Budget Testimony
State's Attorney's Office
Richard A. Devine
January 24, 2005
As the State's Attorney of Cook County, it is my responsibility
to prosecute crimes and to serve as the attorney for
Cook County government and its elected officials. Each
year the budget process requires that we balance our
commitment to professional prosecution and representation
with the need to live within available resources.
I do come before the Board with some appreciation of
the challenges you face. We have been in difficult times
for the past three or four years. We are prepared to
work with you to see what can be done to achieve savings
without compromising vital services.
The budget for FY 2005 is particularly
challenging because Cook County, like all other levels
of government, has faced revenue shortages for several
years. As a consequence, proposed cuts have an even
greater impact than in prior years. For example, we
lost over thirty positions in our office last year.
We have fewer assistant state's attorneys today than
we did in the year 1997. Moreover, we have seen a decrease
of over $800,000 in the non-personnel accounts, which
fund such vital services as extraditions, protection
of witnesses and hiring of experts for trial. In fact,
our budget for the non-personnel items is substantially
lower today than it was in 2001.
During these years of reduced budgets
we have been required to look closely at our operations
and make every effort to maximize efficiencies. We have
identified cost-saving measures and asked assistant
state's attorneys, investigators and administrative
personnel to assume increased workloads as we have reduced
the number of people performing that work.
Despite these actions, we are asked to
do more this year. At the request of several Commissioners,
we went back and reviewed our proposed 2005 budget once
again. We have determined that through the watchful
management of open slots caused by resignations we can
hope to achieve a further 1% cut in expenditures. This
is in addition to positions previously deleted.
Our work is vital to the community. We
cannot live together without an appropriate level of
public safety. There cannot be any sense of community
unless those who commit violent crimes are held accountable
for what they do. That is the job of our office. Unlike
our counterparts on the federal side, we do not, as
a rule, have the luxury of deciding which cases we will
prosecute. Police departments from throughout Cook County
bring hundreds of thousands of cases to us each year.
Where the evidence exists, we have an obligation under
the law to go forward. Despite the good news that crime
rates are down, this has not resulted in fewer cases
being tried in our courts. The reality is that the number
of cases in the criminal justice system in Cook County
has not fallen. Caseloads in our courtrooms today are
as large or larger than in past years.
In fact, the justice system faces a challenge
today which we are determined to meet. There are simply
too many cases that are over two years old. The community
and especially victims and their families, have the
right to expect that cases move forward at a reasonable
pace. As prosecutors we are required to try cases within
120 or 180 days, depending on whether the defendant
is in custody. But more important than that legal requirement,
cases do not as a rule get better for us as they age.
Having said that, I have made it clear
to all our ASAs that we must do everything we can to
make sure that cases are ready for trial as soon as
possible. On January 18th I wrote the Presiding Judge
of the Criminal Division and the Public Defender stating
that we must give our personal attention to this issue.
We are meeting tomorrow to identify the oldest cases
and set a tight schedule for each one to resolve whatever
issues exist and get them to trial.
In addition to our basic workload in the
courts, we have increasing demands for our services.
For example, identity theft is one of the fastest growing
crimes in the country. The public is justifiably asking
that police and prosecutors find the resources to combat
this new threat. Doing so requires prosecutors and investigators
who can devote their time to developing the knowledge
and expertise in this challenging and complex area of
crime so that we can hold offenders accountable.
There are other important challenges.
Prosecutors from our Gang Unit in the Special Prosecutions
Bureau and theNarcotics Bureau have been working closely
with the Chicago Police Department to attack the major
gang structures in Chicago. Their excellent work is
reflected in the significant reduction in homicides
in 2004, along with most other violent crimes.
The Chicago Police Department rightly
believes that we should do more of a good thing. Accordingly,
they plan to double the number of street corner conspiracy
investigations in 2005. These are labor-intensive investigations
that seek to take down entire drug operations. Our ASAs
work closely with the police on these cases and have
enjoyed great success in prosecuting them. Besides preparing
and trying cases, they work with the police to draft
warrants and provide legal advice for the investigators.
We have a total of twelve ASAs doing this
work. They put in long hours because the demands of
the job far outstrip our resources. And now it will
get worse. We should be adding prosecutors to this unit,
but instead we will at best hold the line.
I should add one more example of the impact
of previous budget cuts. Because of the need to reduce
and reallocate resources, many assistant state's attorneys
in our suburban districts have to perform double duty
when they are on call for felony review. This means
that an assistant in a courtroom could be trying a case
during the day and have to go out on a felony review
call in the evening. Besides making for a long day,
this not - uncommon scenario could affect a prosecutor's
trial work, in that preparation of witnesses and development
of strategy are often done in the evening after court
is finished for the day. Obviously no trial preparation
will take place if the assistant is at a police station
interviewing a suspect. Of course, no one will pay attention
until a violent criminal is acquitted or a felony review
assistant is late getting to the police station. Then
the questions are raised as to what happened. What happened
will be that assistant state's attorneys were simply
asked to cover too many responsibilities as budgets
continually reduced our work force.
I could continue, but suffice it to say
that we are seriously stretched now. There is little
give in the budget we have, and at some point something
will snap. The unfortunate part is that a snap in our
office can directly affect the quality of justice provided
to the people of this community.
That is why I have reservations about
across-the-board cuts. I recognize that it is an attractive
approach because it is simple, but it also runs the
risk of cutting muscle and bone along with the fat.
Everything is treated as of equal importance, but that
is not the reality. Some functions of county government
are more vital to our community than others.
I have been of the view for some time
that we should identify the essential functions we have
to perform, determine what it will take to carry them
out, and make sure the necessary funding is provided
for that work. After that, we should prioritize the
things we would like to do and determine what support
should be given to those projects.
I believe it is reasonable to say that
public safety and health care are fundamental to our
community. They must be the top priority of our funding.
But even within those budgets, each of us should be
prepared to review on a line-by-line basis what we are
utilizing funds for. To my knowledge, that has never
been done. Only, when we do so will we have an honest
and sensible approach to funding services for the people
of this community.
As I have noted, I am proud of the achievements that
we have had during my almost nine years in office. We
created a nationally recognized Domestic Violence Unit.
We completely revamped drug prosecutions to go after
the major drug dealers while diverting users of small
amounts of drugs to treatment programs. We helped create
and staff the Child Advocacy Center, which assists young
victims of sexual assault in getting through a traumatic
experience. The Child Advocacy Center had to be manned
by taking fifteen assistant state's attorneys from other
duties because there was funding for the building but
not for the people in the building. We managed to do
this, but not without consequences. Other assistant
state's attorneys simply had to work harder to free
up the resources for the Advocacy Center.
We also created our Community Prosecution
Unit by reallocating existing resources. We now have
five offices in the city and suburbs staffed by ten
ASAs and five support personnel. Prosecutors work out
of storefronts in the community. They deal directly
with individuals and neighborhood groups to resolve
quality of life issues. Their good work is evidenced
by the many requests we have had from elected officials,
including members of this Board, for offices in their
districts. This is a good idea that works but will be
jeopardized by additional significant cuts.
Some have suggested that cuts can be accomplished
by reducing or even eliminating the Special Prosecutions
Bureau. In this scenario the prosecutors in the Felony
Trial Division would handle the work of the Special
Prosecutions Bureau. This view misses the reason for
having the bureau. Each of the Bureau's units was created
so that ASAs could develop an expertise in an important
area and use that knowledge in vertical prosecution.
For example, it is critical to have assistants who know
the structure and hierarchies of the major gangs in
our community. That bank of knowledge allows our assistants
to build solid cases against gang leaders.
The same is true for cold cases and financial crimes.
It would be impossible for prosecutors assigned to a
courtroom to handle their daily calls of violent crime
and at the same time conduct long term investigations
of complex financial crimes or help solve the Brown's
Chicken murders in Palatine.
It is important to note that we maximize
our resources by having the prosecutors in the Special
Prosecutions Bureau team up with the felony division
assistants to try the cases.
I have several comments regarding the
budget package you have received. In the first place,
there was an erroneous report that appeared in the Chicago
Law Bulletin that we had added 49 positions in this
budget. That simply is not the case. The misunderstanding
was because the budget for the first time combined funds
and positions from the narcotic forfeiture funds with
those supported by the county budget. In fact, the forfeiture
fund itself lost spots. The 49 employees supported by
that fund reflect a reduction of six from prior years.
The bottom line is that we have neither asked for nor
received funds for any additional state's attorneys
or any other personnel in our budget.
Some of the categories in the budget require
explanation. For example, what is identified as the
State's Attorney's Request is not based on an initial
submission by our office. We were given a structure
to work with, and we did so. As a result, that category
reflects some initial actions taken by the County Administration.
There are also some new accounting approaches that have
been implemented by the County Administration. For example,
the current budget adopts a new approach for the matching
funds account (818). An increase in that account was
funded by decreasing a number of our operating accounts
and county-wide charge backs. The result is a virtual
wash. Unfortunately, the decrease in operating accounts
could have a significant impact on our work over the
course of the year. For example, our extradition account,
if left as is, may run out of funds during the year,
leaving us unable to bring back charged criminals from
other states. We have never been unable to bring back
a violent criminal from another jurisdiction. This would
be a first, and certainly not a first that the people
in this community would like to see happen.
There are certain positions that have
been identified as deleted. Some of the deletions we
can live with. Others will affect operations. For example
one of the positions deleted was used to dispatch felony
review assistants to cover cases being investigated
by the police. This is a vital function of our office
which should not be undercut. One of the victim witness
coordinator spots deleted served as a Spanish speaking
resource at Branch 50. This is, again, vital work that
must be performed. We have also seen three assistant
state's attorney slots deleted. Because of budget restraints
from last year, two of those slots were not utilized
during the 2004 fiscal year, but one slot was. As noted,
any further deletion of assistant slots can have serious
consequences.
On the plus side, I want to thank the
County Administration and the County Board for including
a $3 million allocation for the creation for a computer
system in our Criminal Bureau. This is the first time
that we have had this support. In fact a Crain's article
a few months ago identified our office as being at the
bottom of county agencies in computer capability. This
was not because we saw this as a low priority. We have
been seeking for several years to upgrade our computer
systems but without success. I am delighted that we
are at last moving forward on this important part of
our justice process. I should note that this is simply
not an advance in some esoteric capability but one which
will allow us to be sure that all documents from the
police department have been retrieved and forwarded
to defendants as part of discovery. There are countless
other pluses of having a decent computer operation in
a prosecutor's office but that is certainly one of the
main ones.
As I noted earlier, your job is a difficult
one, and we are committed to working with you to achieve
a budget that ensures that we all meet our important
responsibilities to the people of Cook County with the
resources available to us.
Respectfully submitted
Richard A. Devine
State's Attorney of Cook County
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