Menu Close

Tag: 2024 News

California Moves to top 10 in National Hospital Safety Ratings Study

The Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grade is the only hospital ratings program focused exclusively on preventing medical errors and patient harm. It is fully transparent, free to the public and updated biannually in the fall and spring.

The Group released its fall 2024 Hospital Safety Grade, evaluating nearly 3,000 hospitals on their ability to prevent medical errors, accidents and infections.

The Hospital Safety Grade uses up to 30 performance measures to assign an “A,” “B,” “C,” “D” or “F” to individual hospitals and uses a public, peer-reviewed methodology, calculated by top patient safety experts under the guidance of a National Expert Panel. It is transparent and free to the public. Leapfrog analysts use the data to observe national performance trends and state rankings.

For fall 2024, Utah ranks number one with the highest percentage of “A” hospitals for the third cycle in a row, followed by Virginia and Connecticut in second and third. The latest Grades also show hospitals are making progress in patient safety across several performance measures including notable improvements in healthcare-associated infections, hand hygiene and medication safety.

“Preventable deaths and harm in hospitals have been a major policy concern for decades. So, it is good news that Leapfrog’s latest Safety Grades reveal that hospitals across the country are making notable gains in patient safety, saving countless lives,” stated Leah Binder, President and CEO of The Leapfrog Group. “Next, we need hospitals to accelerate this progress – because no one should have to die from a preventable error in a hospital.”

Key findings on state performance on the fall 2024 Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grade include:

– – The states with the highest percentages of “A” hospitals are Utah, Virginia, Connecticut, North Carolina, New Jersey, California, Rhode Island, Idaho, Pennsylvania, Colorado and South Carolina.
– – Utah ranks #1 in percentage of “A” hospitals for the third Safety Grade cycle in a row.
– – California ranks in the top 10 for the first time since fall 2014.
– – There were no “A” hospitals in Iowa, North Dakota, South Dakota or Vermont.

Regrettably, Pacifica Hospital of the Valley in Sun Valley California received a grade of “F” and seventeen California hospitals received a grade of “D.” Pacifica Hosptial was rated “D” in fall of 2021, and fell to “F” in sprint 2022 and has remained at “F” ever since.

Detailed hospital performance information, including patient experience and safety measures, as well as grades for individual hospitals searchable by states and localities is available at HospitalSafetyGrade.org.

Bay Area Home Health Company Owner to Serve 2 Years for Fraud

Veronica Katz was sentenced to two years in federal prison and ordered to pay $543,634.34 in restitution for committing health care fraud.The sentence was handed down by U.S. District Court Judge James Donato.

Katz, 36, of San Francisco, was indicted by a federal grand jury on Oct. 17, 2023, along with two co-defendants. Katz pleaded guilty on Apr. 18, 2024, to one count of health care fraud.

Katz was the owner and operator of HealthNow Home Healthcare and Hospice (HealthNow), a home health agency that provided in-home medical care to patients in the Bay Area. HealthNow billed Medicare and private insurance companies for in-home medical care. In the course of operating HealthNow, Katz submitted false documentation to Medicare in order to obtain reimbursements in violation of Medicare’s rules and regulations.

According to Katz’s plea agreement, she participated in a scheme to defraud Medicare that took a number of forms, including using the identities of licensed medical practitioners on electronic medical records and billing information without the practitioners’ knowledge or consent; directing certain individuals to prepare “Start of Care” (SOC) forms even though the individuals were not Registered Nurses (RNs), as required by Medicare; manipulating electronic patient medical records in order to make it appear as if RNs had completed the patient SOCs; and billing Medicare for physical therapy services that Katz knew had not been provided.

In addition, Katz admitted that she took steps to thwart law enforcement’s investigation into HealthNow. In October 2019, Katz met with one of her HealthNow employees, who informed Katz that Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents had questioned the employee regarding the company’s billing practices and SOC assessments.

Katz instructed the employee to lie to the FBI and falsely state that the employee had been trained and supervised by an RN in the course of conducting SOC assessments.

In addition to the term of imprisonment and restitution, Judge Donato also sentenced Katz to a three-year period of supervised release and ordered her to pay a $50,000 fine Katz will begin serving her sentence on Jan. 6, 2025.

Co-defendant Vennesa Herrera pleaded guilty on Aug. 30, 2021, to conspiracy to commit health care fraud and health care fraud, and will be sentenced on Mar. 17, 2025. Co-defendant Simon Katz’s trial is scheduled for May 12, 2025.

Assistant United States Attorney Christiaan Highsmith is prosecuting the case with the assistance of Helen Yee and Mark DiCenzo. The prosecution is the result of a lengthy investigation by the FBI, HHS-OIG, and the California Department of Public Health.

Subminimum Wage For Disabled Workers Ends in California on January 1

In 1938, President Roosevelt signed the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) into law. It was a landmark piece of civil rights legislation designed to protect the rights of workers.

At the time, there was a fear that people with disabilities would be disadvantaged by the law and experience high rates of unemployment if employers had to pay comparable wages to people with and without disabilities. Therefore Section 14(c) of the FLSA (14(c)) was written into the law to allow employers to pay workers with disabilities lower wages.

Accordingly, California also included similar exemptions in its state Labor Code, in Sections 1191 and 1191.5.

The Fair Labor Standards Act authorizes the Secretary of Labor to issue certificates allowing employers to pay productivity-based subminimum wages to workers with disabilities, but only where such certificates are necessary to prevent the curtailment of opportunities for employment. Employment opportunities for individuals with disabilities have vastly expanded in recent decades, in part due to significant legal and policy developments.

Section 14(c) was little known and rarely used until the 1950s when sheltered workshops began to flourish. Sheltered workshops were started with good intentions as parents were seeking a way to keep their children out of institutions. The law currently has about 40,000 American workers laboring for half the minimum wage or less, according to the Labor Department.

However a proposed new rule, announced on December 4 with a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM), would end the issuing of 14(c) certificates, which permit businesses to pay people with disabilities below the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour. If implemented, the proposal would phase out 14(c) certificates altogether over a 3-year period, ending subminimum wage nationwide.

The Labor Department’s proposal follows a review of the program, and the new rule would not take effect until a public comment period ends on Jan. 17, 2025, days before President-elect Donald Trump takes office. The new administration could review and respond to the comments and issue a final rule, or withdraw it entirely.

If finalized, the proposed federal rule would not require workers with disabilities to leave their current places of employment and would not require current section 14(c) certificate holders to amend the employment setting or type of services they provide.

Subminimum wage for disabled workers in California will however end this January.

In 2021, Disability Rights California sponsored legislation to phase out subminimum wage in California. With the passage of SB 639 (Durazo), subminimum wage for Californians with disabilities will be fully phased out at the start of 2025.

California joins more than a dozen states and the District of Columbia that have already banned the program.

Today, unemployment rates among people with disabilities remain disproportionally high, despite the continued use of 14(c) and California exemptions. In 2019, California ranked 22nd in the nation for its employment of people with disabilities. People with disabilities experienced employment rates at 36.9 percent compared to 75.6 percent for their peers. Additionally, people with disabilities also represent a larger portion of the population not included in the labor force. Nationally, about 8 in 10 were not in the labor force in 2019, compared with about 3 in 10 of those with no disability.

WCIRB Geostudy Shows LA Basin Most Costly Area For Claims

The Workers’ Compensation Insurance Rating Bureau of California (WCIRB) released the WCIRB Geo Study 2024, which underscores regional differences in claim characteristics across California. A web-based interactive map allows you to quickly view key measures across regions.

The study’s key findings include the following:

– – Even after controlling for regional differences in wages and industry mix, indemnity claim frequency continues to be significantly higher than the statewide average in the LA Basin and significantly lower than the statewide average in Northern California. This relationship has been fairly consistent over time, although the magnitude of the difference has fluctuated.
– – The LA/Long Beach region has the highest claim frequency, more than 35% above the statewide average.
– – The Yuba City/Redding/Far North and Peninsula/Silicon Valley regions have the lowest claim frequency, more than20% below the statewide average.
– – Regional differences in indemnity claim severity are more muted than for claim frequency. The magnitude of the differences has been consistent over time, but the relative severities by region have fluctuated. The severity relativities shown are adjusted for classification mix.
– – The highest severity cost is in SLO/Santa Barbara, which is more than 10% above the statewide average.
– – The lowest severity costs are in the San Bernardino/West Riverside and Sacramento regions, around 6% below the statewide average.
– – After adjustment for industry mix, regions with lower indemnity frequency tend to have a higher share of large claims, and there is a significant amount of variation among regions.
– – Yuba City/Redding/Far North, Sonoma/Napa and Bay Area have shares of large claims that are above the statewide average.
– – San Bernardino/West Riverside, LA/Long Beach and San Gabriel Valley/Pasadena have shares of large claims that are below the statewide average.
– – There has been a slight increase in the statewide share of indemnity claims that include permanent disability from PY 2021 to PY 2022 at 18 months (RL 1), reversing the decreases since PY 2015
– – Southern California regions have higher shares of indemnity claims with permanent disability than Northern California regions. SLO/Santa Barbara, Tulare/Inyo and LA/Long Beach have the highest shares, with more than 28% of their indemnity claims having permanent disability.
– – Sacramento, Stockton/Modesto/Merced, Bay Area and Peninsula/Silicon Valley have the lowest shares, with less than 22% of their indemnity claims having permanent disability.
– – The share of indemnity claims that include permanent disability is more than 17% above the statewide average in LA/Long Beach and 15% below the statewide average in Ventura at 90 months.
– – Southern California regions were more likely to have an increase in the share of CT claims. San Bernardino/West Riverside and LA/Long Beach (16) have had the largest increases at more than 2%.
– – The statewide share of paid medical for medical-legal reports continued to increase and is at an all-time high for this regional study. The share increased in nearly all regions, but the magnitude varied by region.
– – Medical-legal reports account for a significantly greater share of paid medical in the LA Basin than in the rest of the state.
– – Santa Monica/San Fernando Valley, LA/Long Beach and San Gabriel Valley/Pasadena have the highest shares, more than 12%.
– – Yuba City/Redding/Far North has the lowest share, less than 6%.
– – The LA/Long Beach and Orange County regions had the highest share of litigated indemnity claims, at more than 12% above the statewide average.
– –  The Yuba City/Redding/Far North and Sonoma/Napa regions had the lowest shares of litigated indemnity claims, at more than 17% below the statewide average.

Safety National Announces Winners of the 2024 Safety First Grant Program

Safety National® is a specialty insurance and reinsurance provider with its corporate headquarters in St. Louis Missouri . It is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Tokio Marine Holdings, Inc., a Tokyo-based global insurer with a presence in over 40 countries.

Safety National just announced the winners of its annual Safety First Grant Program. Three policyholders will be awarded matching grants in order to develop the creative risk control ideas they submitted into formal safety programs.

“As a market leader and safety advocate, we are committed to identifying industry innovation that reduces the risk of employee injury and illness,” said Mark Wilhelm, Executive Chairman of Safety National. “Over the last 10 years, the Safety First Grant Program has funded 32 risk control projects, responding to the emerging needs of our clients while building a blueprint for safer workplaces.”

Winners of the 2024 program included:

– – First Place: Berry Global was awarded the $10,000 matching grant for the addition of radar technology capable of detecting human motion inside of an industrial robot cell. This innovation will prevent dangerous machine restarts, which can result in significant injury.
– – Second Place: Bigge Group was awarded the $5,000 matching grant toward the implementation of an enterprise-wide system used to monitor workplace temperature. These sensors can detect rising heat levels, mitigating heat-related illnesses.
– – Third Place: Lam Research was awarded the $2,500 matching grant to install ergonomic improvement equipment, including over 30 pneumatic and electric adjustable tables. This technology will eliminate problematic manual material handling tasks that lead to musculoskeletal disorders.

Nominees for the annual Safety First Grant Program must be an active Safety National policyholder with a risk-reducing solution that applies to the workers’ compensation line of coverage. The applied solutions must relate to an identifiable and quantifiable loss source and include an anticipated estimate of injury cost savings for the policyholder.

“Each year, our applicants submit increasingly impressive innovative and creative risk management ideas for this program, finding new ways to build a safer workplace for their employees,” said Matt McDonough, Assistant Vice President Risk Control of Safety National. “In celebrating these winning submissions, we hope other organizations are inspired to discover their next great risk-reducing solutions.”

Full details on the 2024 Safety First Grant Program winning solutions can be found on its website.

The 2025 grant application period will open in June 2025.

Late Arbitration Fee Penalties Not Applicable to Post Dispute Agreement

Stephnie Trujillo filed a complaint against her former employer J-M Manufacturing Company (JMM) and four former coworkers David Merritt, David Moore, David Christian, and Chuck Clark.alleging five causes of action: 1) unlawful sexual/gender discrimination; 2) unlawful sexual/gender harassment; 3) failure to prevent sexual/gender discrimination, harassment, and retaliation; 4) retaliation for opposing forbidden practices; and 5) injunctive relief.

On February 22, 2021, JMM reminded Trujillo that in 2012, she executed JMM’s arbitration agreement that required her to resolve any employment disputes by private arbitration. Based thereon, JMM asked Trujillo to submit to arbitration. A dispute arose regarding the applicability and validity of some of the terms of the pre-dispute arbitration agreement.

After weeks of negotiating, the parties entered into a stipulation for arbitration, later signed as an order by the trial court. Court proceedings were stayed and the parties initiated arbitration in May 2021.

JMM timely paid the arbitrator’s invoices for over a year. On October 18, 2022, the arbitrator contacted JMM and requested payment for the invoice with a due date of September 12, 2022. JMM immediately paid the invoice. Later that evening,

Trujillo gave notice of her intent to withdraw from arbitration due to JMM’s late payment. She filed a motion to withdraw from arbitration pursuant to Code of Civil Procedure2 section 1281.98, which the trial court granted.

The Court of Appeal reversed in the published case of Trujillo v. J-M Manufacturing Co., Inc. B331083 (December 2024).

On appeal, JMM and the four coworkers argue the trial court erred in ruling that section 1281.98 applied. Appellants contend the statute does not apply to them because: 1) they entered into a post-dispute stipulation to arbitrate with mutually agreed upon terms, whereas the statute governs mandatory pre-dispute arbitration agreements; and 2) they were not the “drafting party” as defined in section 1280, subdivision (e). The Court of Appeal agreed.

We decide, in the first instance, whether the parties’ entry into a post-, not pre-, dispute arbitration agreement affects the applicability of section 1281.98. We note that every single appellate opinion we reviewed above involved arbitration arising from a pre-dispute arbitration agreement. Not a single case considered or addressed a section 1281.98 issue arising from a post-dispute arbitration agreement.”

“We conclude the Legislature intended to limit section 1281.98’s applicability to arbitration arising from a pre-dispute agreement. We so conclude because the Legislature provided us with a clear answer by reading section 1281.98 alongside section 1280. Section 1281.98, subdivision (a)(1) refers to the failure to timely pay arbitration fees by ‘the drafting party,’ a term defined by section 1280, subdivision (e) as ‘the company or business that included a predispute arbitration provision in a contract with a consumer or employee.’ ”

Equitable Estopple Compels Arbitration With Non-Signatory Affiliated Employers

Nowhere Santa Monica and eight other Nowhere LLCs operate nine organic grocery stores and cafes known as Erewhon in the Los Angeles area. A tenth LLC, Nowhere Holdco, is their managing member.

Edgar Gonzalez worked for Nowhere Santa Monica at its Erewhon market for approximately five months. As a condition of employment, Gonzalez entered into an individual (i.e., non-class) arbitration agreement with Nowhere Santa Monica which provided that any dispute “between Nowhere Santa Monica, LLC DBA Erewhon-Santa Monica” and Gonzalez relating to his employment would be submitted to arbitration.

On May 25, 2022, Gonzalez filed suit against the ten Nowhere entities,defining them as “Defendants” those ten entities plus “any of their parent, subsidiary, or affiliated companies.” He alleged that he and the putative class members “were employees or former employees of Defendants covered by” the Labor Code and applicable Industrial Welfare Commission Wage Orders.

In ten causes of action Gonzalez alleged defendants violated the Labor Code by failing to pay minimum and overtime wages; provide meal or rest periods; provide timely wages and accurate wage statements; indemnify employees for expenses; or pay for vested vacation time on termination of employment. These violations, Gonzalez alleged, constituted unfair business practices.

The complaint, a 20-page block of unbroken, nondescript boilerplate, mentioned no employment agreement, described no work performed or control exerted over such work, and made no distinction between any of the ten defendants.

The ten Nowhere entities filed a joint motion to compel Gonzalez to arbitrate his claims on an individual, non-class basis and to dismiss his class allegations. In support of the motion, Tom Wong, Nowhere Holdco’s Chief Financial Officer, declared that each Erewhon market had its own management team that supervised its own employees. Wong declared that Gonzalez worked for Nowhere Santa Monica at the Erewhon market in Santa Monica from May 27, 2021 to October 15, 2021, and never worked at any other Erewhon market or was employed by any defendant other than Nowhere Santa Monica.

Gonzalez opposed the motion on the ground the non-Santa Monica Nowhere entities were not parties to the arbitration agreement.

The trial court found no evidence that Gonzalez was “attempting to enforce any benefit as to the [non-Santa Monica] Defendants while refusing to arbitrate with them,” and thus no evidence demonstrating that his “claims against the nonsignatory Defendants were ‘intimately founded in and intertwined with’ Plaintiff’s arbitrable claims against Nowhere Santa Monica.” The court therefore granted the motion to compel individual arbitration as to Nowhere Santa Monica but denied it as to the other Nowhere entities. Gonzalez thereafter dismissed his complaint against Nowhere Santa Monica.

The other Nowhere entities appeal. The Court of Appeal reversed in the published case of Gonzalez v. Nowhere Beverly Hills LLC -B328959 (December 2024).

It is undisputed that an arbitration agreement exists between Gonzalez and Nowhere Santa Monica. The non-Santa Monica entities admit they are nonsignatories to this agreement, but contend they may enforce it under principles of equitable estoppel because Gonzalez’s (and the class’s) claims against all Nowhere entities depend on and are intertwined with Nowhere Santa Monica’s obligations under the employment agreement with Gonzalez. The Court of Appeal agreed.

“Because arbitration is a matter of contract, the basic rule is that one must be a party to an arbitration agreement to be bound by it or invoke it – with limited exceptions.” One exception is the doctrine of equitable estoppel, which as a general matter precludes a party from asserting rights it otherwise would have had against another when its own conduct renders assertion of those rights inequitable.

In the arbitration context, “If a plaintiff relies on the terms of an agreement to assert his or her claims against a nonsignatory defendant, the plaintiff may be equitably estopped from repudiating the arbitration clause of that very agreement. In other words, a signatory to an agreement with an arbitration clause cannot . . . ‘on the one hand, seek to hold the non-signatory liable pursuant to duties imposed by the agreement, which contains an arbitration provision, but, on the other hand, deny arbitration’s applicability because the defendant is a non-signatory.”

Applying these principles, the Court of Appeal concluded that the trial court incorrectly denied the non-Santa Monica entities’ motion to compel arbitration because all of Gonzalez’s claims against them are intimately founded in and intertwined with the employment agreement with Nowhere Santa Monica, an agreement which contains an arbitration provision.

DWC Seeks Public Input on Update to SJDB/RTW Rules

The Division of Workers’ Compensation (DWC) has posted proposed changes to its Supplemental Job Displacement Benefits (SJDB) Rules and Forms on its online forum where members of the public may review and comment on the proposals.

The SJDB Rules have not been updated since 2013. The proposed updates will:

– – require additional itemization on vocational & return to work counselor (VRTWC) billings,
– – require that education programs offered to injured workers be provided by California public schools or by schools included on the EDD list of approved training providers and schools,
– – update the application process for the VRTWC list maintained by the Administrative Director,
– – limit payments from the Supplemental Job Displacement Benefits for vocational counseling to persons on the VRTWC list,
– – prohibit VRTCWs from holding financial interests in entities that receive proceeds from the SJDB voucher,
– – create a process for removal of VRTCWs from the VRTCW list, and
– – update the SJDB voucher form and instructions.

The proposed changes will update the California Code of Regulations, Title 8, Chapter 4.5, Division of Workers’ Compensation, Article 7.5, Supplemental Job Displacement Benefits, Sections, 10133.31, 10133.32, 10133.58, 10133.59, 10133.59.1, 10133.59.2.

These proposed changes will increase efficiencies in the SJDB voucher program, improve management of the VRTCW list, and provide safeguards against fraud within the system.

The forum can be found online on the DWC forums web page under “current forums.” Comments will be accepted on the forum until 5 p.m. on December 16, 2022.

Massive Increases in Payroll Taxes Needed to Fix “Broken” UI System

The California Legislative Analyst’s Office released a report Monday detailing the urgent need to fix the state’s “broken” unemployment insurance system, which currently faces significant financial challenges incurred during the pandemic, including an outstanding $20 billion loan from the federal government.

According to the Executive Summary the “State’s Unemployment Insurance (UI) Financing System Is Broken. The state’s UI program is supposed to be self-sufficient-that is, the system should collect enough funds to pay for benefits over time. This means, in some years, the system will collect more than necessary so that, during most economic downturns, there is enough money to pay for rising benefit costs. That system is broken: tax collections routinely fall short of covering benefit costs. (The state’s fiscal problems are unrelated to the widespread fraud that affected temporary federal UI programs during the pandemic.) Both our office and the administration expect these annual shortfalls to continue for the foreseeable future. Under our projections, deficits would average around $2 billion per year for the next five years. This outlook is unprecedented: although the state has, in the past, failed to build robust reserves during periods of economic growth, it has never before run persistent deficits during one of these periods.”

The state’s UI tax system requires a full redesign so that contributions: (1) cover benefit costs in most years and (2) build up a reserve that can be drawn down during recessions. The Report recommend four main areas of change:

– – We recommend the Legislature increase the taxable wage base from $7,000 to $46,800, tying the taxable wage base to the amount of UI benefits a worker can actually receive ($450 per week). Taxing this level of earnings means no taxes would be paid on wages that are not covered by UI. This taxable wage base level would place California among the ten states with taxable wages bases above $40,000 and all other Western states. While necessary, this step alone would not be sufficient to address the state’s solvency problems.
– – Following federal guidelines, we recommend the state adopt a simple, robust UI tax structure comprised of a standard tax rate and a reserve-building tax rate. The standard tax rate would cover typical UI benefit costs. The reserve-building rate would help the state build up a robust reserve that can be drawn down during recessions. Under current conditions, the standard tax rate would be 1.4 percent and the reserve-building rate would be 0.5 percent, for a total of 1.9 percent UI tax rate applied to our proposed $46,800 taxable wage base.
– – We recommend the Legislature transition to a new experience rating system that bases employers’ tax rates on increases or decreases in their employment, rather than an exact accounting of their former workers’ UI costs (as the current system operates). This approach would continue to reflect, indirectly, employers’ costs to the UI system because business that reduce employment tend to have higher UI usage. Thus, this alternative approach maintains the policy goals of experience rating but does not suffer from the main downsides of the current system.
– – The outstanding federal loan complicates the state’s efforts to fix its broken UI financing system: as long as the federal loan remains outstanding, even an improved tax system would probably not be able to build reserves ahead of the next recession. To address this, and in acknowledgment of the unique nature of the pandemic that caused the significant UI loan, we outline a shared approach to refinancing the federal loan. This would involve two equal parts: (1) a revenue bond paid back by employers and (2) new borrowing from the Pooled Money Investment Account paid back by the General Fund.

The Executive Summary concludes by saying “The scope and magnitude of our recommendations reflect the deep problems in the existing UI system. These include: (1) the staggeringly large and growing loan from the federal government and (2) the fact that the system is currently running a deficit even during an economic expansion. These are significant problems in isolation, let alone in combination. The significant changes proposed in this report are an honest reflection of these problems. However, whether or not the Legislature takes action, employers will soon pay more in UI taxes than they do today due to escalating charges under federal law. Making changes now will allow the Legislature to make strategic choices about how to repay the federal loan, while also replacing the UI financing system with one that is simpler, balanced, and flexible.”

DWC Announces Transition to CourtCall Video Platform for Hearings

The Division of Workers’ Compensation (DWC) announced it will be moving from the telephone conference lines used for status conferences, mandatory settlement conferences (MSCs), priority conferences, and lien conferences to the CourtCall video platform. All hearings currently heard via the conference lines will transition to the CourtCall video platform on March 1, 2025.

CourtCall developed the Remote Appearance Platform, creating an organized and voluntary way for attorneys to appear for routine matters in Civil, Family, Criminal, Probate, Bankruptcy, Workers’ Compensation and other cases from their offices, homes or other convenient locations. Designed with reliable and user-friendly technologies, Courts and remote participants experience seamless communication during cases, while benefiting from significant time and cost savings.

According to its website, CourtCall says it benefits judges and court staff in the following ways”

– – Reduces the cost of litigation
– – Less crowded courtrooms and increased security
– – More efficient case flow
– – Increases public access
– – Connects all relevant parties, regardless of their locations
– – “Privacy” and “Open Court” services available
– – More efficient courtroom logistics; eliminates work for busy Court Staff

Today, CourtCall says it remains the industry leader in providing supported Remote Legal Collaboration services throughout the United States, Canada and Worldwide. They maintain an updated list of the Courts they serve across the Nation.

Each judge will have a link to their virtual courtroom on the CourtCall video platform. In the coming months, these links will be posted on DWC’s website and included on hearing notices. Every courtroom will also have a call-in number if needed by the parties. Training videos will be available on the DWC website.

DWC believes that this technological upgrade will provide greater functionality for hearings and allow parties more flexibility during the conference process. There will be no charge to the parties for this service.

All trials, lien trials, and expedited hearings will continue to be set in person.

DWC will provide regular updates regarding the conversion timeline via its Newslines.