|
CCRA past president Lesia Mervin was invited to participate in a roundtable discussion on this topic this past Saturday at the CJA conference, along with other panelists, including LA County Court’s presiding judge, San Diego County Court’s presiding judge, Orange County Court’s Court Executive Officer, a civil litigator, a criminal litigator, and a representative from the Family Violence Appellate Project, to give their perspectives on the issue of “the court reporter crisis.”
During Lesia’s presentation the panel allotted her more time to discuss what is happening from the working court reporter’s perspective. Lesia made it clear that at every courthouse and statewide we must be made partners while searching for solutions. That it is not a court reporter shortage as the Court Reporters Board’s statistics prove; it is a shortage of court reporters wanting to work in court. She also discussed the fact that the CRB test-taker statistics are drastically increasing. There was a 53% pass rate in July and a 56% pass rate in November. She educated all attendees on the important fact that both California court reporting schools and out-of-state schools have an increased enrollment.
She discussed the pitfalls of SB 662 and gave multiple examples of changes, both legislatively as well as locally, to help attract reporters back into the courts.
The meeting ended with Lesia voicing a Call to Action to every judge in attendance, a challenge to return to their respective courts and ask questions of their administration as to where the $30 million in court reporter-specific funding was spent, if at all. She discussed how only 22 counties are using their share of these funds. She asked, Why is that? Is your court using the money? If not, why not? How is your court treating the reporters? Is the relationship between the reporters and management adversarial? If so, why? She reminded the judges that the administrators work for them and to make sure their wishes were heard.
What Lesia expressed to us and wants all of you to know is that the feeling from the audience was one of great respect for our profession and the need for more information and suggestions. CCRA is at the forefront of this! We are in the process of compiling data from all 58 counties. We will be having discussions with every stakeholder as to possible solutions.
Please make sure your county is represented on CCRA’s Action Team listserv, where information gathering and sharing is a valuable resource. It is important that we understand what is happening around the state and in each county. This enables us to focus on what needs to be addressed in a more precise manner.
| 
