Judiciary’s FY 2005 Budget Request Seeks FY 2004 Funding Levels

     The federal judiciary, aware of belt-tightening, is seeking a fiscal year 2005 budget with “the minimum funding needed to maintain FY 2004 levels of services and operations.”

     U.S. District Judge John Heyburn II of Kentucky, who chairs the Budget Committee of the policy-making Judicial Conference of the United States, recently told a Senate appropriations subcommittee’s leaders that the federal courts do not seek “the funds necessary to meet our FY 2005 workload requirements.”

     The decision was made, Heyburn said in a letter to the senators, because “we are well aware of the overall budget constraints under which you are forced to operate this year.”

     He noted that the funding levels provided for the federal court system in both the House and bills for FY 2005 “will continue this trend ever-growing workload and fewer resources to handle it.” The two differing appropriations bills are now before a conference committee.