Perry proposes pay raises for judges (TEXAS)

Fort Worth Appeals Court Judge Bob McCoy's promotion about a year ago came with a more prestigious title, a law clerk -- and a pay cut.

The former state district judge's salary dropped from $114,000 to $112,000 when he was appointed to the 2nd Court of Appeals by Gov. Rick Perry.

"While I was honored and I'm still honored that I was appointed to the court of appeals, after I thought about it, I wasn't sure how many more of these honors I could afford," McCoy said.

In an effort to boost salaries for McCoy and other judges on the state's top courts for the first time in nearly 8 years, Perry is recommending spending an additional $6.6 million.

Under Perry's proposal, base pay would jump by about 30 percent for the 18 justices on the Texas Supreme Court and the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals and for the 80 judges on the state's 14 appeals courts.

Texas Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn and Sen. Robert Duncan, R-Lubbock, a member of the Senate Finance Committee, have endorsed separate proposals that would include raises for the 424 trial-court judges as well.

"I think there is a recognition, without sounding too melodramatic, that there is a crisis in the judiciary," said Linda Thomas, chief justice of the 5th Court of Appeals in Dallas.

Thomas said that many judges cite the relatively low pay as a reason for leaving. A first-year associate at a large law firm can make $125,000 a year or more, studies show.

Perry vetoed the last proposed pay raise for judges, in 2001. It would have been the first such raise since 1997 and the second in 12 years.

Texas ranks 39th in the country in salaries for judges in its highest courts and 34th in salaries for appeals-court judges, studies indicate.

The result: The average tenure for an appeals court judge is about six years and for a state district judge about eight years, according to a comptroller's report released in December.

Texas Supreme Court Chief Justice Wallace Jefferson, who became the first African-American in that post last year, has said his salary will be a factor in whether he serves beyond 2008.

Perry spokesman Robert Black said steps must be taken to keep good judges on the bench.

"The governor believes we are too rapidly losing some of our best and brightest for the simple reason that we cannot compete or come close to competing with the private sector," Black said.

The last time the state's 522 sitting judges got a raise was in 1997, when lawmakers set the salary for the state's highest courts at $113,000 a year, appellate judges' pay at $107,350 and trial court judges' pay at $101,700.

Those salaries were based on a formula that sets pay for appellate court judges at 95 percent of what the justices at the top two courts earn. Trial court judges earn 90 percent of what the top-court justices make.

Tarrant and six other counties asked the Legislature for authority to supplement local judges' income with local tax dollars, allowing the lower-court judges to make more than some of the state's top judges.

In Tarrant County, for example, a state district court judge can get a supplement of up to $16,000, depending on years of service, to boost pay to as much as $117,760. The county also supplements the pay of the appeals court judges.

Perry's proposal would bump the pay for the Supreme Court and Court of Criminal Appeals justices to about $148,000 a year. The salary for appeals court judges would jump to about $140,000.

Salary increases for state district court judges are not listed as a priority in Perry's plan, although Thomas said she has been assured by members of the governor's staff that they won't work against it.

"The judges are all in agreement that this is a statewide, systemwide crisis and that there is no one individual group of judges that is more deserving than the other," Thomas said.

In her December report, Strayhorn suggests raising the base salary for trial-court judges by about 5 percent, from $101,700 to $107,000.

The comptroller also recommends basing pay on district-court judges' salaries, including the supplements paid to trial judges in the five largest metropolitan counties.

Under Strayhorn's plan, justices at the Supreme Court and the Court of Criminal Appeals would get 120 percent of that pay, or about $151,000. Appellate-court judges would get 110 percent, or about $138,000.

Strayhorn, who may run in the Republican primary against Perry for governor, sent letters to the homes of trial-court judges in December touting her plan and her report.

"I am proud of our state's judges, and I believe being a judge should be the pinnacle of a distinguished legal career, not a financial penalty," Strayhorn wrote.

Duncan filed legislation last week that uses the same funding formula for high-court and appellate judges' salaries that Strayhorn's plan does. It sets a higher base salary for trial judges -- $125,000 -- but eliminates supplements.

He said the $50 million for pay raises would come from increasing criminal case filing fees by $2 and civil-case-filing fees by $35.

"I can think of no better purpose for a fee increase than to adequately pay our judiciary," Duncan said.

Duncan said lawmakers may have been reluctant to raise salaries because their retirement benefits are tied to the judicial salaries. To remove that barrier, Duncan's bill would tie legislators' retirement benefits to the governor's salary.

Thomas said, "I am cautiously optimistic that there is going to come from all this a plan that everyone can sign off on and be relatively happy."

Thank you Perry for alienating another Republican: me.

Of course, you've had plenty of time to do it. This isn't the only thing you've done. In TX, RINOs end up out of office, even if it means a Rat is elected. Because as we all know, what is the difference?

First he loads up the court system with RINOs and cronie judicial recruits taken out of the megalawfirms that bankroll his campaigns. Next he tries to give them all a pay raise.

I'm sorry, but many of Perry's judicial appointments are among the most underworked public officials in the state! Several of them exploit the "visiting judge" system, which means a subordinate visiting judge (normally a part time ex judge who has retired or even a Democrat ex judge who got booted off the bench by the voters) gets picked up by the real judge to do the day-to-day routine court stuff. The real judge in turn spends the day at leisure and stamps the papers with his signature at the end of the day, collecting a salary as if he's done an honest day's work when in fact he's done nothing. Those types of people do NOT need a pay raise and do NOT deserve to be making 6 figures. RINO Rick needs to go!

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