Lawmakers debate remote hearings and night courts
During a Senate budget subcommittee hearing on Thursday, judicial branch representatives pleaded with lawmakers to allow them to continue to use remote appearances. Some senators had different ideas.
"Have we thought about expanding night court?" asked Senate Budget Subcommittee No. 5 Chair Aisha Wahab, D-Hayward.
While the concept might be more familiar to most people as a 1980s sitcom, night courts are still in use across much of California, particularly for traffic dockets. Wahab noted night court is available "one or two nights a week" in her district in Alameda County. Several other counties around the state offer night court a few nights a month.
Others, including Orange County, used to have night courts but discontinued them. Orange County Superior Court Presiding Judges Maria D. Hernandez made it clear she did not see night courts as the solution to her court's problems. Instead, she told Wahab that "budget restrictions" was one reason her county no longer has night courts.
Hernandez quickly changed the subject to the topic she and her colleagues really wanted to talk about: remote court appearances. Answering a question raised by Wahab and other senators, Hernandez said litigants have options if technical issues cause them to miss all or part of a remote hearing.
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Wahab said even the small percentage of respondents who said they were dissatisfied amounted to thousands of people.