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Court Clerk Bill Divisive

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By JOHN W. ALLMAN

jallman@tampatrib.com

Published: March 1, 2009

TAMPA - It's a thorny issue, the push to take court-related duties away from circuit court clerks in Florida.

The state courts system and members of the judiciary say it's necessary to restore balance to a system with little oversight and to help fund lagging court coffers.

The state representative sponsoring the bill, Republican Ellyn Bogdanoff of Fort Lauderdale, says the effort will help shore up a $5 billion state budget deficit. And it will fix a broken system that has allowed court clerks too much power.

But at least one clerk, Hillsborough County's Pat Frank, says no one seems to be considering the human impact, the 585 people that Frank says she could no longer pay if the bill is signed into law.

"It's very disturbing to the office. Everybody has a dark cloud hanging over their head," Frank said Friday.

The legislation would phase out all court-related duties from the 67 circuit clerks in Florida and hand responsibility to the chief judge and courts administrator in the state's 20 judicial circuits. The transfer would affect five judicial circuits each year for four years. Those duties include case maintenance, records management, processing jurors, and collecting and distributing fines, fees, service charges and court costs.

Hillsborough County Chief Judge Manuel Menendez and court administrator Mike Bridenback, who support the legislation, said widespread job loss likely wouldn't happen, at least not locally, if the switch occurred.

Some circuits, such as the 2nd Judicial Circuit, include up to six counties. That means the work of six circuit clerks, each with their own staffs, would be consolidated under one court administrator.

"If you combined those functions," Menendez said, "I would imagine there would be some loss of jobs." Menendez's circuit only has one clerk.

"If this passed, the impact on employees would not be that they would lose their jobs," Bridenback said. "I think the primary savings would be reducing the cost of benefits, which would be a negative to the employees." State benefits, he said, cost less than county benefits.

Estimating The Savings

The total savings such a transfer of duties might bring statewide is not known. Some proponents of the legislation have estimated the amount at $200 million. Menendez said revised estimates point toward $80 million to $100 million.

In fiscal year 2008-09, Florida's clerks received $966 million in revenue. A bulk of that, $539.3 million, according to the state courts system, went to fund their respective budgets. The state courts budget is about $433 million.

The clerks also are required to remit a portion of the revenue to the state's general fund. Last fiscal year, that amount was slightly more than $261 million.

Menendez said it appears clerk budgets statewide are increasing at a time when judicial budgets are being cut back. Some clerks, he said, are awarding bonuses to employees, such as in Broward County last year, while court staffs are being reduced.

Frank has argued the opposite, saying clerk budgets have not increased at the rate alleged by state court officials. Her office has not issued any bonuses, she said, and has returned more than $21 million to the state since fiscal year 2005.

She said she welcomes scrutiny.

"It wouldn't bother me at all to have the Legislature go line by line on our budget," she said. "The Legislature created this system. We're doing what they told us to."

Frank Responds To Filing

The brouhaha over the clerks' function ignited Tuesday when Bogdanoff filed her bill.

Frank immediately sent a letter to legislators saying the clerks' office has existed for 170 years and that it helps keep the courts system running in a "transparent, fair and orderly fashion."

In an interview, Frank said she worries that giving the courts system control of all court functions could lead to problems.

"I don't want to say there's corruption in the court, but it would lead itself in that direction," she said. "Here you have an independently elected person. It's a protection for judges."

Menendez strongly disagrees.

For one, he said, the system hasn't been in place for 170 years. It began about 2004. For another, "they're not a fourth branch of government," he said of the clerks' office.

"There are problems in clerks' offices that nobody knows anything about," Menendez said, "because there's no accountability."

Frank and her staff said the push for change appears isolated to counties and judicial circuits with reported clerk-court conflicts.

"Those instances are few in number," she said, "and doesn't warrant turning the whole system upside down."

Reporter John W. Allman can be reached at (813) 259-7915.

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