Dallas commissioners may consider cutting judges’ pay over case backlog

At least two of five Dallas County commissioners have threatened to slash district judge salaries during the upcoming budget cycle if the criminal court case backlog is not sharply reduced. Commissioners J.J. Koch and John Wiley Price want to vote in the coming weeks on the possibility of withholding the county’s portion of district judges’ salaries over the number of active cases waiting for a trial. Courthouses nationwide shut down at the beginning of the pandemic, suspending jury trials and dismissing cases, but case filings did not stop. As courtrooms began slowly reopening, massive criminal case backlogs confronted many judges. Dallas County allocated $3 million of its federal COVID-19 relief dollars to address a logjam of 20,767 active and pending felony cases, but Price said the district courts have no policy in place to report the use of these funds for backlogged cases.

The two commissioners worry about a potential audit of the use of these federal funds. “That is something I think we should look into regarding some of those performance issues and disclosure issues. If we can’t do our job, we have to have some way of holding them accountable,” Koch said at Tuesday’s regular Commissioners Court meeting. “I think that additional salary that we provide to them should be on the table.” A district judge in Dallas County earns between $158,000 and $194,000, depending on experience. Most of that sum is paid by the state, but many urban counties provide a “supplemental salary.” Dallas County contributes $18,000 of a district judge’s total annual salary. Price and Koch are considering asking the Commissioners Court to withhold that $18,000 in the next budget cycle until they see results. The metric potentially tied to their salaries has yet to be determined.