Letters

Illinois Appellate Court
EDITOR: Your recent article concerning the Illinois Appellate Court (March 1981) principally concerned the First District. Unfortunately, the writer did not discuss the subject with a representative of this court prior to its publication.

The study referred to took place in 1978 and sampled cases in the years 1975 and 1976. The 649 days, referred to in your article, represented the time from the filing of appellant's notice of appeal in the circuit court until the issuance of the mandate by our court; of the 649 days, 54 percent of the time was the delay caused by tardy court reporters' transcripts and the preparation of the circuit court record. In 1975 and 1976, this court had no control over those delays.

In 1978, this court instituted a number of internal changes in order to more efficiently process its appeals. Then in October 1979, as the result of certain modifications of Supreme Court Rules, the Appellate Courts of this state for the first time were given control over appeals from the date of filing of the notice of appeal. We have also tightened, and more effectively control, the time requirements for filing the record and briefs, and we have adopted certain internal procedures to shorten the time for, but not the quality of, dispositions. The result has been a dramatic decrease in overall time between the filing of the notice of appeal and disposition.

Our average annual disposition per judge increased approximately 22 percent between 1978 and 1980. Not only are we interested in speed and total output, but we are primarily concerned with the quality of justice. We are confident our quality is comparable with any other intermediate appellate court, be it state or federal.

We are presently reviewing the procedures used in disposing of cases in the other appellate courts throughout the United States. We believe this study will provide the basis for further improvement in our method of disposing of cases.

We expect that in 1981 we will install computer equipment for case management and shortly thereafter, issue indexing and word processing. This modern equipment will be of great help in the control of the appellate caseload.

The proper administration of the appellate justice system requires the cooperative efforts of attorneys, court reporters, circuit court clerks, and our court. There has been and will continue to be an ongoing effort to provide quality justice in the shortest possible time.
     Robert J. Downing,
     Chairman of the Executive Committee
     Illinois Appellate Court,
         First District

On solar systems
EDITOR: Mr. Adkins' excellent article on solar systems ("Solar Energy") in your April issue contained one weak section: Codes are critical. I agree that municipalities must eventually address the question of solar access. However I don't agree that most local zoning ordinances or building codes hinder new or retrofitted solar systems.

Many Illinois communities, mine included, have adopted one of several national building codes. None, to my knowledge, prohibit passive or active solar systems. For example solar collectors (or almost any similar dead load) can be placed on roofs under the BOCA (Building Officials Code Administrators) basic building code if the bearing structure is adequately designed and installed. Also the use of double studded walls (Lo-Cal Houses) would normally be controlled by building codes and not zoning ordinances as was indicated.

I've read more zoning ordinances than I care to recall and written drafts of several. Such ordinances simply do not handicap adequate solar siting of buildings or collection units. In fact building setback provisions were originally incorporated into zoning ordinances to provide for access to light (solar) and air in addition to other purposes. Obviously not all building designs will fit all available lots. But this is a design problem not a zoning problem.

Keep up the fine job you're doing presenting timely articles.
    Michael A. Steele,
    Director,
    Department of Planning
        and Development,
    City of East Peoria

General Assembly Office in Washington
EDITOR: In regard to Robert Mackay's recent (April) article, "The General Assembly Comes to Washington," I, as a partisan Republican member of the Illinois General Assembly, wish to speak out in favor of Bill Holland and the General Assembly Office in Washington.

I have had the privilege of service in the General Assembly, serving under five different governors. It has been my experience that each of these five chief executives operated on the principle that the less the members of the General Assembly know or are informed, the easier it will be for them to function. Beginning with the leadership of Senator W. Russell Arrington, when he was president pro-tem of the Senate, and continuing on under the leadership of President Rock and Speaker Ryan, the General Assembly has constantly strived for more and better information so that each of the members can cast an intelligent vote on the thousands of bills and proposals on which we are forced to make decisions.

I am sure that any vehicle which supplies information to the members, so that they may have available to them the necessary data upon which to base their decisions, is overwhelmingly supported by the citizens and taxpayers of the State of Illinois, even if the appropriation for the office is $173,000.
    J. Theodore Meyer,
    State Representative, 28th District
    (R., Chicago)

30/June 1981 /Illinois Issues