If you’re a court reporter working in California then you may have already heard by now that when Governor Schwarzenegger released his revised state budget on May 14th, he continued his assault on the court reporting profession by continuing to promote a plan to replace court reporters with electronic recording in California’s superior courts.

COCRA has been monitoring the situation since news broke of ER’s return and COCRA has been diligently gathering information from all of the various legislative advocates that represent court reporters including SEIU, AFSCME, IFPTE, and COCRA’s own legislative advocate Shane Gusman from the offices of Broad & Gusman.

Over the weekend, COCRA learned that the Senate decided not to place the issue of ER on their budget hearing agenda. However, COCRA understood that the matter was still on the Assembly’s budget hearing agenda.

We have just received good news on both fronts. COCRA has been told that the Assembly has NOT placed ER on their agenda. What does it mean that ER is not on the agenda for both the Senate and Assembly budget committees? It means that ER will not be discussed or recognized and it’s now a “dead” issue.

However, as Governor Schwarzenegger once promised when he was an actor many years ago, it does not mean that ER won’t be back. But COCRA continues to monitor the situation and continues to work with all parties involved in the fight to protect the court reporting profession, and more importantly, protect the public’s access to justice.