Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson appeared before the Joint Finance Committee making her case for the court system's 275-million dollar two year budget request.
The Chief Justice said the proposal won't address all the challenges but is a step in the right direction. Some of those challenges, she said, are the need for more interpreters and counties struggling to fund circuit courts while trying to keep property taxes down.
The Chief Justice also wanted to clear up a misconception about the state's popular public website for accessing court records, Wisconsin Circuit Court Access, which gets two to three million hits daily. But it is known as WCCA not C-CAP which is the internal case management system.
Some in the legislature have been confusing the two.. thinking a fee is being proposed for the public site. The Chief Justice says there is no intention of setting such a fee.