KnowYourJudge.com launched to educate public on the availability of Judicial Performance Data
August 3, 2010 - CJI is proud to be a part of a new campaign to make the voting public in Colorado aware of independent, non-partisan data on the performance of judges appearing on the 2010 fall ballot. KnowYourJudge.com is the product of a partnership between the Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System, the Colorado Bar Association, the League of Women Voters of Colorado, and the Colorado Judicial Institute. The campaign includes the website, television ads and radio ads that will run through October.
"Making the public aware of evaluation data is a critical effort if we expect our system of judicial selection and evaluation to continue to be a national model," said Dana Nelson, Executive Director of CJI. "The accountability offered to voters through judicial retention elections requires that they have the opportunity to review non-partisan data about how each judge appearing on their ballots does their job," said Nelson.
The ads were created by Dewey Obenchain Films, Inc., an Academy Award winning film and video production company based in Denver. The people appearing in the ad are "average" citizens - not actors with pre-scripted dialogue. Polling data from early 2010 has shown that the majority of likely voters have no idea where to find information on judges and frequently skip voting on judges or develop novel systems to guide their voting - voting for only the judges with S or D names, voting an alternating pattern of "yes" and "no".
Find Judicial Performance Data Here!
CJI Elected New Board Members, Officers at Annual Meeting
CJI held the 2010 annual meeting on Thursday, May 13th at the Mountain States Employers Council in Denver. During the meeting, the CJI membership elected board members, elected board officers and thanks outgoing board chair Bob Miller for two years of service as chair.
Elected to the board were Carolyn Jefferson Jenkins, Ph.D. and Mark W. Pedigo, CPA/ABV/LCFF/CVA/CFFA. Carolyn is currently serving as Executive Director of Learning Services for Douglas County Public Schools. Mark is a principal in the Forensic & Litigation Consulting Group at GHP Horwath. More information the new board members can be found by clicking here.
CJI also elected a slate of current board members to new terms. Elected to a new three-year term was:
Steve Briggs — JAG, Inc.
Hon. Russell Carparelli — Colorado Court of Appeals
Mark Fogg — Kennedy Childs & Fogg P.C.
Hon. Robert Fullerton — Retired
Michael J. Gallagher — Davis Graham & Stubbs LLP
Anne Garcia — Rose Community Foundation
Elinor Miller Greenberg, EdD. — EMG and Associates
David Hersh — Burg Simpson Eldredge Hersh & Jardine, P.C.
Otto K. Hilbert, II — Robinson Waters & O’Dorisio PC
Michael J. Hofmann — Holme Roberts & Owen LLP
Michael L. O’Donnell — Wheeler Trigg O’Donnell, LLP
Lance Tanaka — American Arbitration Association.
For the complete story, please click here.
Voters Turn Against Politicians on the Bench
by Bob Ewegen
Retired Denver Post Editor and Columnist
CJI Journalist In Residence, CJI Board Member
Denver—Americans have been shocked by abuses in the legal system as special interests wage multi-million dollar campaigns to elect their hand-picked candidates to high judicial offices. Now, more states are turning toward nonpartisan judicial merit selection systems such as Colorado’s, two prominent legal reformers told the Colorado Judicial Institute’s fourth annual membership breakfast March 18.
About 120 people came to the University Club to hear Rebecca Love Kourlis and Theresa Spahn outline judicial reform efforts. Kourlis is a former justice of the Colorado Supreme Court who now leads the Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System at the University of Denver. Spahn is director of the Institute’s O’Connor Judicial Selection Initiative. To read complete article click here.
Supreme Court Justice Ginsburg: End State Judicial Elections
Thursday, March 11 - In remarks to the National Association of Women Judges, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg stated that ending judicial elections at the state and local level would be the one reform she would make to the nations justice system. Read the full text of the Washington Post story here.
High Court Ruling Proves Need to Choose Judges by Merit
The January 21st U.S. Supreme Court ruling that opened the floodgates for corporate and labor union contributions to political campaigns only underscores the wisdom – and growing necessity – for the kind of judicial merit selection systems in place in Colorado, Bob Miller, chair of the Colorado Judicial Institute, said Monday.
Miller, former U. S. Attorney for Colorado, pointed to another high court ruling – last June’s Caperton decision – as evidence that runaway campaign spending in states that still elect their judges in contested elections can undermine public confidence in the courts. Read more here.
Public Education Program OUR COURTS Wins National Honor
February, 2010 - The Our Courts public education program, a joint program of the Colorado Bar Association and CJI, has been awarded the American Bar Association's 2010 Burnham "Hod" Greeley Award.
The award recognizes extraordinary outreach efforts that show the public the need for a fair and impartial judiciary. Judges evaluated the nominations for significant, positive impacts on public understanding of the role of the judiciary in a democratic society and for ability to convey the importance of the judiciary’s role in the rule of law. The award is named in honor of the late Hawaii attorney Burnham “Hod” Greeley, a dedicated ABA leader who was committed to promoting public trust and confidence in our justice system.
The award was presented on February 5th at the ABA annual mid-year meeting in Orlando, Florida.
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