Special Commission on the Future of the New York State Courts

District Court. Upon the merger of the lower trial courts
(the sixty-one upstate City Courts, the New York City Criminal
Court, the New York City Civil Court and the two District Courts
on Long Island) into a single, statewide District Court, the acts
currently governing all of these separate lower courts would need
to be reconciled. This would likely require a repeal of certain of
these Acts, such as the New York City Civil Court Act, the New
York City Criminal Court Act, the Uniform District Court Act
and the Uniform City Court Acts and the implementation of a
coherent procedural code for the new, statewide District Court.
Likewise, the Uniform Rules for each of the current local courts
would need to be redrawn.
* * * *
This is by no means a comprehensive accounting of the
procedural codes that will need to be amended, and obviously
this section does not attempt to identify all of the individual code
provisions that will need modification. The <strong>Commission</strong>
recognizes that these considerable tasks must be pursued
carefully in the near future. Given that consideration of these
issues is underway, however, and given the substantial lead time
that will exist between the initial passage of the Constitutional
Amendment and a statewide referendum, the <strong>Commission</strong> has
every confidence that there will be sufficient time to complete
this undertaking. A streamlining of the procedural codes, where
appropriate, will enhance the broader goal of efficiency that will
result from a restructuring of the courts.
* * * *
The diagrams on the following page compare the current
and proposed trial and appellate court structures of the New York
State Court System for both criminal and civil matters.
A Court System for the Future, February 2007 87