Legal News

Report: New Cuomo Budget Could Lead to Court Layoffs

By Ashby Jones

There was big news out of Albany over the weekend — that Governor Andrew Cuomo and the state legislature had reached agreement on a $132.5 billion budget plan. Click here for the WSJ story; here for the NYT story.

Yes, there will be cuts. Spending in the next fiscal year would drop by about 1% to 2%-possibly the deepest retrenchment since the beginning of the Pataki administration.

And why are we legal beagles covering such news? Because the cuts are going to affect New York’s court system, according to this story in the New York Law Journal. To the tune of $70 million. According to the NYLJ, such cuts raise “the spectre of ‘significant’ layoffs in the year beginning Friday.”

The cut is in addition to the $100 million offered by Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman to the Judiciary’s proposed $2.7 billion budget for 2011-2012. Click here for the NYLJ story on that from earlier this month.

“We will look at everything,” said chief administrative judge Ann Pfau, Monday morning. “But I don’t think there is any way we can avoid significant layoffs, given the new cuts.”

Another piece of legal news to arise out of the budget: At the eleventh hour, state leaders nixed a provision that would put a $250,000 cap on non-economic medical malpractice awards. The proposal was opposed by the New York State Bar Association, trial lawyers and patient advocacy groups.

Hospital and doctor groups had pushed for it, but Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, as the NYLJ notes is himself a personal injury lawyer, said his Democratic majority in the Assembly could not accept the proposal.

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on March 28, 2011 (boomark / email).