I call today's meeting.

Find the date.

January 27th at 1030 a.m.

In addition to being able to attend in person, remote attendance has been made available to the public via Zoom.

And at the link on the agenda, this meeting is being recorded through Zoom.

We have been notified in advance that Member Dan Forth has requested to participate electronically due to uh work.

A physical quorum is present so that we may mark as present and we are um and he is eligible to vote on matters before the committee today.

As a reminder to members attending remotely, please ensure your camera is on at all times.

All right.

Will you please join me in the Pledge of Allegiance?

I pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands.

One nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice call.

Thank you.

May you have a roll call, please.

Yeah.

Member Altenburg?

Here.

Uh Chair Cunningham is absent.

Member Dan Ford.

Present.

Member Kniesek is absent.

Member Kyle is absent.

Member Peterson.

Vice Chair Roberts here.

Ex officio member Hart.

I'm here, but I don't think I don't think I'm able to vote on this, right?

Because we have you will be you are you're the physical quorum.

Yeah.

You may excuse me.

It's okay.

But I I make a quorum, but even though he's remote.

I I'm happy to vote, but I just wanted to.

Why don't I vote?

And if it doesn't matter, it doesn't matter.

Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Is there an addenda to the agenda?

No addenda to the agenda.

Public comments.

No public comment.

Thank you.

Uh chair remarks.

Um, well, I'm not the chair, but I'm the vice chair and I just welcome everybody.

Any unfinished business?

No unfinished business.

New business.

We start at uh I need a motion for consent.

Any motion for the consent agent motion by Member Altberg, second by Peterson.

All in favor.

Okay.

All right.

8.4.

Um director of finance, 19th circuit, Lisa Wolf.

I need, do I need a motion?

We do need help.

A motion and a second.

A motion by Aldenberg, second by Peterson.

And then just if you can read what the I'm sorry.

This is a joint resolution authorizing an emergency appropriation with offsetting revenue in the amount of 14,000 to support the 19th Judicial Circuit Court's disability accessibility improvement program.

Hi, good morning.

Lisa Wolf, Director of Finance for the 19th Circuit Court.

Um, this is this our disability and accessibility uh grant is actually the second year that we've received this grant.

I would like to give a shout out to Elizabeth Bogey, who has been a staunch advocate for ensuring access to justice.

Um as in with last year's grant, we are continuing on with the um uh cart services as well as um court reporter and transcript fees.

Um however, last year we did in mobility scooter.

This year our initiative is the automatic door opener for the law library.

Okay.

So that way people using that scooter can then access that library.

Um happy to answer any questions.

Uh do you have a quote any questions?

Uh Chair Hart.

Thank you.

So um we have had some conversations regarding the law library and whether or not it's going to remain there.

Um so I just wanted to understand, and and this is uh an award, and it's very important that we have this disability uh accessibility.

I guess I just wanted to understand um for potential future use, those doors would remain.

Do we have any idea?

I don't know if that's a facilities question.

Yeah, unfortunately, I'm sorry, I don't have the information for that.

Okay.

Looks like Carl May.

Carl wants to come up.

Yeah, something.

In all of our discussions to date, I think the earliest you would see a law library move, even under the best of circumstances would be five plus years out.

Um when you look at the way it has to be staggered, um, each phase of any future construction project, I think that would probably be one of the last things to be done.

So I think certainly this modification would be in use for many years before it had to be, I guess, torn apart.

Got it.

Thank you.

Thank you for answering that question.

And if people aren't aware of it, um, I just wanted to make sure people in the audience, as well as my uh colleagues, um, the law library is really a reference library, right?

And so it's very difficult for members of the public, uh like I'll say myself, if I want to go down there and figure out how to use that library, I I don't know how I would do that, right?

Having worked in a reference library before, um, oftentimes you need somebody to go and sort of fetch materials for you.

So my argument has been and continues to be um utilizing space on the first floor for a lie a law library um might not be the best use of that space.

Uh, because if we could make it easier for our residents who come in to use the clerk's office, the treasurer's office, um, the clerk of the circuit court, the recorder of deeds, um, all of those things.

Perhaps there's some opportunity to make it uh easier for our residents, as well as just thinking about how we use our space across all of our facilities, and certainly that would include this one as well.

So thank you.

Thank you.

Uh, any other questions?

So I I have one question.

So you it says that the grant funds of 14,000 will cover the entire amount, so you know you've done your research, obviously.

An older estimate on the automatic door opener.

Um, a couple of years ago, it came in at 5800.

We've estimated 7,000 for it.

Um, in the event that it's you know comes in higher than that, we can reallocate some of the reporter fees over.

Okay.

We'll make accommodations.

All right, thank you.

If there are no other questions, I call a vote.

All in favor?

Aye.

None opposed.

Motion carries.

Thank you.

All right.

Uh 8.5 is I'll need a motion and a second to approve a joint resolution authorizing an emergency appropriation with the offset revenue in the amount of twelve thousand dollars to support a trauma informed mural project at the Hall's detention center.

Motion by Peterson, second by Altonberg.

Go ahead.

Uh yes, this uh grant is uh first time for us.

This will actually provide funding um to work with the local artist.

Um it also um it works into our commitment to integrating art into the programming um for healing and engagements.

Um if we'd be happy to answer any questions with me is James Edwards, our director of juvenile facilities.

Thank you.

I I do have a question.

Um they're beautiful.

They can they are statements.

So I just wondered when you the decision was made or if it's not made yet, what what the artwork is going to be.

Did you include the entire juvenile detention community in that process?

Well, we'll what we'll get will be artist renderings.

If you've seen some of his work, you'll see it on Belvedere as you're going east toward, you know, kind of toward this way Evert Reynolds.

And um, what we want to do is look at some artist renderings and then get a lot of input from both residents, obviously the chief judge and others, and as we take a look at how we want those to look.

So the plan is to have one in the cafe, which is also used for visitation as well as in the gym on both sides.

Thank you.

Yeah, member Altabertis.

Yes.

You know what they like and don't like.

And so that sounds, you know, I think it's art is a great expressive way for people to really support their feelings and tell the world, you know, what's happening with them.

So I think I think it's really great to have some type of project like that in this youth community where maybe a lot of these, you know, people who are there have not had these types of opportunities before.

So I think it's, you know, it's a thoughtful way to it'll be participatory with the artists, yes.

Yeah, exactly.

Yeah, that's great.

Yeah, definitely a sense of ownership.

That's what I guess I was looking to hear.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Anyone else?

Okay.

All in favor?

Aye.

None opposed.

Motion carries.

Thank you.

Um, item 8.6, public defender.

Uh I need a motion and second for a joint resolution authorizing two principal public defenders to staff a newly consolidated domestic violent courtroom at an estimated cost of approximately 135,000 for the remainder of fiscal 2026.

And we have second by Peterson.

Um public defender correct test.

Good morning.

That's the text.

I know who you are.

It's a rough death.

Good morning, everybody.

So we learned that uh in late uh November of last year that the courts have decided to consolidate the domestic violence cases from felony the felony courtrooms into a single courtroom.

In order to do so, uh my office would need an additional two felony assistance because the current caseloads are being held by attorneys who are in felony courtrooms now.

And obviously they can't be in two places at one time.

Um approximately 10% of of each of their caseloads is domestic violence cases.

And amongst those 12 attorneys, that would make up a caseload for approximately two attorneys as we see it now.

Uh I'm not sure if that caseload will remain static, but at this point, we would need those additional attorneys to be able to staff this change.

Any questions?

Questions?

I thank you.

And this might be a question more for the chief judge.

I wanted to understand um sort of some background on it.

Uh and thank you, uh, Chief Judge Chains for sending the information across about um you know, we know when when somebody retires and we see the growing caseload.

So I just wanted to understand um how it wasn't put into the budget for the 2026 fiscal year.

So do you think or rethink.

Well, as I explained, I I was unaware of it um until November.

So had I known, I would have added it.

Um I can assure you this upcoming budget season, I'm gonna be asking for additional trainings because we still are understaffed across the board.

But as to this particular situation, I'll leave it to the chief judge.

Thank you.

Sure.

Good morning.

Uh it's uh pleasure to be here when I'm not on the agenda.

Uh so I'm here to support the public defender's request.

And the why now question uh, of course, is is fine and appreciated.

I want to make sure yesterday uh with the support of county administration, I did send an email across.

I I think it was shared with everybody, which lays out some of this.

Uh one of the things that I've learned in the few years that I've been chief judge is how firmly the county goes with this fiscal year for the budget, December, December.

Um, by August, it's pretty much written in, some changes are made in the margins and then adopted often in November with you know, December one fiscal year.

Uh the courts don't really work that way.

Uh we're not on that same cycle.

Uh we uh it's it's simply a different um business practice.

When judges um judges are assigned to dockets, right?

We have 41 judges.

And the most organic time for structural change within the courts, um, a Navy friend of mine used this analogy once, but changing the direction of an aircraft carrier takes time.

They don't just turn on a dime.

Uh the the courts are not terribly dissimilar, um, as nimble as we try to be.

So when judicial, the most organic and and logical time to change judicial assignments is when the musical chairs of of judges change.

Uh we have 41 judges, and when a judge leaves, retires or whatever, and a new judge comes on, then the assignment chairs rotate.

Uh we don't pull a chair out underneath anybody like the musical chair games.

There's 41 judges and 41 chairs.

Uh so but it's the game of dominoes where uh things move around.

That institutionally is for courts across the country the most logical time to make change.

Uh I don't always know when judges are retiring.

Uh they give typically a couple weeks to a couple months notice.

So what we're always doing, always doing is looking across our structure as to where our problems, where are the rough edges, what can we change?

What do we need to change when the opportunity presents itself?

Uh the best example I can give is 2007.

We had 2006, we had one judge doing all the mortgage foreclosure cases plus other chancery matters.

Then the market fell apart, right?

2007, the recession, the mortgage foreclosure crisis, and we need to have three judges do mortgage foreclosures.

So we changed, we moved and we moved on since then.

The order of protection, while the public defender is here because of criminal domestic violence cases, that's actually not the trigger for what caused this.

It's a secondary thing.

It's really the orders of protection.

They have been growing and growing steadily.

The information I shared provides some of those uh numbers for it.

Uh, and the current docket assignment is simply unsustainable.

So if I have to separate order of protection, and I'm using that broadly with firearm restraining orders and stocking no contact orders, but all those OP type cases have to be separated from the 500 odd criminal misdemeanor cases uh that are pending so that justice can be available to the people who need all of those things.

Um the need to separate order of protection gave us the opportunity to look toward consolidating domestic violence cases.

Uh the misdemeanors are held in one place, the felonies are spread across at least five different courtrooms.

Bringing them together gives us a synergy where a number of efficiencies can occur both in a business practice way as well as a justice way, if you will, by consolidating those together, having greater uh consistency, having greater connection of resources.

Um the public defender believes it'll, or the state's attorney believes it'll uh support victim safety, which I don't disagree with.

That's why he supports it.

The public defender looks at it and says, Well, I'm gonna need a couple more people.

Um that's why we're here.

So why didn't this occur back in August or September or October when we were doing the budget?

Because the dominoes weren't falling, the chairs weren't moving because we didn't have that retirement coming up.

And the the opportunity that that judicial retirement provided is when we're able to move forward on this.

Thank you.

So I agree with uh, you know, with efficiency, right?

And certainly I agree with the need for public safety and consolidation.

My question, which you just answered at the very tail end was why didn't this happen sooner?

I'm looking at the press release from that that went out October 31.

My guess is that the judiciary knew that Judge Strickland was going to retire before then.

So it was a complete surprise to the 19th Judicial Circuit that Judge Strickland was going to retire.

When that's excuse me.

So I find that hard to believe.

My my thing is it's helpful for us to know in advance.

I hear you say that the judiciary doesn't really work within a fiscal year.

I think when we can plan, we can go back and listen to recordings, whatever.

We all have to plan in advance.

So that's just the way it works.

That's what we all have to do.

Every department has to do it.

We have to plan in advance for expenses.

Certainly, I will tell you right now that I am absolutely in favor of this additional headcount.

That is not my argument here.

My argument here is that we all have to work together.

And that means that departments have to be proactive and mindful of when there are going to be changes that occur that we have to take that into account for future budget, right?

So this cost um 135,000.

Not a ton of money on our budget.

Certainly not a lot of money.

But we need to adhere to a budget.

So my second question that I sent back to Chief Judge Chaint was do you foresee an area within your budget where you can make up for that 135,000 increase?

So, first, Chair Hart, it's it's it's hearteningly suspicious of you to say that we do about it ahead of time.

I'm personally disappointed.

You know, the way a judge leaves the bench voluntarily, uh, you know, short of dying, is with retirement is by sending an irrevocable letter to the Supreme Court saying that it's been a pleasure to serve, I'm going to retire.

That is, I cannot describe how big of a deal that is for a judge, because having attained the position and the privilege to serve, sending in something for which you can never change your mind takes a great deal of confidence.

Um those who are around the judicial circles and the legal circles know that there are judges who talk about retiring for years before they pull the trigger on it.

So are there judges who are serving who I think might be retired at some point?

We're all going to retire at some point.

Uh I don't count on anyone retiring until I hear from the Supreme Court that they send their letter.

So there's that.

But but leaving that aside.

Um I am very gratified to hear of your support for the public defender's request.

It's not the court's request, it's the public defenders.

And this board, this committee, you and your predecessors have supported the public defenders' request for many, many, many years.

And that is to your credit.

The public defender, frankly, asks for very little and gets it.

Be happy I'm not the public defender.

I'd be asking for six or eight more positions.

They're asking for two.

So uh they will be and and will be, and I'll support that too.

So uh they need it.

I'm glad that you're supporting it.

Uh, but this is a public defender request.

And and I'll just add this too.

Well, no, the little voice in my head says discretion is a better part of valor.

I look forward to continuing these conversations uh in many ways uh in the future.

I appreciate Chair Hart, your support for the public defenders requests and this board's historic support for the public defender.

When we're talking about domestic violence victims and defendants, we're talking about some of the most vulnerable and underserved members of our community.

This board can't do enough to help them.

Right.

Thank you.

And so you won't get any argument from me, as I stated in the very beginning.

Um, my argument is about the process and the planning.

And so I didn't hear where that offset would come from the 19th Judicial Circuit.

I know that the public defender needs to make this request because of this change.

I am fine with the change.

What I would ask for future budget process, uh, you're kind of saying if I and excuse me if I'm misstating that you guys don't really work that way.

It just it's it's different and sounds like it's very difficult to work within our uh fiscal year.

I I might suggest that you work closely with our county administrator and our finance team, and they could probably help you with planning in the future.

Um, but I'm all in on best practice, and uh and I continue to be very supportive of the public defender.

But to say that this is a request, you know, it it is a request made by the public defender because of a change that is made by the chief judge.

So I just want to be really super crystal clear, which is why I had asked for you to come up and why I assume you agree because you're the one who sent us the letter.

So no, I do.

And uh I I agree with you agreeing with me, agreeing with you uh that we all support the public defender's request.

I look forward to building closer relationships with county administration.

Uh and I suppose I'll just add this.

So much for discretion being the better part of Valor.

Umlike most people who sit at this table, you're correct.

The public defender is here because of his perceived need because of a change that the courts are making.

The courts are a separate and co-equal branch of government from the board.

The chief judge, like the county board chair, is an independently elected official selected by his colleagues to lead that separate and co-equal branch of government.

As we do these things, I am gratified that there is a long and warm history of support between the courts and the board in furthering the mission of providing justice to the people of Lake County.

But we're not a county department.

And that's a hill we die on.

Totally fine.

Still have to work within the confines of the budget.

Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Um other questions?

So I think this I do like a change.

This court will focus on those types of cases.

I think that's not a bad thing.

Thank you.

Um, I feel like I understand where Chair Hart is coming from as well.

Because we have, you know, we get a lot of requests later, and we're trying to balance it all.

So but thank you.

Thank you.

Um Clay, I have a I have a question.

Of the new cases, do you I don't know if you'll have this answer, but the in out of them out of all the cases, what's the percentage that the public defender represents?

Of all the order of protections, do you do you have access to that information?

I'm just curious.

Because I I mean, someone who knows firsthand, because I we my husband is a prosecutor, and I work with the public defenders daily now, and they are so understaffed, and it's always turning every day.

It's like, wait, do I send this discovery to this one or this one?

I mean, because it's you're so understaffed.

And I just wondered, because you're asking for two.

Is two enough?

It probably not.

But we will see.

I mean, so I mean, just to clarify, you mentioned orders of protection.

We don't represent uh litigants on orders of protection, domestic violence cases.

Yeah.

But it's been estimated, and I don't have, I mean, Mr.

Reinhardt might know the total number of domestic violence cases charged, but it's usually roughly around uh 50% to 60% of all the cases.

Um our staff has been well outpaced by the increased demands uh as a result of the pretrial fairness act.

I mean, we have gotten far more uh appointments.

I'm sure you've seen my statistics uh each quarter.

Um I believe uh have the hard numbers here, but it's it's easily 100% uh or I mean a 50% increase from a year ago just in felonies.

So yes, I uh I am gonna be asking for more staff because that's the the need that's coming.

And with the uh implementation of the state public defender statute, they're going to be more strict about caseload standards, and we need to anticipate that and get ahead of it.

Um so keep in mind what I'm asking for are these positions.

There's a a dearth of of people wanting to do this work.

So even once I get the positions, I have to fill them.

And we've had positions that have been remained unfilled for quite some time.

So um the struggle will continue.

Um the difficulty is still ahead of us.

I I appreciate, I firmly appreciate the support that this board has always given this office.

Um and the problems aren't here, thankfully.

Um I know in other states and um other counties, even within the state, they struggle um with the support.

I've not seen that, so I appreciate that, but I still need to find these positions.

So the need for two people is the initial numbers that we've crunched.

We've seen that, like I said, about 10% of the caseloads of the current felony assistants is domestic violence cases.

So we've come up with a raw number of about 133 cases or thereabouts.

Um based on the uh studies, we would need at least two attorneys to handle those caseloads.

Now they're not going to drop on these attorneys all at once.

We've agreed to stagger the hiring to account for the fact that we're outside the budget constraints, and so we want to be able to bring one person initially, feed some of those cases to that person as this courtroom uh begins to run.

Um it may turn out that the demands are higher than that, and then of course we'd be before the board again.

I mean, it would have been nice to have studies and and all these things to figure out what this courtroom is going to look like.

Um we might find ourselves with two domestic violence courtrooms by the time this is done, just depend on charging.

You won't find a weekend uh practically every weekend you're gonna see domestic violence cases come in um over the weekend.

I just use that as an example.

I mean, there's or every day, it seems like there's at least one or two domestic violence cases.

So it is an issue that has to be addressed.

Thank you.

Um as uh Vice Chair Cunningham would say, we're always going to support.

So go ahead.

Are these cases going up?

Um the appointments, our appointments have gone up.

Um, I think Mr.

Reinhardt might be able to address those uh uh that granular level of of whether there's more domestic violence cases.

I've been I mean, uh ironically, our misdemeanor appointments and domestic violence cases has dropped about five percent or so.

But the felony cases have increased and Mr.

Reinhardt's here if he wants to address it.

Good morning, Vice Chair Roberts.

It's nice to see your chair part, Administrator Sutton, your honor, public defender.

Um as we recall, I won't start my timer, maybe I should.

Um I know we all recall, I I appreciate how much this committee and county administration has thought more over the last five years, in particular about um criminal justice issues.

Please recall that domestic violence is probably our most underreported crime.

Sex crimes are also deeply underreported.

So statistics regarding domestic violence are always complicated.

Let's let's start there.

It's in it's important to talk about that.

Umicides are not underreported because we don't have a large number of missing people.

I'm just giving you an example.

Um, but domestic violence is deeply underreported.

Um the cases are relatively steady.

The order of protection numbers are moving up as uh Judge Shanes indicated.

The domestic violence filings are relatively flat.

We would have a thought over about 1,100 total domestic violence cases in this courtroom because the misdemeanor and felony cases would be would be combined.

Um so uh the courts are able to monitor it.

The prosecutor, the the state attorney's office is obviously monitoring the domestic violence filings for you know its own reasons.

Um the oral protections, the state does not have a large our office does not have a large role in order protection filings.

We support a lot of firearm restraining order filings.

We expect those to go up.

They've doubled between 2024 and 2025.

We're proud of that because we think that protects people.

I would expect those to continue to go up.

We have secured a lot of grants in that space, and we're very proud of those numbers going up.

So the order protection issue is very uh real in the sense that those filings are going up.

The domestic violence filings are relatively a relatively flat or move within a couple percentage points.

Um and that's different from talking about the occurrence of domestic violence because we know it's it's underreported.

Thank you.

Any other questions?

No.

Okay, I see none.

Um call vote.

All in favor?

None opposed, motion carries.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Item 8.7, state attorney's office cheaped up the administrative services CAO.

Joe Gavert, Gravert, Griveter.

Thank you.

This is a joint resolution authorizing the acceptance and execution of the Healing Illinois grant award to the Lake County State's Attorney's Office through the Illinois Department of Human Services as a subgrantee of the Lake County YWCA to fund a gun violence prevention mural to promote community building and engagement in Lake County and an emergency appropriation of 12,000 in grant funds.

Joe, sorry, I messed up your last name.

No worries.

Oh, I'm sorry, I need a motion to second.

Motion by Altonberg, second by Peterson.

Good morning, everybody.

Um so yes, this is a uh 12,000 grant that we received from the YWCA for the purposes of creating a mural in North Chicago.

Um, so the mural is to be placed at the FOSS Park Viaduct, and it's slated to be completed for uh gun violence awareness month, which is June uh in June of this year.

So community members impacted by gun violence are um they're welcome to come and contribute to doing this as well.

So and I guess the location was chosen by the North Chicago Police Department.

Okay.

I know that information.

Nice.

All right.

Any questions?

No, so it sounds like the sound like we participating in actually painting the mural or designing it.

Um thank you, Steve Spagnolo.

I can't speak to exactly the interactive nature of it, but there will be an interactive um active part, yeah, part for the community to take part in it.

Great.

Any further questions?

All right, all in favor, aye.

Aye.

Motion motion passes.

Thank you.

Item 8.8.

This is a joint resolution authorizing the state's attorneys uh um appellate prosecution program for fiscal year 2026 for a continued participation fee of 55,000.

I'll need a motion and a second motion by Altenberg, second by Peterson.

Joe.

So this uh this is a an annual renewal.

Um, so the appellate prosecutor program, the the fee was the same last year at 55,000.

It has been included in our fiscal year 26 budget.

Um, so the state's attorney appellate prosecutor handles things like uh Lake County criminal appeals, serving a special prosecutor when needed, uh, providing tax objection services and offering continuing legal education programs to assist all prosecutors in meeting their mandatory requirements.

Um so as I said, that it is included in the budget.

However, we need um as as part of the requirement, the contract with the state is essentially a certified copy of this approved uh past resolution.

So that's why we bring it to committee every year.

Thank you.

Any questions?

All in favor.

Motion passes.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Is there a county administrative report?

No county administrators report.

Is there a need to go into executive session?

No need for executive session.

A member remarks.

I know that uh member Aldenberg has a remark.

Um, anyway, today is Holocaust Remembrance Day, and I didn't want to pass up the chance to talk about that today.

And um, you know, every single year and more, we need to recognize that the Holocaust happened, that six million Jews and many other millions of other citizens' innocent lives were taken during World War II for no reason except for hate.

And there are, you know, very disturbing things happening in this country right now that revolve around hate and um you know innocent lives are being taken.

And also, I feel like, you know, unfortunately, because of what's going on with DHS, a lot of the uh the spotlight on anti-Semitism has dissipated lately.

And there is still a lot of anti-Semitism going on in this country and around the world, and we all have to be aware and really, you know, recognize that that's there's no good reason that that's happening.

The Jewish community has done so much for our country, for many countries.

They've been in many leadership roles and really tried, you know, to be there for people.

And we have so many nonprofits that help not just the Jewish community, but every community across our country.

It's very important to us to be a contributor.

So um, you know, I just want people to recognize that we've got to eradicate hate.

There's no reason for it, and we've got to work with our neighbors, and we've got to all be out there, and I think we are out there standing up for you know good people, and we need to follow our constitution, and everybody deserves their rights to be protected, everybody.

And we want to remember that today.

Thank you.

Thank you for sharing that.

Anyone else?

No.

All right.

Um I could call, do I need a motion to adjourn?

No.

I'm adjourned this meeting.

Next meet meeting is February 3rd, 2026.