Auld Lang Syne
The year 2000 nears its end and so does my term as Chief Justice of the West Virginia
Supreme Court of Appeals.
It has been a truly wonderful experience for me to have had the great privilege to serve
as your Chief Justice this year. This is an awesome and very demanding job, but I will
miss many things about it when I go back "into the ranks" next year. Among the
things I will miss most are the pleasure of working daily with the 1,100 superb folks who
serve in the West Virginia court system, and I will miss writing this column and the
direct contact it gives me with you. It was a good year and this is a good time to take
stock and see what we have accomplished in 2000 and to look ahead to the challenges facing
our courts in 2001.
Family Courts
Implementing the great changes the Legislature made to the family court system in 1999 was
our major accomplishment in 2000. In response to concern that the old family law master
system was not meeting the needs of litigants in the growing domestic law area, the West
Virginia Legislature revised the original family law master system it had established in
1986.
The Legislature increased the number of law masters from 14 full-time and 13 part-time
positions to 33 full-time positions, effective October 1, 1999. The Legislature also
created the position of family case coordinator to help manage the new system's mandatory
statewide parent education and mediation requirements. The Legislature required the
Supreme Court to hire 20 case coordinators by October 1, 1999. In 2000, the Supreme Court
hired an additional 13 case coordinators so that all 33 family law masters now have a case
coordinator. Given the increase in law masters, case coordinators, and secretary-clerks,
the Supreme Court had to purchase additional equipment and work with county commissions to
find additional office space.
In addition to the demands of an increase in staff, the Supreme Court made expanding and
improving on mandatory parent education and mediation programs, which went into effect
statewide on January 1, 2000, a top priority. Previously, family law master regions
sponsored parent education and mediation on a voluntary basis. Parent education is now
available in all 55 counties, and has been very successful.
Mediation also is available statewide. Parents pay for mediation on a uniform sliding
scale based on ability to pay. In 2000, the Supreme Court secured grants and alternate
sources of funding to help pay for mediation for indigent parents, and we will continue
our efforts.
We celebrated our greatest accomplishment in the family law area for 2000 with a bang in
November when West Virginia voters overwhelmingly passed the Unified Family Court
Amendment. The amendment will allow the Legislature to create modern family courts to
handle all family law issues. While our court system has worked hard and successfully to
get the new system up and running, we must realize that we don't have a finished product
today. To misquote Churchill, this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the
end. It is perhaps, the end of the beginning.
I strongly caution us all to recognize that the passage of the Family Court Amendment will
result in huge, fundamental and dramatic changes in the way litigation is conducted in the
entire court system in West Virginia. This is truly just the beginning and we have
virtually a clean slate. The single greatest challenge facing West Virginia courts in 2001
will be to provide direction and leadership and to cooperate with the Legislature in
crafting the new family court system. What jurisdiction will these new courts have? Should
juvenile matters, abuse and neglect cases, adoptions, will and probate disputes, and other
similar issues be given to these new courts? How many judges are needed and what
geographical areas should they serve? These and hundreds of similar hard questions must be
answered in 2001.
Technology
West Virginia has become a national leader in the use of ATM (asynchronous transfer mode)
technology to create the Courtroom of the Future thanks to a successful partnership formed
in 1997 between Governor Cecil H. Underwood's Administration, the Governor's Office of
Technology, the Supreme Court of Appeals, the Regional Jail and Correctional Facility
Authority, the State Tax Department, and Bell Atlantic (now Verizon). ATM technology
provides a simultaneous video, audio, and data link to parties in different locations.
Our court system currently is using ATM technology to allow magistrates in county
courthouses to conduct initial appearance hearings with prisoners in regional jails.
Twelve counties are using the ATM system to conduct initial appearance hearings, and ten
more counties are close to being operational. Ultimately, the ATM system will be
operational in all 55 counties.
The present use of ATM technology for the initial appearance of prisoners helps the court
system save transportation and security costs, share information, and improve the
administration of justice. In addition to the initial appearance of prisoners, ATM
technology will have other court and non-court uses, such as expert witness testimony and
the medical examination of prisoners. The possibilities for ATM technology are only
limited by our imagination.
The Supreme Court's Web site on the Internet (www.state.wv.us/wvsca) also continued
to expand in 2000, reaching thousands of people and providing more information to the
legal community and the public.
Court Reform
Our various Supreme Court commissions also had a successful year. In 2000, the Legislature
came close to reforming our mental hygiene system from an adversarial system to a medical
model based on the recommendations of the 1999 Report of the Commission on Mental Hygiene
Reform. The Legislature will revisit the issue and I am confident we will have a
dramatically improved system to help thousands of West Virginians impacted by mental
illness.
The Supreme Court recently received a $70,000 grant from the State Justice Institute to
fund projects recommended by our Task Force on Self-Represented Litigants, including an
informational video and brochure for self-represented litigants, training for court
workers to assist self-represented litigants, and computer software for circuit clerks to
collect data on the number and nature of cases brought by self-represented litigants.
Our Workers' Compensation Mediation Program again had another successful year and received
high praise in an independent review by Roger Hanson, Ph. D. funded by a technical
assistance grant from the State Justice Institute. Dr. Hanson's report praised the
program's success in settling approximately half of all cases referred to mediation. Dr.
Hanson found that participating lawyers were very satisfied with the program, and that the
Court's leadership was a major factor in the program's success. In keeping with Dr.
Hanson's recommendation, we pledge to continue our efforts to strengthen the mediation
program and to make the settlement process a routine part of workers' compensation
practice.
Public Outreach
The Supreme Court continued to reach out to West Virginians in exciting ways in 2000. This
year, for the first time, we released an Annual Report of the West Virginia Court System
for 1999, which was very well received. The annual report is available on our Web site or
directly from the Supreme Court's Information Services Division. We also have continued
sending a version of this monthly column to newspapers throughout West Virginia.
The Supreme Court, working with circuit courts, bar members, the school system, and others
in the community, has educated almost 800 West Virginia high schools students over the
past two years through our annual LAWS Project. LAWS, an acronym for Legal Advancement for
West Virginia Students, allows students to study real Supreme Court cases in advance of
the Supreme Court hearing the cases in the students' home circuit. The Court held the
second annual LAWS at the Harrison County Courthouse in Clarksburg for 344 students in
March 2000. We also made our traditional annual visit to the West Virginia University
College of Law to hear oral arguments and judge the Baker Cup Moot Court Competition.
Finally, on a personal as well as a professional note, I was overwhelmed by the Supreme
Court's special fall docket this year. For several years, the Court has held special out
of town sessions in both the fall and spring to allow citizens who have never before seen
a Supreme Court argument better understand how the Court operates. This fall we had a
docket in Williamson. I think the whole town came out for our visit. It was a wonderful
homecoming and I am grateful to the other justices for taking the court to my hometown.
I have been honored to serve as your Chief Justice over the past year. Thanks for the
memories. I wish you and yours health and happiness in the New Year.