Voting to retain judges: How to decide

This year, Boulder County voters face the often puzzling question of whether to vote to retain a variety of judges from the Boulder County Courts, the 20th Judicial District Court, and the Colorado Court of Appeals. In total, fourteen judges are on the Boulder County ballot.

Fortunately, there is information available from the Colorado Office of Judicial Performance Evaluation (OJPE) to help voters make informed decisions regarding whether to retain a specific judge.

The OPJE is a non-partisan agency charged with evaluating all people being considered for appointment as a state judge as well as all sitting state judges. There are a total of twenty-three judicial performance commissions: one State Commission and twenty-two District Commissions.

Each District Commission is responsible for evaluating the state, county and district court judges within their judicial district. The State Commission is responsible for evaluating the Court of Appeals judges and Supreme Court justices. The State Commission is comprised of eleven voting citizen commissioners along with six non-lawyers, and five lawyers. To help foster the non-partisan nature of OJPE, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, the Governor, and the majority and minority leaders of the State House and Senate all make appointments to the State Commission. Each District Commission consists of ten citizen volunteer voting commissioners along with six non-lawyers, and four lawyers.

In Boulder County, the 20th Judicial District Commission on Judicial Performance evaluates the county and district court judges.

The OPJE evaluates sitting judges two years after their initial appointment to the bench and then every four years thereafter for county judges, every six years for district court judges, every eight years for Court of Appeals judges, and every ten years for Supreme Court justices. Therefore, not all judges are subject to retention votes during every election.

Each Commission evaluates judges using four different sources of information: (1) surveys completed by people knowledgeable about the judge, including lawyers, jurors, court staff, law enforcement, other judges, social services personnel, and litigants (however, any person may complete an online survey regarding a judge); (2) observations of the judge in their courtroom; (3) a review of opinions written by the judge to evaluate for things like clarity, potential bias, and legal reasoning; and (4) interviews with the judge and other interested people.

Once the Commission has reviewed all information, it drafts a narrative summarizing the performance findings and states whether the judge “meets'' or “does not meet” judicial performance standards. These narratives may be found in the Voter Information Guide and at the OJPE’s website. The OJPE also provides a detailed survey report for each judge that can be found with the OJPE’s online evaluation.

The OPJE narrative includes the Commission’s recommendation, the vote regarding the recommendation, the types of cases over which the judge presides, the judge’s temperament, a discussion of judicial opinions and overall competency as a judicial officer, the information collected and the judge’s legal and judicial background. Some evaluations discuss the judge’s strengths as well as areas in need of improvement.

This year, the OPJE evaluated one hundred forty judges across the state who were eligible for retention. One hundred thirty-five of them announced their intent to stand for retention and appear on the ballot with five judges choosing not to continue as judges when their term expires.

Critics of the system note that it is difficult to vote a judge out of office, but proponents of the system note that judges who receive unfavorable evaluations often decide not to run for retention. The system, known as the Missouri Plan, seeks to take partisan politics out of the judiciary, and avoid the unseemly campaigns where prospective judges seek endorsements and financial contributions from lawyers who will appear before them. Seven states use the Missouri Plan for all judicial appointments, and 17 states use it for the state Supreme Court appointments.

Of the one hundred thirty-five judges standing for retention, the OJPE found that all judges, including all Boulder County and District Court judges, met performance standards. Interested voters can review these recommendations and survey results to reach their own conclusions on whether to vote to retain a judge.