Last year, California’s judiciary adopted new transparency rules that allowed access to spending records on personnel, including salaries.
The Contra Costa Times have obtained court information that includes includes all California judges and employees of appellate courts, the supreme court and the administrative office of the courts, and totals more than $1 billion in salaries for 15,377 employees.
While judicial salaries have long been public because they are considered to be constitutional officers and thus paid for by the state controller’s office, now public for the first time is the pay of all court employees including clerks, lawyers, and administrators.
“They have no choice but to release the data,” said Peter Scheer who is the executive director of the First Amendment Coalition which specializes in issues of government transparency. “The new transparency rules are as good or better than the Public Records Act from which the courts are exempt.”
However, not all of the courts have complied. Yolo County is one of four counties that have not provided data at all, and five other counties have either dragged their feet or otherwise put up obstacles.
“Foot-dragging by nine counties’ courts, including Los Angeles, suggests that many judges are unhappy with the new transparency rules imposed on them from above last year by the California Judicial Council,” wrote Anne Lowe from Californians Aware, another organization that supports open government.
The Contra Costa Times reported earlier this week that the Los Angeles Court’s top official “Chief Executive Officer John Clarke, held meetings where he discussed how to ‘stonewall as long as possible’ the release of salary data.’ “
The article goes on to report, “The state’s largest court system ‘creates and condones a culture of secrecy’ and its leadership ‘is not interested in living within the spirit of the (transparency) rule,’ said the former spokesman, Alan Parachini. The court fired Parachini last month, alleging that he leaked confidential information to a tabloid website, an allegation he denies. He said he is considering legal action and his dismissal was really about attempts to make the court more transparent and to aid journalists in doing their jobs.”
It continues, “Clarke and other court officials, he said, wanted to ‘make it as hard as possible’ to access public information, in part by deciding to require requests be sent by postal mail and rejecting e-mailed requests. The irony, he added, is that the court is ‘a very responsible steward of public dollars’ and the unreleased data will show no salary abuses.”
So why is Yolo County stonewalling? It is not clear. The Vanguard has requested a copy of all court salaries and will await the results of that inquiry.
Transparency and public accountability are hallmarks of democracy. It is sad to see that public officials are actually taking steps to hide the release of such data. One always wonders in those cases what public officials are attempting to hide.
It would be interesting to discover if the source of Yolo County’s failure to release such data has to do with its Court Executive Officer or an order from the presiding Judge David Rosenberg.
Recall earlier this year that Judge Rosenberg attempted to block the county’s ability to stop providing county-funded benefits to their Yolo County judges.
At the time, Judge Rosenberg indicated that while he was well aware of the county’s fiscal position, he did not believe that rescinding judicial benefits would save the county much money.
“I appreciate the argument,” Judge Rosenberg said at the time. “And I personally don’t think counties should be paying benefits to state officials. It will change. But it’s a process that will not happen overnight.”
Bottom line, the public is entitled to the information, so release it and let light shine into the Yolo County system, if only for a moment.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
While I agree with the basic principle of “transparency”, I strongly disagree with a policy that amounts to a blatant invasion of personal privacy by tying names to salaries online and unrestricted. If you have such a burning need to “browse” what would ordinarily be confidential information, then at the very least you should be willing to provide your own name and/or valid e-mail address for access.
As an alternative, the Court could easily redact individual names, which would provide the information necessary to meet the public’s demand, *and* the “need to know”. Absent a minimal level of security, I’m with the Court on this one.
You’re with what court on this? The judicial counsel has already ruled on it. The court is not in compliance with the current law.
I’m sorry but when you work for the public, your right to privacy diminishes.
“. . . at the very least you should be willing to provide your own name and/or valid e-mail address for access.”
Any pleas for full name disclosure in any context is compromised by the fact that the person making such plea speaks using the unidentifiable, “Neutral.”
When the judicial counsel required transparency of the salary information, did it necessarily require that a specific name be associated w the salary? Or is it just a position is associated with the salary? I’m trying to remember when city of Davis salaries were listed, if they required specific names w salaries or just positions w salaries – and as I remember it was just the position. Am I not remembering correctly?
[quote]… tying names to salaries [u]online and unrestricted[/u]. [/quote]
[quote]I’m sorry but when you work for the public, your right to privacy diminishes. [/quote]
Ok, David… seems to be that in your viewpoint, whether you’re a janitor, a school teacher, a planner, a city manager, if you work for the public sector you should expect your name(which would be easy to correlate to address, phone #, etc. via the “tools” on the internet), position, salary, etc. to be available to not only the citizens in the jurisdiction of employment, but to every scam artist, solicitation firm, perhaps even el-quaida(sp?). who has access to the world-wide web?
I strongly disagree. The names MUST be omitted.
The law right now requires disclosure of employee names with salaries. I fail to see how that makes people vulnerable to scam artists, names are not exactly difficult to obtain and not protected under any law I know.
[quote]I’m trying to remember when city of Davis salaries were listed, if they required specific names w salaries or just positions w salaries – and as I remember it was just the position.[/quote]I believe that it was just the position. That resolves some of my concern related to world-wide availability. But it poses another interesting wrinkle… city employees often have position titles that are “unique” to them… DJUSD does not have it so much, except in higher compensated admin positions. So, even locally, we have two classes of public employees, if it is by position. Since this blog does not seem to be concerned about the proposed substantial (~55%, or $175) increase in the school parcel tax, at the same time teachers want to have the district undo their ‘token’ concession on compensation (which was pretty much offset by the automatic step increases for many)[and there were NO concessions last FY], perhaps it doesn’t matter that some public employees are ‘more equal’ than others.
[quote]The law right now requires disclosure of employee names with salaries. [/quote]Can you point us to the list of all DJUSD employees?
When I posted the 100K club, the first time I had employee names, second time I listed position. Both times, I received the records from the city with names. The name redaction was my choice.
I haven’t posted a list of all DJUSD so I can’t point you towards one.
. . what court . .
The nine holdouts.
They can only delay the inevitable.
[quote]I haven’t posted a list of all DJUSD so I can’t point you towards one.[/quote]Ok… for City employees, the criteria was 100k in salary… DJUSD has no 100k salaries?
dmg: “When I posted the 100K club, the first time I had employee names, second time I listed position. Both times, I received the records from the city with names. The name redaction was my choice.”
It is interesting that even you chose to redact names, and just listed positions. I think for privacy’s sake that makes more sense…
[quote]When I posted the 100K club, the first time I had employee names, second time I listed position.[quote][/quote]It is interesting that even you chose to redact names, and just listed positions.[/quote]At least half of the time.
You can look up any attorney on the State Bar web site. Judges have their name, bar number, position, date admitted and location. Not like it is a secret.
As for Gov employees giving up some privacy, Public Gov employees give this up, like cops, DA’s, Judges, elected officials.
Why would someone object to being identified or having their basic info about salary disclosed? It is not like people want their blood type, DNA or social security number.
City of Vacaville:
[url]http://www.thereporter.com/salarysurvey/ci_15086026[/url]
City of Woodland:
[url]http://www.cityofwoodland.org/civica/inc/displayblobpdf2.asp?BlobID=9182[/url]
On the Sacramento Bee web site the salary of every state worker can be very easily looked up.
For example Judge Timothy Fall’s 2009 salary was $171,288. Judge Rosenberg made $173,460. Local salaries are not available on this site.
When your salary is being paid by the taxpayers, taxpayers have a right to know how much you are being paid.
Don’s two examples are interesting:
His Woodland citation lists positions and salary ranges, without identifying names nor where in the range the employee falls. His Vacaville citation has names, actual salaries, but apparently only for electeds & department/division heads. Davis has all the same info as Woodland readily available on its website. The electeds are conspicuously absent. DJUSD has no names for rank & file, and you’d have to know what range and step someone is at to see the salary. SacBee list doesn’t have a “complete list”… to search it, you need to know name and agency to find it. That’s not how David’s list was shared.
Roger’s comment is also interesting. Since Social Security, Small business loans, etc., are financed at least in part by taxpayers, why is this info not broadcast the same way, at least to the extent of State workers?
To the main point, I can see why judges would have their compensation readily available. I’m not getting why law clerks, stenographers, clerical should have to have their names, classifications and salary available to be posted to the whole world…
. . a right to know how much you are being paid.
No. We only have a right to know how much the position(s) cost. The specific individual filling the position is irrelevant.
Neutral: “No. We only have a right to know how much the position(s) cost. The specific individual filling the position is irrelevant.”
I heartily agree…
“Neutral: “No. We only have a right to know how much the position(s) cost. The specific individual filling the position is irrelevant.”
I heartily agree… “
I agree disclosure laws have gone further than is really necessary. If anyone wants to review Public spending it makes more sense to review average job type salaries along with a range. I doubt the salaries by individual name are really useful except at the executive level.
However, the law is the law and currently the law says all public salaries must be transparent. There is no excuse for Courts to disregard this law. If they do not like the requirement then they should appeal the law, but obey it until it is changed!