Judges take plea for raises into the court system
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- September
- 12
An international law firm with headquarters in New York City is taking Gov. Eliot Spitzer, the Legislature and the state to task for not raising judicial salaries this year. Chadbourne & Parke announced today that it filed a pro bono lawsuit on behalf of four New York judges. One of the attorneys working on the case is none other than George Bundy Smith, who served on the state’s highest court for 14 years before retiring a year ago.
The judges are seeking salary hikes and back pay from 2000 to the present. The last pay increase for judges was in January 1999.
“The state has failed to raise judges’ salaries for eight years even as inflation has raised the cost of living,â€? attorney Thomas Bezanson said in a statement. “That violates … the New York State Constitution, which states that judges’ compensation ‘shall not be diminished during the term of office for which he or she was elected or appointed.’â€?
The issue of judicial pay raises was on the table this year, but the governor and lawmakers did not reach an agreement because pay hikes for judges have been linked to increases for legislators.
“By connecting judicial salaries to legislators’ salaries and to political issues of the executive and legislative branches, the state undermines the independence of judges,” Bundy Smith said.
The firm filed the suit in state Supreme Court in New York City on behalf of a local Family Court judge, a local Civil Court judge, a local Criminal Court judge and a Cattaraugus County Family Court judge.
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on Wednesday, September 12th, 2007 at 8:32 pm by Cara Matthews.
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Jay Gallagher has covered Albany for Gannett News Service since 1984 and has been Albany Bureau chief since 1989. He`s a native of the Boston area and likes to point out that in this millennium, the score is Red Sox 1 championship, the Yankees 0. 
Cara Matthews has been a statehouse correspondent in the Albany Bureau since August 2005. Prior to that, she covered Putnam County government and politics at The Journal News for nearly five years. Before that, she worked at newspapers in Connecticut and covered the state Legislature for one of them. 
