The Delaware Joint Finance Committee held FY2026 budget orientation sessions for the Judicial Branch, Office of Defense Services, and Criminal Justice Council, with no votes taken. The hearing surfaced sharp disagreements over new position requests against a backdrop of 138 vacancies, unfunded non-judicial agency positions, and the taxpayer cost of compassionate release and fines-and-fees legislation.
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Representative Short argued the Judiciary cannot justify requesting 18 new positions while simultaneously carrying 126 vacancies, stating 'I don't understand the concept of what the judicial.' Brian Maxwell responded that of 138 vacant FTEs, only 20 had been vacant longer than a year, and Evelyn Nesselrod clarified that 10 of the 18 positions are not new but a switch in funding source.
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“They do have a significant number of vacancies. The report that I pulled earlier this week was 138 vacant FTEs, most of which are general funded. But when I looked at the position exit dates on a lot of these positions, only 20 of them have actually been vacant for longer than a year. So we are looking at a lot of more recent vacancies.”
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Sign in to subscribeWelcome to order Members, please make your way to your seats. We're going to get started this morning with orientation as we always do. We have before us our wonderful analyst Kylie Thompson. And we're going to start with judicial. And the floor is yours. Good morning. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. So we are in week three of the Binder Judicial Tab is 0200. At the top we have the fiscal year 2026 base budget which includes 18.3 NSF FTEs, 110.3 ASF FTEs, 1265.7 General Fund FTEs, an ASF spending authority of $12,052,600 and a General Fund appropriation of $141,875,800. Below that is the fiscal year 26 personnel contingency, which is $5,365,300. The first request you'll see is recommended, it's for $340,600 for an increase to the interpreter program. This request is tied to not only an increase to the number of individuals who are federally entitled to interpreter services, but also an increase to rates for interpreters across the region, including hourly rates, travel time and mileage reimbursement. The next request which is recommended is to switch fund 10 ASF court security officer positions and funding for from ASF to general funds, an associated reduction of ASF spending authority…
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