Sunday, November 1, 2015

Chief Judge Urges Restoring $3.4 Million to Mortgage Foreclosure Mediation Program

2016 Cook County Proposed Budget:  Chief Judge, October 30, 2015

Chief Judge Timothy Evans came prepared to secure support from the Commissioners for restoring the $3.4 million cut from his requested budget by the President in her Executive Budget.  This money would be used to hire outside attorneys to advise homeowners during mortgage foreclosure hearings.  In the President’s remarks in presenting the Executive Budget, the President had said this money was cut in recognition that the number of new foreclosure proceedings had fallen 52% (the Budget Director on Friday stated that the figure was now 67%).  Money for 8 County employees dedicated to the program was retained.

Chief Judge Evans argued that the $3.4 million should be restored because (1) there are currently 32,000 cases pending in the system which need to be dealt with, and (2) while new foreclosure cases have dropped considerably, there are still roughly 1,400 new cases being filed each month currently.  The Chief Judge said the outside attorneys were needed to advise the homeowners, which the County employees, who are part of the judiciary, could not do.  The Chief Judge also had examples of homeowners who had been helped by the program in each of the Commissioners’ districts.  It was clear that a number of the Commissioners were prepared to try to find all or at least part of the $3.4 million, though it was not clear where that money would come from.

Chief Judge Touts New Public Safety Assessment Tool
Chief Judge Evans was enthusiastic about the new Public Safety Assessment Tool being used in Bond Court to assist judges in determining whether and how much of a bond was necessary. The concept behind this tool is that it will scientifically help predict whether an accused person will show up for trial if released and whether the accused would be likely to commit a crime if released.  The Chief Judge says that so far the tool is working well: the monthly reports show that only 2% of those released have failed to show up and only 2% have committed crimes while released. These numbers compare favorably with Washington, D.C. where another tool has long been in place and which has been considered a model program with 6% of those not showing up and 6% committing crimes while released.

Commissioner Garcia said he had heard there were some issues with regard to how the different judges were using the tool. Judge Evans explained that each judge by state statute has to consider 36 parameters when determining a bond, and that this was an additional tool.  But ultimately, it is the judge who has to decide.  Further, this new assessment tool is only being fully implemented as of January 1, and it is only then that he will be able to see how often judges differ.

The Chief Judge also explained that his office had worked with the other Public Safety stakeholders, including the Illinois Crime Lab, to reduce the probable cause process from 21 to 14 days.  One improvement is that the State’s Attorney’s lawyers are now exchanging all evidence with the Public Defender’s attorneys prior to the bond hearing, as opposed to later after arraignment.  Chief Judge Evans, like the other Public Safety officials and departments, also cited the reduction in the average daily jail population from over 10,000 to 8,000. 

Chief Judge Adopting National Benchmarks for Comparing Case Disposals
The Chief Judge has been the one Cook County official who has refused to participate in the County’s STAR Performance Management program, citing the need to separate the departments under him from the Executive and Legislative branches.  But in a response to Commissioner Schneider’s question as to how Cook County courts are doing with case backlogs, Chief Judge Evans said that he was now using the American Bar Association and another national set of benchmarks to see how well the Cook County courts were doing in the time being taken to dispose of a case.  He said that for criminal cases, Cook County was about 80% there, though he did not provide any more specifics.

Juvenile Temporary Detention Center (JTDC)
Leonard Dixon, the new Superintendent of the JTDC, which is under the Chief Judge, was questioned by Commissioner Gainer as to whether it was sustainable to manage a workforce at the JTDC which had 193 FTEs (or about 1/3 of the total FTEs) out on leave. Mr. Dixon said this was a nation-wide problem, but offered no specifics as to what he might do to try to deal with this issue. Mr. Dixon received kudos from a number of Commissioners from both parties as to what they have seen thus far at the JTDC under his leadership. 

Commissioner Gainer pressed the Chief Judge to allow Mr. Dixon to meet with the Juvenile Justice Advisory Board, which had been established by unanimous vote of the Cook County Board and which is made up of volunteers with experience with youths.  After several minutes of back and forth, the Chief Judge agreed to that.

-- Priscilla Mims, League Observer

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