Court Restructuring

2012 Campaign for Court Simplification

INVITATION TO JOIN THE

STATEWIDE COALITION FOR COURT SIMPLIFICATION

New York has perhaps the most complex and convoluted court system in the country. Over the last two hundred years, lawmakers have allowed this system – designed to serve a population a fraction the size of the current population – to develop haphazardly and with insufficient planning or oversight. The result is the current morass of eleven different trial courts and four unbalanced appellate divisions. This archaic and inconsistent structure is needlessly confusing. A Constitutional Amendment to bring the Court into the 21 st century offers an opportunity for every population that uses the courts and provides for a more just, efficient, and equitable system.

The Fund for Modern Courts has established a Task Force on the Simplification of the New York State court system. Consolidating the eleven separate trial courts into a single court of first instance will streamline judicial operations, save money, help families and increase appellate level diversity. We support a passage of a Constitutional Amendment that would simplify the New York court system by creating a two-part structure, with a new Supreme Court -- consisting of the current Supreme Court, County Court, Family Court, Surrogate's Court and the Court of Claims, and a new District Court -- consisting of the current District Courts on Long Island, the New York City Civil and Criminal Courts, and the City Courts outside of New York City.

We ask that you add your organization's name to the newly formed Statewide Coalition for Court Simplification and work with a growing coalition of groups across the state to achieve this much needed goal.

Court simplification will

• Remove procedural and jurisdictional obstacles associated with a multi-layered trial court structure, to reduce the cost and time of litigation.

• Simplify the trial court structure by reducing the number of courts and thereby make it more accessible and easier to understand for the public and the Bar.

• Ease the difficulties experienced by children and families in family-related litigation (e.g., cases involving divorce, child custody and support, family offense), while promoting greater fairness and consistency of result.

• Consolidate the State's lower courts and expand their powers, enabling them to better serve local communities. (This amendment would not affect Town and Village Justice Courts.)

• Insure a more appropriate distribution of resources to the various courts, especially those that handle family matters.

• Greatly broaden the pool of judges that can be appointed to the Appellate Courts.

For more information/questions contact Denise Kronstadt, Deputy Executive Director/Director of Advocacy, the Fund for Modern Courts advocacy@moderncourts.org

To join the coalition :

Click here to join the coalition or get more information

Join Us, List in Formation

Children's Law Center

Common Cause/NY

Citizens Union

Day One

Downstate Coalition for Crime Victims

inMotion

Lawyers Committee Against Domestic Violence

New York State League of Women Voters

LIFT