Posted by Dave on 02/02/07 at 10:04:58 am
Categories: Crime and Justice, Chicago/Illinois

As I have discussed before, Todd Stroger is forcing the Cook County Public Defender's Office to make drastic cuts - both in number of employees and in wages. Here is what it comes down to:

Our Office received notice from President Todd Stroger that he plans on attempting to impose 4-day work weeks and 10-day furloughs. The Notice states the following in pertinent part:

As you know, Cook County is facing a severe budget crisis. I am writing to inform A.F.S.C.M.E. Local 3315 that Cook County will take the following actions that will effect members of A.F.S.C.M.E. Local 3315 employed in the Office of the Public Defender:

1. Effective March 5, 2007, no work week of any assistant public defender will exceed four (4) days, and ten (10) of the workweeks during the period between March 5, 2007, and the end of 2007will not exceed three (3) days.

2. Effective March 5, 2007, the salary of each assistant public defender will be reduced proportionately to reflect the reduced workweeks.

3. Effective as of the close of business on March 16, 2007, Cook County will lay off thirty-six assistant public defenders.

On top of the layoffs, the paycuts add up to a 24% cut in wages.

Of course, this go against the union agreement, so there could me signficant problems with this deal. But there are a couple of things that are even more concerning. For one, Public Defender Edwin Burnette, who directs the office, is receiving almost a $12,000 salary increase. So while he prepared a new budget for Stroger that cut 36% of his PDs and cut the salaries of the rest by 24%, he secured what ammounts to an 8% increase in his own salary.

But even more disturbing is the fact that the Public Defense system is already broken. There are not enough lawyers for way too many cases. Added to that is the frustratingly low wages that PDs receive in relation to the vast majority of lawyers around the country. Basically we have underpaid and overworked lawyers now being forces to be paid less.

Doesn't that sound good to you?

Todd Stroger is leading the way, along with Edwin Burnette, to run the Cook County Public Defenders Office into the ground. There are great lawyers who love what they do in that office, even though they are the bottom of the totem pole in the legal world in terms of pay and prestige. And they work their ass off to provide quality legal care and advice to thousands of indigent defendants.

Who really loses here? While not minimizing the loss of jobs/pay, the PDs that get laid off will probably be able to find other jobs. The PDs with cut salaries should survive. But the poor defendants will suffer the most - those who are unable to afford a lawyer. Don't get me wrong - they will still be defended, just not as well. They CCPD office will be more stretched than it already is, which will lead to overworked lawyers who simply cannot give enough to their clients.

And of course, no one really will care, because who cares about poor criminal defendants, right? People only will care if you are white and rich.

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