by Bradley Parsons
Staff Writer
Even with a last-minute windfall from the legislature, the State Attorney’s Office still gets the short end of the budget stick when compared to the Public Defender’s Office, says State Attorney Harry Shorstein.
Actually, the recent trend in Tallahassee has been to bring the two budgets closer together. The State has traditionally spent more on its 20 State Attorney’s Office districts than on its Public Defenders. But the recent trend has been toward better budgets and better pay for the defense side of the aisle, Shorstein said.
He now believes his office is underfunded compared to the Public Defender, a situation Shorstein has seen across the state.
“State Attorney’s Office has always made more,” said Shorstein. “It’s not because we’re better than the Public Defender’s Office, it’s because we have larger staffs and have more responsibilities.
“But now you have situations like in Monroe County, where the public defender makes as much working in a county of 60,000 people as the state attorney in Dade County, which has something like 3 million people,” said Shorstein.
Shorstein expected to get about $20.7 million from the State to run his office in the next year. He actually made out a little better than that, although Shorstein didn’t have the exact number as he made his comments prior to the Jacksonville Bar Association’s annual meeting at the Deerwood Country Club.
Shorstein said his office gets $3 from the state for every $2 the state spends on the local Public Defender — he said the Public Defender’s Office would say it’s more like two
to one.
That sounds like a favorable split, but Shorstein said his office is still underfunded when its workload is considered.
Shorstein’s 88-person staff has been hit with preparations for eight first-degree murder trials in the past seven weeks. His office is prosecuting all the cases while public defenders are working three, he said.
“That’s a pretty good representation of the workload,” said Shorstein. “But, if you look at the funding split, it’s nowhere near 8-3. We have to prosecute against private attorneys as well as the public defenders.”
Shorstein also has been leading a grand jury investigation into the city’s deal with developer TriLegacy to develop the Shipyards, another responsibility unique to his office.
“That’s a six-month investigation,” said Shorstein. “The public defenders don’t have the investigative responsibilities yet their offices are making the same money. It’s having a very negative impact on crime prosecution in Florida.”
Shorstein said he’s noticing a trend in Tallahassee tipping toward the defense side of the Bar. There are fewer lawyers in the legislature than has traditionally been the case, and Shorstein said many of the most influential lawyers in the body come from a criminal defense background.
He hopes to tip the budget scales more in his favor through an ongoing lobbying campaign. But Shorstein said his words have fallen on many deaf ears in Tallahassee.
Legislators, he said, reserve most of their quality time for contributors.
“All 20 state attorneys try to get the message to the legislature, but it can be very frustrating. We’re public servants; we can’t contribute to political campaigns,” he said. “It’s like trying to get in to see the Pope or God or something.”