FAMILY COURTS RESEARCH COMMITTEE 
Summary of Recommendations Contained 
in 
A Vision of Justice, the Future of the New Hampshire Courts 
The Report of the New Hampshire Supreme Court Committee 
on Justice System Needs and Priorities 
(September 2004) 
1. Background to the Vision of Justice Report. 
• The charge to the Supreme Court Committee on Justice System Needs and 
Priorities (Committee): “to consider the period of the next five years and 
identify critical needs, assess developments in the delivery of justice to the 
public and to provide a basis or platform for future implementation and 
action on innovations and initiatives.” 
• Committee work was conducted in four subcommittees and 
recommendations followed the subcommittee structure: 
o Quality Assurance Subcommittee – enhancing and measuring 
court performance – quality assurance and public confidence. 
o Public Service and Responsiveness Subcommittee – responding 
to the needs of the public – making justice affordable, efficient, 
and respectful. 
o Court Facilities, Services, and Personnel Subcommittee – 
improving the operations of our courts – court facilities, services 
and personnel. 
o Technology Subcommittee – advancing access to court 
information through technology – innovations that improve the 
administration of justice. 
• The Committee did not undertake a review of issues surrounding the 
revamping of court jurisdiction (such as the creation/expansion of the 
family division): “Evaluating the establishment of new courts with unified 
or specialized jurisdiction is beyond the specific charge of this Committee, 
but we recommend further study of such issues.” (p. 30) 
• The Vision of Justice Report was issued prior to the enactment of RSA 
490 – D (Judicial Branch Family Division) that provides for the 
implementation of the judicial branch family division in all counties as 
made operational by order of the supreme court. RSA 490 – D: 1 states 
that “[T]he goals of the family division are the respectful treatment of all 
citizens by justices, marital masters, and other family division staff, the 
prompt and fair resolution of family issues by justices and marital masters 
specially selected and trained to deal effectively with such issues, the use 
of alternative dispute resolution to reduce the adversarial nature of 
proceedings involving families, and the assignment of all family matters 
of a single family to one family division justice or marital master located 
in a family division court that is geographically accessible to the family.” 
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2. The Vision of Justice Report includes an executive summary of the 
recommendations of the four subcommittees identified above. A copy of the 
executive summary is attached below. 
Executive Summary
A Vision Of Justice 
The Future Of The New Hampshire Courts 
The New Hampshire Supreme Court 
Committee on Justice System Needs and 
Priorities identified critical areas within 
the state court system that will impact the 
delivery of justice to the public during the 
next five years. Based on its findings, the 
committee members unanimously endorse 
the following recommendations and 
present them to the Chief Justice and the 
members of the Supreme Court for their 
consideration. 
Enhancing And 
Measuring Court 
Performance – Quality 
Assurance And Public 
Confidence 
• Improve accessibility through procedural 
changes, training initiatives, and 
enhanced methods of communication. 
• Adopt specific case processing time 
standards and monitor compliance 
to enhance control of scheduling and 
processing of individual cases so that 
final disposition is timely and fair. 
• Reinforce core criteria of equality, 
fairness, and integrity in all court system 
decisions and actions. Specific emphasis 
should be given to advancing uniformity, 
consistency of protocols, and court 
oversight of the litigation process. 
• Maintain independence and 
accountability of the justice system, 
while promoting continuity and working 
relationships with other components of 
state and local government. 
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• Build public confidence and trust in the 
courts by expanding communications 
about the justice system; enhance 
judicial evaluation procedures; provide 
appropriate responses to erroneous 
information relating to the justice 
system. 
II 
Responding To The Needs 
Of The Public – Making 
Justice Affordable, 
Efficient, And Respectful 
• Enhance availability of legal 
representation for citizens who do 
not have adequate resources to retain 
counsel; support efforts to secure 
adequate funding for indigent litigants. 
Alternative models for delivery of legal 
services should be explored including 
modifications of ethical rules to permit 
“unbundled” legal services, expansion 
of incentives and responsibilities of New 
Hampshire lawyers to provide pro bono 
services, and development of panels 
of specially trained lawyers to handle 
particular types of cases. 
• Provide expanded alternative dispute 
resolution (ADR) opportunities and 
systems in all of New Hampshire’s courts 
and hire a professional coordinator for 
such services. 
• Continue to enhance efficiency and 
promptness of operations. 
• Locate courthouses geographically to 
provide easily accessible public service; 
revise forms and system documents to 
make them more easily understood and 
uniform from court to court; improve 
interpretation services for non-English 
system users; enable users to interact 
with the system by computer. 
• Continue and expand efforts to promote 
public education programs and 
interaction with the public so that input 
necessary to improve the system can be 
obtained and reviewed. 
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• Reflect throughout the courthouse 
environment, including court staff 
actions, a system-wide ethic based on 
respect, courtesy, and the dignity of all 
participants; improve systems to provide 
information and respond to questions 
of court visitors; provide a visual 
environment in courthouse facilities 
consistent with the cultural diversity of 
our state. 
• Expand training, education, and 
monitoring of judicial officers and 
court system staff; expand use of “bench 
books” and protocols to encourage 
consistency; improve systems to 
recognize and reward the excellence 
of the court system staff; expand 
performance evaluations and assessment 
of court system procedures. 
• Explore innovative and flexible proposals 
to deliver justice to the public in a 
rapidly changing world. 
III 
Improving The 
Operations Of Our 
Courts – Court Facilities, 
Services, And Personnel 
• All courts within the New Hampshire 
judiciary should continue to move to 
staffing by full-time judicial officers. 
• Update the job description of court 
personnel at each New Hampshire court. 
• Expand the use of case managers to assist 
parties in dealing with court procedures. 
• Review the results of the state’s problemsolving 
courts and consider their efficacy 
and potential for further expansion, with 
the objective to reduce recidivism, keep 
non-violent offenders out of prisons, 
and hold offenders accountable for their 
conduct and their treatment. 
• Enhance the efficiency and quality of 
court reporting, especially through the 
use of digital recording and increased 
use of trained court monitors. 
• Expand training and education of court 
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staff to include training in customer 
service; encourage cross-training of the 
court staff in the varying responsibilities 
within the clerk’s office; study the use of 
“floating” court staff to meet unusual 
demands at court sites around the state. 
• Enhance the availability, quality, and 
efficiency of language interpretation in 
all New Hampshire courts. 
• Develop and utilize a realistic and 
reliable weighted caseload system as a 
management standard in budgeting and 
performance assessment. 
• Prioritize convenience to the public 
and users of the facilities and reflect 
ongoing changes in demographics in 
citing or locating new court facilities; 
encourage and provide for interaction 
and cooperation among various New 
Hampshire courts. 
IV 
Advancing Access To 
Court Information 
Through Technology 
– Innovations 
That Improve The 
Administration Of 
Justice 
• Deploy updated case management 
system (“CMS”) for all New Hampshire 
courts allowing for a system-wide 
database and uninterrupted exchange of 
information among system users. 
• Launch business process enhancement 
(BPE). 
• Examine issues of public access and 
privacy and develop recommendations 
concerning those issues. 
• Continue communication with a broad 
group of constituencies to maximize the 
success of technology development and 
utilization. 
• Establish a CMS working group to assist 
in implementation and development 
issues. 
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• Inform the Legislature about the 
financial impact associated with 
court technology and enlist legislative 
support for funding needs and staff and 
technological costs (where not offset by 
savings) in each budget cycle. 
• Make available to the public “self-help” 
computer terminals at each court site as 
the CMS is implemented. 
• Begin electronic notification 
(“e-noticing”) of hearings and 
court orders simultaneously with 
implementation of the CMS at each 
court site to assist the staff, bar and selfrepresented 
litigants. 
• Use a centralized mailing system to 
relieve staff from the effort involved in 
paper-noticing to those parties, jurors, 
etc. for whom e-noticing is not available. 
3. Specific recommendations from the Vision of Justice Report that are relevant to 
the operation of the Family Division. 
• Uniformity of court rules, practices, and procedures to promote 
consistency in court practice. 
• Court forms written in plain English and also available in different 
languages. 
• Expand the use of Case Managers to assist citizens, particularly those 
without legal counsel, with the court process. 
• Expand the availability and use of interpreters. 
• Establish protocols regarding chamber conferences. 
• Court shall take responsibility for the enforcement of its orders. 
• Provide increased training of judges and staff on the importance of 
reflecting principles of equality, fairness, and integrity to the public and 
litigants. 
• Enhance the availability of legal representation for citizens who do not 
have resources to retain counsel. 
• Provide expanded alternative dispute resolutions alternatives. 
• Promote individual assignment of cases to a particular judge to promote 
accountability for each case. 
• Courthouses should be located convenient to the public. 
• Review the results of the state’s problem – solving courts to determine 
efficacy and possible expansion. 
• Develop and deploy an automated case management system to improve 
the exchange of information. 
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