Year in Review

The judicial branch of California continued to prioritize and expand access to justice for court users and the public.

In 2025, California’s Chief Justice, the Judicial Council, and the courts continued their efforts to improve court operations, enhance services, and expand access to the justice system for the public.

The following are highlights of those efforts:

Chief Justice Delivers 2025 State of the Judiciary Address

Chief Justice Patricia Guerrero delivered her annual State of the Judiciary address to the California Legislature. In her remarks, she emphasized her goals for the judicial branch, which include a continuing focus on advocating for judgeships in those counties that need them the most; expanding education and training for judicial officers; enhancing caseflow management and case resolution; providing effective, efficient, and experienced counsel for appellants with death judgments and indigent defendants on appeal; extending the ability to conduct remote proceedings; and engaging with local senators and assemblymembers to foster communication between the legislative and judicial branches.

Online Tool to Request Reductions to Traffic Tickets Goes Statewide

The MyCitations online tool allows low-income individuals with infraction violations to request a reduction in their fines and fees without going to the courthouse. Users can also request a payment plan, more time to pay, or community service.

Launched in the first superior court in April 2019, the MyCitations tool was successfully implemented in all 58 counties before July 1, 2024. Since its launch through November 2025, more than 328,528 litigants have submitted requests to reduce their fines, resulting in more than $110,286,008 million in reductions.

Adding to the MyCitations tool’s functionality, a new Online Trial by Declaration module allows a defendant to contest eligible traffic citations by submitting a written statement and uploading evidence online. So far, five courts are offering this option, with a total of approximately 1,400 litigants statewide taking advantage of the service.

California Courts Continue Work on CARE Act Petitions

Implemented in October 2023, the CARE Act statute authorizes specified people to petition a civil court to create a voluntary CARE agreement or a court-ordered CARE plan that can include treatment, housing support, and other services for persons with schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders. Recent legislation enacted this year expands eligibility to bipolar defendants with psychotic incidents.

CARE Act implementation started with seven counties (Glenn, Orange, Riverside, San Diego, San Francisco, Stanislaus, Tuolumne), and Los Angeles County followed two months later. The remaining 50 counties met the legislative deadline for accepting petitions by Dec. 2, 2024.

Since the CARE Act took effect through November 2025, the council reports that statewide the courts have:

• Accepted [FILL IN NUMBER] CARE Act petitions
• Held [FILL IN NUMBER] CARE Act hearings
• Approved [FILL IN NUMBER] CARE Act agreements or ordered [FILL IN NUMBER] CARE Act plans

Sargent Shriver Program Helps Litigants Who Can’t Afford Attorneys

The Sargent Shriver Civil Counsel program supports California projects that provide legal representation and improve court services to low-income parties on critical legal issues affecting basic human needs. Shriver funding supports legal services in housing-related matters (unlawful detainer), child custody, guardianship of the person, probate conservatorship, domestic violence restraining orders, civil harassment restraining orders, and elder abuse cases.

Since its creation in 2012, the Shriver Civil Counsel Act program has provided legal assistance in more than 53,000 civil cases, benefiting nearly 150,000 household members across California.

Courts Continue to Improve the Juror Experience

Recognizing the integral role jurors play in our justice system, following are some recent judicial branch initiatives to improve jury service in California:

Mileage Reimbursement Increase: New legislation allows jurors to claim the mileage reimbursement rate of $0.34 per mile for travel both to and from court, doubling the amount individuals can receive—the legislation also authorizes courts to partner with local public transit agencies for low-cost or no-cost roundtrip transportation during jury service.

Staggered Reporting Times: Courts now use staggered reporting times for jurors, such as 8:00am, 10:00am, 1:00pm, or 2:00pm—this system recognizes individual jurors' schedules and helps reduce the lines of people checking in for duty at once.

Jury Portals: Courts continue to improve their online jury portals where individuals can check dates of service, request postponements and excusals, and sign up for reminders—additional features include the ability to contact jury department staff with concerns, get information about court procedures, and obtain proof of jury service for employers.

New Juror Orientation Videos: Updated orientation videos shown to prospective jurors and available online, explain how the jury system works, what jurors can expect, and how implicit bias can affect the process—the videos have been streamed more than 50,000 times and viewed in courts by more than 1 million jurors.

Return of Beyond the Bench Conference

About 1,000 judicial officers, court staff, attorneys, county agency representatives, tribal court leaders, and other professionals eager to learn and connect on issues related to juvenile justice convened at the Beyond the Bench conference. This council’s signature multidisciplinary conference devoted to children, youth, and families involved in the California court system was the first in-person event of its kind since 2019.

The theme of this year’s conference was “Coming Together Again to Support Children, Families, and Communities,” based on the need to improve collaboration within the broader child welfare system affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, staff turnover, and other factors. This year’s workshops highlighted court partnerships, voices of lived experience, and other topics impacting children and families involved in juvenile dependency and delinquency cases, including cross-over legal issues such as mental health and trauma-informed practice.

Foster Children Benefit When Adopted by Extended Family Members

For this 26-year anniversary of Court Adoption and Permanency Month, the council highlighted the importance of kinship care and developing a “kin-first culture.” This is the term used to describe a system that prioritizes placing children with their extended family network.

Research demonstrates that children in kinship care experience fewer behavioral health problems and less placement disruption and require fewer mental health services than youth in a nonrelative placement. For example, children who are first placed with relatives or extended family members are three times as likely to remain there after 12 months, and youth who are with a relative at the time they exit from foster care are also less likely to reenter care within 12 months

In addition to promoting kinship care, the council helps improve the court adoption process by:

• Providing education and technical assistance to courts and justice partners
• Supporting and overseeing the 11,000 active Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASA) volunteers providing services to 13,000 children and youth statewide
• Expanding resources for court-appointed counsel for children in foster care and their parents

Tribal Court-State Court Forum Anniversary

This year marked the 15th anniversary of the council’s Tribal Court–State Court Forum, a landmark collaboration to establish California tribal and state courts as equal justice partners in serving the state that's home to the most Native American people in the nation.

The group began as a meeting of tribal court and state court judges statewide who gathered to study and provide recommendations on issues such as enforcing protective orders and judgments; sorting out jurisdictional issues; and ensuring access to justice in tribal areas involving issues like domestic violence and sexual assault.

In 2013, the council made the group a formal advisory committee, acknowledging tribal sovereignty and recognizing tribes as distinct, independent political nations with authority to establish their own form of government, including tribal justice systems. Today, the forum makes recommendations to the council for improving the administration of justice where jurisdiction by the state judicial branch and the tribal justice systems overlap.

New Courthouses Will Improve Safety, Service for Court Users

In February, the judicial branch broke ground on a new courthouse in Mendocino County. The council is also nearing the completion of new courthouse projects in Sacramento County, San Bernardino County and Sonoma County, and expects to complete additional new courthouses during 2026 in Lake County, Modesto County, and Riverside County.

The new buildings will address overcrowding, security, and accessibility issues, and help consolidate and improve court services for their communities.

Since assuming responsibility for court construction in 2002, the council has completed 35 new courthouses, and another 16 are underway in various stages. These include new court facilities in both large and small counties, as well as urban and rural areas across the state.

California Courts Helping Nursing Moms by Adding Lactation Spaces

The judicial branch has recently added [FILL IN NUMBER THROUGH NOVEMBER 2025] new public lactation spaces in courthouses around the state, with plans to complete an additional [FILL IN NUMBER]. The state Legislature provided $15 million to complete the 103 lactation room projects, which should be completed by June 30, 2026.

More state funding is needed to address the remaining, assessed need for an additional 154 lactation spaces in superior court facilities statewide. To address this need, the Governor’s Proposed Budget for fiscal year 2025–26 included $5.4 million to complete 22 of those projects; but an additional $50.5 million will still be needed to complete the remaining 132 projects.

Remote Proceedings Enhance California’s Courtrooms and Improve Court Participation

Each business day, approximately 7,000 remote hearings, civil and criminal, take place in California courts, saving court users an estimated 1.75 million trips to courthouses annually. Survey results show roughly 90% of participants in remote proceedings have a positive experience.

According to the most recent council report to the Legislature, 57 out of 58 trial courts in the state reported using remote technology from Sept. 1, 2023 to Aug. 31, 2024. During that period, a total of 1,146,184 remote civil proceedings took place statewide. These included civil proceedings such as civil unlimited (46%), family law (19%), probate (13%), civil limited (9%), juvenile dependency (6%), juvenile delinquency (4%), small claims (2%), and civil mental health (1%).

The council continues to advocate for extending legislation that allows for the use of remote technology in court proceedings.

Courts Continue Modernizing Services for the Public

Each year the council allocates funding provided in the state budget dedicated to court technology to help improve operations and services for court users. Priorities for the fiscal year 2025-26 grant funding included court projects related to cyber/information security, remote proceedings, data analytics, AI, and modernizing court technology infrastructure.

Recent examples of how courts have used this technology funding include:

• California Courts of Appeal digitized their operations, saving off-site storage costs and increasing public access to records
• In Sutter County, the court created a back-up server system in the cloud that helped it restart its computer system in minutes after an outage, ensuring continuing services to the public
• In Los Angeles County, the court created a tool that allows litigants, attorneys, and court staff to view and share small claims evidence

New Guidance for Courts That Use Generative AI Tools

The council approved a new rule of court and standard that address local court policies on the use of generative artificial intelligence for court-related work by judicial officers or court staff. The guidelines focus on ensuring accuracy, supervision, and transparency when judicial officers or staff are using generative AI tools. They also address privacy, bias, and security risks posed by these tools. Courts that do not prohibit the use of generative AI were required to adopt a use policy by December 15.

Courts’ Budget Helps Maintain Critical Services to the Public

Despite a $55 million ongoing reduction to trial court operations, funding to the courts provided in the fiscal year 2025-26 state budget included money for court-appointed dependency counsel, continued implementation of the Community Assistance, Recovery, and Empowerment (CARE) Act, and other costs associated with trial court operations.

Commenting on the judicial branch budget, Chief Justice Patricia Guerrero said she appreciated “the Governor’s and the Legislature’s commitment to maintaining critical judicial branch programs and services. The funding provided for our courts—including support for language access, treatment court programs, court-appointed counsel, and facilities improvements—helps us perform our functions as a coequal branch for the benefit of communities throughout the state.”

Court leaders continued outreach to their local legislators to educate them on the work of the courts, and to communicate the operational impacts budget cuts have on court services to the public.

California Continues Work to Diversify the Bench

The council surveys California justices and judges at the end of each year to get a snapshot of the demographics of the California bench—including gender, ethnicity, and sexual orientation.

For the 19th straight year since tracking this data, the number of women and people of color on the bench has increased. Female judicial officers now constitute 43% of the state’s judges. The number of Asian, Black, and Hispanic judges has more than doubled during that same time.

Supporting the goal of “Access, Fairness, Diversity, and Inclusion,” the council’s diversity initiatives include the Judicial Mentor Program, a statewide undertaking between the executive and judicial branches to develop and recruit qualified and diverse judicial applicants for the state’s appellate and superior courts. The appellate and superior courts also have their own local mentor programs.

The council has also created an online toolkit called Pathways to Judicial Diversity. The toolkit has resources designed to help judges and courts reach out to diverse law students and attorneys and encourage them to pursue judicial careers.

California Program Provides Preview of Careers in the Judicial Branch

Running from September to June each year, the judicial fellowship program is co-administered by the Judicial Council and Sacramento State University’s Center for California Studies, which also offers fellowships in the state’s executive and legislative branches as part of the Capital Fellows program.

Judicial Fellows work in superior courts and Judicial Council offices across California on initiatives related to court programs, public policy, legislative analysis, language access, and community outreach. Each fellow is mentored by court executive officers and senior court and council staff.

For the 2024-2025 school year, seven fellows worked at courts in the counties of Alameda, Butte, Los Angeles, Riverside, Sacramento, San Bernardino, and San Mateo. Instead of actual court assignments, three fellows worked at the Judicial Council, gaining experience in statewide policy issues related to criminal justice, pretrial programs, governmental affairs, and court statistics and data.

Judicial Branch Continues to Expand Civic Learning

The Chief Justice’s Power of Democracy Civic Learning Initiative continued to expand its reach into more California’s schools.

The initiative’s Civic Learning Awards program encourages K-12 public schools to share how they promote opportunities for students inside the classroom and in their communities. The awards program has presented the Civic Learning Award [FILL IN NUMBER] times to [FILL IN NUMBER] schools in the last decade—[FILL IN NUMBER]  elementary, middle, and high schools across California were recognized in 2025. Schools at the highest level, Award of Excellence, traditionally receive a visit from California Chief Justice Patricia Guerrero, while judges from other courts present the awards of Distinction, Merit, and Honorable Mention.

The initiative’s Judges in the Classroom program enables teachers to invite judges to visit their classrooms (either in-person or virtual) and engage their classes in lessons on the U.S. Constitution, Rule of Law, Voting Rights, or Historical Milestones in the making of our democracy. Currently, [FILL IN NUMBER] volunteer judges representing [FILL IN NUMBER] counties around the state support the initiative. Last school year alone, the program reached more than [FILL IN NUMBER] students.

Public Service Week

California Chief Justice Patricia Guerrero and the Judicial Council honored the thousands of additional public servants of California's judicial branch the first week of May during Public Service Recognition Week. Videos produced by the council highlight five of California's dedicated public servants, who speak about why they choose to serve in the judicial branch.

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