Judiciary asks for roughly $82 million in FY27, highlights IT, help-desk and training needs

The state judiciary asked the House Appropriations Committee on Feb. 3 to approve roughly $82 million for fiscal year 2027, citing rising IT costs, high help-desk demand and the need for new statewide training positions, State Court Administrator Terry Corson said.

Chief financial officer Greg Mosley told the committee the judiciary has an appropriation figure of "$78,499,500" for the current year, the governor's recommended budget shows about "$81,000,000," and "if our budget request is approved, it'll be $82,000,000" for the entire system. Mosley said differences between the governor's recommendation and the judiciary request are primarily the governor increasing vacancy-savings targets and a fee-for-space reclassification that reduced the governor's recommended total.

Why it matters: Mosley said the governor's office raised the vacancy-savings assumption from roughly $1.0 million to about $1.2 million and shifted some costs into indirect accounts, producing an approximate $1.1 million gap between the judiciary's request and the governor's recommendation. The judiciary said those adjustments, plus higher IT and security costs, explain much of the difference.

Mosley detailed specific cost drivers: an aggregate increase to current IT services of about $357,000 and an additional $190,000 for cybersecurity software, tied to the judiciary's recent move to an independent IT network separate from ADS. He said about 72% of the judiciary budget is salaries and benefits; the judiciary employs roughly 420 people across 23 courthouses and has limited discretionary funds for programs such as interpreters, guardian ad litems and mediators.

Requests omitted from the governor's recommendation include one additional help-desk analyst to reduce ticket burdens (Mosley said each help-desk worker currently handles about 3,000 tickets versus an industry standard of 2,000), and roughly $611,000 in other position requests. Corson described a proposal for four dedicated statewide judicial assistant trainer positions (criminal, family, civil/probate, juvenile/mental-health) to deliver consistent onboarding and free up local staff who now provide ad hoc training.

On grants and continuity, Corson said the judiciary included a one-year contractor request to continue a project director position that coordinates bringing mental-health and substance-use providers into courthouses; the role was funded by a federal State Crisis Intervention Program (SCIP) grant that currently ends in September 2026 and for which solicitations have been delayed.

The presentation emphasized that many requested items are intended to stabilize operations (reduce employee turnover, right-size help-desk staffing and maintain recently established programs) rather than create large new discretionary programs. The committee asked follow-up questions about the new budgeting software and the reclassification that produced the fee-for-space shortfall; judiciary staff said the change reflected how their submission was fit into the new governor's budgeting system.

The committee did not take a vote during the presentation. Closing exchanges focused on next steps and appreciation for the judiciary team's work.