakers raised concerns that the cut would only worsen the financial struggles facing civil legal services in the state, which Wilson last year “falls far short of any conceivable measure of need.”
Though Zayas at first defended the measure, noting that while the IOLA fund would be reduced, other civil legal services funding streams would be increase, he later said that he initially crafted the budget with a more pessimistic view of the state’s finances than what Governor Kathy Hochul expressed through her recently released executive budget.
“As we prepared our budget on Dec. 1, we had understood that there was an austerity and maybe not a balanced budget,” Zayas said in response to a question from Assemblymember Chris Burdick. “[Now,] I keep thinking I made a mistake and we should have requested 200 million more dollars for civil legal services.”
“I should have asked for much more than we did, but to the extent that you have the power to do that, I will gladly accept that into my budget,” Zayas added.
In response, Burdick noted that “there’s no way to predict” exactly how much money will be available for the state to craft its budget with.
“But I would welcome working with you on trying to get that number [for civil legal services],” the lawmaker added.
