The California Supreme Court has agreed to hear a case from two Bay Area legal organizations pushing to address the state’s burgeoning court reporter shortage by requiring electronic recordings when court reporters are not available.

A “show cause” order from the high court on Feb. 19 places a petition from Family Violence Appellate Project and Bay Area Legal Aid, both based in Oakland, on its calendar.

The petition, filed in December, names the Superior Courts of Los Angeles, San Diego, Contra Costa and Santa Clara counties as respondents.

“We are incredibly grateful the Supreme Court has agreed to consider our case addressing trial courts’ inability to provide a verbatim (word-for-word) record of what happens in thousands of court hearings every day resulting in devastating effects to low-income litigants, including survivors of domestic abuse,” said a statement from Jennafer Wagner, director of programs for the Family Violence Appellate Project.

California law requires court reporters in all felony and juvenile proceedings and limits the use of electronic recordings as an accurate means of providing verbatim records to criminal misdemeanor, limited civil and infraction cases.

In instances where electronic recording is not permitted and where court-employed reporters are not mandated, self-represented litigants face heavy financial burdens to hire a private court reporter and often can’t afford the $3,000 to $5,000 cost per day, the L.A. County Superior Court system has estimated.

The petition asks the Supreme Court to require that trial courts electronically record court proceedings for low-income people when the court cannot provide a free court reporter. Electronic recording is widely and successfully used elsewhere, including the California Courts of Appeal, which considers more than 500 cases per year.

Access to justice

Bay Area Legal Aid attorneys frequently see first-hand that access to justice in California too often comes at the cost of a private court reporter, said Brenda Star Adams, the organization’s director of litigation.

“We are thankful that in accepting our case, the Supreme Court has recognized the importance of this issue,” Adams said. “Wealth must not be the deciding factor in determining access to justice.”

Los Angeles, Santa Clara, and Contra Costa Superior Courts have issued orders to help tackle court reporter shortages, but are not addressing the problem fully, while San Diego Superior Court is “regularly failing,” Bay Area Legal Aid said.

Los Angeles Superior Court officials declined to specifically comment on the petition.

“However, the leadership of the Superior Court of Los Angeles County is committed to ensuring fair and equal access to justice,” the court said in a statement. “This commitment includes safeguarding litigants’ full appellate rights by providing access to a verbatim record of their proceedings when a court-employed court reporter is unavailable and fundamental rights or liberty interests are at stake.”

High vacancies

The LASC Court Reporter Crisis Dashboard, unveiled in August 2024 to detail efforts to fill more than 125 court reporter vacancies, indicated more than 525,000 family law, probate and unlimited civil proceedings occurred in the county without verbatim records from Jan. 1, 2023, through June 30, 2024. Updated figures to the dashboard were not immediately available.

The shortage raises due process concerns for people in child custody disputes, divorces, restraining orders, conservatorships and other proceedings.

The L.A. Superior Court system spent nearly $14 million in state funds from July 2022 to June 2024 to retain and recruit court reporters. Its extensive recruitment campaign included advertising on billboards and bus stations across the county.

It has also offered a variety of incentives, including a $50,000 signing bonus for new hires and a $25,000 finder’s fee for referrals from court employees.

In September 2024, LASC issued a general order permitting recording during certain family law, probate and civil proceedings when court reporters are not available to address the growing “constitutional crisis.”

However, the order has put litigants at risk of faulty recordings and incomplete or inaccurate transcripts, and does not guarantee their ability to appeal cases, according to the Los Angeles County Court Reporters Association.

Union critique

“We are dismayed that the Los Angeles Superior Court, after failing to invest in a strong court reporter workforce time and again, is now using the court-created crisis to threaten access to quality transcripts,” Cindy Tachell, then president of the union, said after the order was issued. “The LA Superior Court needs to start working with us to effectively recruit and retain qualified court reporters instead of actively undermining this vital profession.”

There were 4,587 licensed court reporters living in California as of Jan. 1.

According to the California Department of Consumer Affairs, the total number of licensees declined nearly 21% and the number of new license applications declined by nearly 43% from 2013 to 2023, suggesting the pool of licensed court reporters will continue to shrink.

California faces several obstacles in filing the ranks of dwindling court reporters.

The state, for example, does not make exceptions in its licensing requirements for certified court reporters who relocate from other states. A perception also exists that compensation for court reporters in the private sector is greater than in the trial courts. Industry experts say those hired by attorneys for depositions and the like are able to charge as much as a “couple of thousand dollars” per day.