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Wednesday, July 06, 2011

Ind. Courts - "St. Joseph County prosecutor, judges, sheriff receive bump in pay"

On June 17th the ILB posted this entry, that began:

Updating this ILB entry from May 2, and the update from May 8th, Chief Justice Shepard has now posted an order headed "Approval of Salary Adjustment," filed June 16, 2011.
The result in St. Joe County is reported in this story today by Erin Blasko in the South Bend Tribune. Although she has it somewhat wrong:
SOUTH BEND — Local judges and prosecutors, along with the sheriff, received a pay raise this month thanks to Gov. Mitch Daniels.

Under Indiana law, if the governor adjusts pay for employees serving in the executive branch, judicial officers in the state are entitled to an equivalent adjustment.

Daniels did just that in April, including in the state budget a pay increase of 1.3 percent for executive branch employees as a way to "recognize financially the hard work" of those employees.

As a result, circuit and superior court judges here, as well as Prosecutor Michael Dvorak, his chief deputy and one of his other deputies, all received equivalent pay raises effective July 1.

Randall Shepard, chief justice of the Indiana Supreme Court, issued an "Approval of Statutory Adjustment," which officially approved the raises, on June 16.

Actually, this year the budget bill was written so that the state's judges and prosecutors would receive a pay raise equivalent to that received by executive branch employees only if the Chief Justice signed off on it. See the links at the beginning of this entry for the details.

As for the details of the raises, reporter Blasko writes:

Judges and prosecutors in the state earn the same amount, exactly $127,280 annually now with the raise. Locally, each also receives a $5,000 stipend each year from the county.

The judicial officers that received pay raises are all paid by the state.

Incidental to all of this, Sheriff Mike Grzegorek, who is paid by the county, also received a raise this month, increasing his annual salary from $125,647 to $127,280, or $1,633, the same as the prosecutor and judges.

By state statute, sheriff and prosecutor pay rises and falls together.

According to county Auditor Pete Mullen, Grzegorek’s raise is automatic, meaning it does not need to be approved by the council or board of commissioners.

In a fiscal impact statement issued in May, the Legislative Services Agency calculated the annual cost of the pay raises for state judicial officers at about $1.08 million in fiscal year 2012 and 2013.

As for appellate judges, according to this survey from the National Center for State Courts, as of Jan. 1, 2011 (i.e. before the raise), the salary of an Indiana Court of Appeals judge was $147,103, and a Supreme Court Justice, $151,328. This is about the same as the State of New York.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on July 6, 2011 05:54 PM
Posted to Indiana Courts