Legal News

E-Filing Fees May Keep Courthouses Open

By Brian Harris

By Amaris Elliott-Engel
Of the Legal Staff

In a fiscal year in which the First Judicial District has seen its funding cut by $15 million, two fees attached to the court's five-month-old civil e-filing system will help limit the number of days the court has to close by almost five days, FJD Court Administrator Dave Lawrence said in an interview last week.

Because of budget cuts, the FJD likely will have to close all of the courthouses for a few days in the next fiscal year.

A new $5 fee started June 1 for all credit card transactions that are used to pay for electronic filings. Another $5 fee has been in place since the start of the e-filing system in January for each filing conducted electronically.

Lawrence said the court pays $300,000 each day in payroll. The e-filing fee that started in January is estimated to bring in $1.1 million to the court in the fiscal year that starts July 1, and will keep the court open for four days, Lawrence said. The credit card fee that started a week ago is estimated to bring $250,000 into the court in the fiscal year that starts July 1 and will keep the court open for almost a day.

Lawrence said since the city is cutting general fund monies to the court system, the court system must find ways to generate more revenues in order to run the system as close to normal as possible.

"We don't like doing this," Lawrence said. "But it helps us stay afloat."

Full post as published by The Legal Intelligencer Blog on June 10, 2009 (boomark / email).