Oregon Judicial Department briefs joint judiciary committees on rising caseloads, program expansions and judgeship needs

Nancy Kozine, identified in the hearing as the state court administrator for the Oregon Judicial Department, and Amy Miller, assistant deputy state court administrator, gave a roughly 15–20 minute overview to the joint Senate and House Judiciary committees on Jan. 21, 2025.

Kozine said Oregon’s unified state court system — which includes the Supreme Court, Court of Appeals, Tax Court and circuit courts — was established in 1981 and now includes “over 200 elected officials and approximately 2,000 staff statewide.” She described the state’s “grand bargain” arrangement: the state assumed many court functions when the system unified while counties retained responsibility for facilities and security. Kozine said the unified system allows more consistency across counties and that courts handle more than a half‑million cases annually (data for 2024 remain under reconciliation, she said).

Miller outlined programs created or expanded with legislative funding in 2022: a statewide, centralized remote child support docket staffed by court facilitators (matched with federal dollars); expansion of family treatment courts from five to 12; pretrial programs in every judicial district staffed by trained release assistance officers following Senate Bill 48 (2021); and a statewide case-management system. Miller said courts have used technology — remote hearings, eCourt public access, TurboTax‑style guided forms, electronic filing and a statewide text‑messaging reminder system — to improve access and customer service.

Both administrators stressed a series of rising demands: a spike in landlord‑tenant filings (predominantly eviction matters), increases in misdemeanors and general civil cases, greater use of set‑aside petitions since Senate Bill 397 (2021), and growing aid‑and‑assist caseloads (cases in which a defendant’s fitness to proceed is at issue and the court may order treatment to restore competency). Miller said the public‑defense system lacks sufficient capacity, calling it a crisis that affects case processing and public confidence.

Kozine and Miller also described efforts on guardianship and conservatorship oversight: a federal grant-funded self‑assessment led to a centralized financial auditing program to review complex financial filings; Kozine said courts oversee more than $1,400,000,000 in conservatorship assets and have expanded data collection and training.

Committee members asked several follow-up questions. A House member asked whether text-message hearing reminders are sent to all parties; Kozine said the text reminder system has been expanded statewide and staff would confirm whether messages go to all litigants for whom contact information exists. Several legislators asked about judgeship workload and facility constraints. Kozine said the office maintains a workload study and dashboards that estimate judges needed by district and that the department’s current estimates show need exceeding the number of judges requested this session; she added that county-provided facilities can limit the number of judges that can realistically be added in some districts.

Kozine closed by listing four bills the Judicial Department plans to present this session: judges and support staff, judicial compensation, mediation and family law-related changes, and a housekeeping/technical-fixes bill. She encouraged members to contact the department for data or to request additional information. The presentation was informational; no formal committee action on those items was taken at the meeting.