The BPC began by looking at the National Center for State Courts (NCSC) CourTools Measures related to “time to resolution,” “age of active pending caseload” and “clearance rates.”  The CourTools measures for trial courts were rejected by the BPC as not an appropriate measure for Washington’s intermediate appellate courts.  Judge Quinn-Brintnall reported that the Court of Appeals (COA) has assembled a caseflow management committee(CMC). The BPC decided that initially, the job of discerning appropriate measures should be given to the CMC.  Preliminarily the CMC determined that RAPs set out a minimum of 225 days from the filing of the notice of appeal to the ready date (when the respondent’s brief is filed) in a civil case, 255 in a criminal case.  Until those things are done the case is not ready for judicial review.  After the case is ready for review the case is screened, the record and briefs are read, the law is researched and a research memorandum on the case is presented to the assigned panel for review.  To allow for this necessary preparation, the date the case will be reviewed at oral argument or conference must be one or two calendars following the ready date. 

 

Following extensive study several years ago it was determined that each Court of Appeals judge should author between 70 and 80 majority opinions a year.  Because it reviews cases in panels of three this means each judge reviews between 210 and 240 cases a year. The Court of Appeals judges believe 240 cases to be a temporary maximum which cannot be reasonably sustained over time. When 80 cases becomes the consistent minimum, additional judges are needed.  The CMC appears to agree.  Currently, cases are being set for review two to three and sometimes four calendars or more following the ready date.  Although some time to review the record and briefing is required, four calendars are too long.  But, without additional judicial capacity or reduced case filings, this is not anticipated to change.

 

The caseflow survey and data show a significant number of extensions of time for filing clerk’s papers, verbatim reports of proceedings and briefs.  Although not desirable, because each division is working at or above the 70-80 case-per-judge capacity, these extensions do not impact the ultimate time for filing of opinions.  If extensions of time for readying the case for review ceased without adding additional judges, it would increase the case backlog but would not affect the time from filing the notice of appeal to filing of the opinion.  The parties would simply hurry up to wait.

 

The CMC has determined that there are some significant slowdowns, however.  One is that time from oral argument or conferencing to the filing of the final Opinion in some cases is too long. It was realized that in Division II some of the delay was because electronic signatures are not available; the delay could be reduced by about 10 days by utilizing electronic signatures.  An electronic signature pilot project (with hardcopy back up) will be tried.

 

Suggestions that the court of appeals speed up case resolution times by issuing “Decisions without opinions” and “summary affirmances” have not been approved by the CMC.  A target date rule similar to that used in other states (in the form of X% of cases within Y number of days) is being considered.

 

The CMC will do a report for approval by COA judicial members after which it will be presented to the BPC and, if all goes well, on to the BJA. 

 

 

There was a quick walk-through of the information behind Tabs 4, 5, 6 and 7.

 

Judge Quinn-Brintnall asked Dr. McCurley if the Washington State Center for Court Research (WSCCR) followed GR 32. Dr. McCurley replied that the WSCCR works on validation of measures for this committee. In general, when they do a performance review of an area (outside this committee) it is in the form of a process or outcomes evaluation. They have statutory authority to review practices of the courts and provide recommendations for changes to those practices (see RCW 2.56.030). The work the WSCCR has done has not been considered to be covered under GR 32. If the WSCCR was doing performance reviews on a more regular basis, they will look at an authorizing court rule/statute.

 

 

Judge Rietschel said the committee needs to choose a new measure to move forward on; she is proposing we look at trial date certainty for superior courts. Discussion followed regarding this suggestion.

• Which courts should we look at? CLJ/Superior/All levels?
• Can we get the data we need?
• Civil and/or criminal cases?
• There are a variety of calendaring practices; can we determine what they are?
• Would we measure by trial day or trial week? Would this change the information and how important is it?
• Should we look at terminology (arraignment/pretrial/omnibus), identify all of the functions and see if they are measured and if there is sufficient data?
• Jurisdictions that have too few judges (actual vs. judicial needs estimate) could have an impact on trial date certainty.
• Data could be skewed looking at municipal courts as there are part-time judges that may only work one day a week or even one day a month