......is an organization that brings unity and conformity to the 2,100 justices in the 1250+ City, Town, and Village court rooms in New York State. The website can be found by clicking this link. With a huge organization as this, there also needs to be a plan. Hence the Action Plan For Justice Courts 2006 and it's 2 year update 2008 . The Unified Court System also has an assistance program known as the Justice Court Assistance Program [J.C.A.P.]. J.C.A.P. doles out grants to local courts that apply in amount s up to $30,000 per court annually. The NYS Unified Court System also offers a Justice Court Security Assessment.
The following are quotes from the Action Plan 2006:
These assessments occur on-site at the Justice Court and include not just physical inspection, but also detailed discussions with court staff and other local personnel. Each assessment generates a confidential report to the Justice Court and the locality, with recommendations to improve the tribunal’s security infrastructure in ways that often are economical, simple and straightforward.
To date, however, barely 4% of Justice Courts have availed themselves of this opportunity, leaving over 1,200 Justice Courts without any security review at all.
As with other Judiciary grant programs, recipients of these Justice Court facility grants would be subject to performance standards and financial review by OCA and the State Comptroller’s Office.
My guess is, a municipality such as ours stands a better chance of receiving the J.C.A.P. grant if we also participate in the Security Assessment. There was some debate recently regarding one of our Village Police present during court. My argument was that this was never discussed at a VB meeting. I was also told that I was wrong. The following are minutes from the VB meetings where the the J.C.A.P. grant application is discussed and the security assessment is briefly discussed.
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| From minutes justice security |
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| From minutes justice security |
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| From minutes justice security |
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| From minutes justice security |
I do not see any reference to placing a Village Police officer into our court room. Therefore I am not wrong! I have no problem with making our court safe and secure. I do however have issues with the cost of doing court room business. It costs more to run our court than what it takes in with fines and surcharges. I do not believe that the J.C.A.P. grant compensates the village tax payers for the extra police duties in the court room. I wonder what the Town Board plans to do with their court room regarding security. It should be the goal of both the Village and Town Boards to consolidate both Justice courts into ONE!
