Goodbye St. Louis

My request for a transfer back to Syracuse, NY came through in record time. I successfully negotiated with the largest bureaucracy on earth to be allowed to move at a time that better suited my family. My boss threw me a great farewell party and said nice things about me. So why am I blue?

During the 16 months we have lived in St. Louis I have grown quite fond of the city. On balance it is a lively place with many unique features. The city has fabulous public spaces, chief among which is the Gateway Arch. Unique in the world, this monumental building so dominates downtown as to disappear from consciousness. At unexpected times it suddenly appears as a shimmering reflection in windows of an office tower, or a partial view of the north leg from the windows of the office, or in the distance when driving toward downtown. The Arch reminds me I could be in no other place in the world.

We have spent many reflective and renewing hours in the world class parks here. The parks define the boundaries of my St. Louis experience. The two neighborhood parks, Lafayette and Benton, are good ways to come to know your neighbors, their kids and dogs, at least by sight. A bit further afield is the arboretum called Tower Grove, where our kite got stuck in a tree one breezy Sunday, also home to the farmer's market we frequented. Further, but still within an easy drive is magnificent Forest Park, home to the art museum, the history museum, the Zoo, the MUNY and miles of dog walking trails. Downtown, only a few blocks from my office, is the brilliant new Citygarden, a sculpture park unlike any other. Merry has beautifully documented all these municipal gems on her photoblog at http://meredithleonard.blogspot.com/

The queen of all the city parks is the Missouri Botanical Garden. I was completely unaware of this amazing garden before we moved here. Founded in 1859 by Henry Shaw, who made a fortune peddling housewares to passing pioneers, this garden has a look and feel of earthly perfection. We have visited botanical gardens everywhere we have traveled, but only two (Kew in England and Longwood in PA) rival Shaw's Garden. It has historic structures, wonderful sculpture, a 1960s geodesic dome jungle, a kids' garden, a spectacular Japanese garden and an astounding collection of plants from all sorts of habitats. When we visit St. Louis in the future, we will always spend at least part of a day in this garden.

We have spent considerable time searching out the great restaurants of the city. We favor ethnic food, so we didn't eat at many of the well known high end places but we did come to love Vin de Set with its rooftop view of downtown and Chez Leon, traditional French cuisine and a player grand piano to boot. Many weekend mornings we would head for the Mississippi Mudhouse, a funky coffee shop in the Cherokee antique district, for fresh roasted coffee, spicy hot chocolate and breakfast. We tried several Italian places on “the Hill” but generally did not take to toasted ravioli, provel or the heavy pasta here. The single exception is Stelina Pasta Cafe where all the pasta is made fresh daily on the premises. When hungry for reliably wonderful food, we would head for the Tower Grove/South Grand neighborhood and eat at Basil Spice (Thai), Cafe Natasha (Persian) or The Shaved Duck (Barbeque). These are unpretentious spots where the owners treat you like family and the servers remember what you like. We especially love Thai food and the friendly Thai people. The owners of Basil Spice always greeted us warmly, often made us special desserts and even gave us a sweet going away present. I'll miss them.

Of course, a great part of my life here was spent inside 200 N. Broadway where Social Security holds hearings. Before coming to St. Louis I had generally escaped working within any large bureaucratic organization. I was worried that working for Social Security would be soul numbing. In fact, it is psychologically very hard, but the staff who do the work in St. Louis do it with grace. This is certainly due in large part to the efforts of the chief judge, W. Gary Jewell, and the hearing office director, Karen Kumpe. Karen knows everything, can find anything, fix anything, and understands how it all works because she has done every job in the office over the years. Judge Jewell, a true son of Alabama, “Roll Tide,” learned how to motivate people during his military career in the JAG corps. He knows people want to do well but can be lax if you let them. He devises little motivators, walks around the office causing cheerful disturbances and lets people know he cares that they do their work well. He will always step up to help, often taking the extra work on himself. His staff want to get the job done for him. He changed the name of the three staff work groups from A, B, C to Aardvarks, Cobras and Bobcats. I'll forever hear him call out “Goodnight, Bobcats” in my mind at the end of a work day.

And so I leave with a sense of regret for leaving my temporarily adopted city. I'll miss the friendly people and my daily dose of real life as I ride the bus. I'll miss the smell of hops from Budweiser when the wind is from the south. I'll miss my wonderful massage therapist, Cathi, from Indigo, who nursed my sore muscles back from stress and fatigue. I'll miss all of this, but I'm grateful to have had the opportunity to live at the gateway to the west. Farewell.

CPMS and other ODAR acronyms

Merry's been away this week taking a load of fragile items and a canoe back to Syracuse, so there is no new picture for this blog. Check out her new pictures from the Adirondacks here: http://meredithleonard.blogspot.com/

I've been mostly focusing on work this week. I have a lot of cases pending and need to decide as many as possible before leaving for my new post in Syracuse. As I work through these cases I've been reminded of the amazing process Social Security uses to keep track of cases as they move through the adjudication system. If you are interested in knowing more than you need to about how this bit of bureaucracy works, keep reading.

The last Friday of every month is the “official” last day of the month for purposes of toting up what has been accomplished. For ALJs this means the “bean-counters” make note of the total number of cases assigned to each judge, the number scheduled for hearings, the number of final decisions issued and the number of cases pending in “judge controlled” status. They get their data from an electronic case management system called CPMS that can display a constantly updated listing of the current status of every case for every judge. When I'm reviewing a case before a hearing it's in ARPR. If it's waiting for my post hearing review it's in ALPO. Decisions waiting to be edited are in EDIT and decisions waiting to be signed are in SIGN. There are “benchmarks” assigned to every status. If a case remains in any status too long, someone, somewhere is bound to notice. Did I mention that four letter acronyms are dearly loved by your government?

This case tracking system applies to every employee at the Office of Disability Adjudication and Review [ODAR]. From the second a case comes to ODAR at the beginning of the request for a hearing until that case is finally closed, it resides in some status on CPMS and responsibility for the work is assigned to someone. Yes, there is a category of “unassigned” cases but that case is actually sitting for a day or two in a supervisor's cue just waiting to be assigned to the appropriate employee.

Not only are there benchmarks that apply to the time individual cases stay in a given status, there are “goals” for total numbers of cases decided. All ALJs nationwide have the goal of issuing 500 – 700 “legally sufficient” decisions per year. To achieve this overall goal, each office assigns sub-goals to every employee. Every month everyone knows exactly how many cases need to be completed to meet the goals at every level. Everyone is acutely aware that their numbers will be toted up on the last Friday of every month. To deal with this mutual stress the unwritten rule seems to be to pretend not to care about the pressure while keeping an eye on your goals. Managers, including the Hearing Office Chief ALJ [HOCALJ], the Hearing Office Director [HOD] and the Group Supervisors [GS], send out email updates on everyone's progress toward monthly and yearly goals so no one forgets they are watching.

So far as I can tell, nothing bad happens when goals are not met. Then again, our office has met or exceeded our goals for every month I've been here. Coincidence? I don't think so.

There is a very good reason for all this attention to numbers. Social Security operates the largest judicial system on the planet. More than 2.6 million people applied for some type of disability benefit this last year. Every one of those applications gets decided at some level. Over the past decade the “backlog” of applicants for benefits who are waiting for their case to be adjudicated has grown. Right now if a person is not approved at the initial level they can expect to wait 15 – 18 months for a hearing before an ALJ. In some parts of the country, especially the northeast, it's worse.

Everyone acknowledges that this is too long to wait. It's too long for the deserving applicant but also for those who don't qualify. People put their life on hold while they wait. We need to do better. This year agency-wide the top goal was to decide all cases pending 850 days or more. Last year it was 900 days. That's right, highest priority was to decide cases pending 2 1/3 years or more. When I left work Friday no official announcement had been made, but I know St. Louis met this goal on Tuesday.

This past Friday, Sept. 25, marked the official end of the federal 08-09 fiscal year. I took a look at my own first year numbers. I held hearings in about 675 cases, about 56 a month, or about 12 a week. That gives me about 3 hours to work on each case including preparation, a one hour hearing and decision writing. Since I did take two weeks or so off for vacation, the real averages are a bit higher. I issued decisions in about 540 cases. The remainder of the cases were postponed for future action. My productivity is speeding up a bit, so I'm confident I'll do slightly better next year.

After working in St. Louis for just over one year, I have over 800 cases pending on my docket. I started with about 500. Some judges in St. Louis have over 900. The situation is pretty much the same across the country. If every judge in the country issues 500 decisions a year [that's 700,000 cases] and if cases keep flowing into the system at the same rate, we won't ever reach a point where every case can be concluded in one year.

So, it's easy to see how numbers can become a fetish in my job. I try not to think about it too much. My work is to decide each case on its merits, not to meet a quota. Wish me luck.

Jane

Hello from Albuquerque, NM. Yesterday afternoon I rendezvoused with Merry at the airport and now we're sitting at Fred & Mary Upshall's dining room table. Fred's an ALJ here who I met at training last summer. We've been sharing stories about our first year as judges. One odd thing we both noticed was how little our new colleagues seemed to care about our social adjustment to a new city. Had we joined a new law firm we would have been shown around and invited to social events. At ODAR there is almost none of this.

My experience in St. Louis was a little different than Fred's here, because of Jane Lanser.

Every Social Security hearing is electronically recorded. The recording itself is performed by independent contractors called “hearing monitors” who are paid a set amount per hearing. Many of the hearing monitors are retired Social Security clerks who are very familiar with the process. The ALJs have no say in who is scheduled as their monitor, but the cadre is small, so it's easy to become familiar with the unique personalities of every monitor.

I met Jane during my first week at St. Louis ODAR. Jane worked at SSA for many years before retiring and taking up the hearing monitor job. She has a government pension but does the monitor job part-time as a source of “mad money.” Jane has lived a long time in St. Louis. She really, really loves the place and seems determined for me to see it through her eyes.

I have Jane as my monitor about once a week. Every time she's in my court she brings me guidebooks, magazines, flyers, newspaper clippings, handouts, and books that she believed will help me understand all that St. Louis has to offer. If I should happen to express an interest in any particular subject she will search her vast archives and produce relevant material for my review. Her archives are impressive. For example when I was writing the entry on Bevo, Jane showed up with a book on the Busch family and even old newspapers related to the family.

Over time Jane has become my principal guide to all things St. Louis. Jane has informed me in detail on every St. Louis cultural institution. She consistently provides me with insider information on how to get the most out of the many free concerts, Shakespeare in the Park and the free seats at the Muny (a summer outdoor professional theatre in Forest Park). When I was seeking a good restaurant she provided a recent list of the 30 best. One day she brought a magazine article with the 100 things ever St. Louis citizen should see or do. She is an awesome history buff but she loves two things above all else: the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra and the Cardinals.

This last Thursday there was an afternoon home game against the Pittsburgh Pirates. The game started at 1:00, my hearings ended at 12:30. Busch Stadium is only four blocks from the hearing office. Jane was my monitor. I immediately knew she was planning to attend the game. She showed up for work in a “Cardinal” red dress with matching red blazer. Each lapel sported an enameled Cardinals pin. She wore earrings shaped like small baseballs with Cardinals in the center. Her tote sported the Cardinals logo done in cross stitch. Her handbag looked like a zippered fuzzy baseball about the size of a basketball. When I left work at about 3:30 the game was just getting out. The Cards won. I spotted Jane, her gray hair hidden under a Cardinals cap, in the celebrating crowd streaming out of the park. Her dress was distinctive, but every fan had their own bright red outfit. Downtown was awash in a sea of red. I waved to Jane across the street.

Jane also reports to me on every Symphony concert. She was particularly enraptured by the recent appearance of Nadia Solerno-Sonenberg. She also introduced us to the fine community orchestra at Webster University in which her daughter-in-law has played for many years.

Thanks to Jane our move has been enriched and we feel more at home.

On another note, I'd like to thank everyone who responded to last week's posting on cognitive surplus. I must have accidently hit on a topic with resonance. To clarify, I did not mean to suggest that TV never be used for entertainment, nor did I mean to suggest that if everyone turned off the TV that there would be a huge increase in Wikipedia entries. Thanks to everyone who wrote back. I plan to do more with that piece when I get the chance.

Now, off on our drive back to St. Louis.

Bandwidth

Earlier this week I realized I would be at work preparing to hold hearings this coming Tuesday, Inauguration Day. I hoped to watch the swearing in and hear Obama's address live rather than on the evening news. Our office does not have a television in the lunch room. After some preliminary investigation I decided I needed to ask Karen, the Hearing Office Director, and longtime boss of all things, whether she would permit arrangements to be made that would allow the office staff to watch the Inauguration. Karen was not in the office at the time so I sent her a brief email.

The next day Karen came to my office and told me she was unable to clear the idea. She looked uncomfortable. There were technical problems. It seems you can't get good TV reception in the office, and we aren't allowed to use SSA's satellite up-link for streaming TV over the internet. There was a possible issue with video hearings that might be held, which had something to do with available bandwidth, not to mention the difficulty clearing use of the computer system for such use, complete with allusion to prior difficulties encountered. Clearly she was not enthusiastic.

When I arrived home Tuesday evening, turning this bureaucratic encounter over in my mind, I was surprised to find an email waiting for me from John Mahoney, a friend of mine from way back in the late 60s. It seems John saw the item in the Bucknell Alumni magazine announcing my move to St. Louis and decided to drop me a line. He reminded me that back then when we were fellow student radicals working to stop the Vietnam war he arranged for a speaking engagement for a previous black presidential candidate. Here's how John puts it:

“Do you remember when I brought Dick Gregory to Bucknell? Jake Register (and his wife) and I drove down to Harrisburg to pick him up that afternoon - but he wasn't there. We were told that he was at Penn State - so we drove there and picked him and his assistant up. On the drive he kept tossing out his campaign literature - which was dollar bills with his face on it with the White House painted black. We would have made it to the Davis Gym in time - but Gregory needed to be fed. He was a vegetarian! I had never met a vegetarian and didn't know what to do - so I headed to IHOP!”

Frankly, until John's email I had mostly forgotten this event. I still have one of those “Gregory Dollars” in my collection of 60s political memorabilia. I vaguely remember being disappointed in Gregory's speech at Bucknell not only because he showed up late, but because he spoke more about the health values of vegetarianism than about ending the war. I didn't vote for Gregory.

Next week an African American will be sworn in as our President. I believe Dick Gregory's somewhat jokey, sure-to-fail, presidential write-in candidacy 40 years ago played some role in changing the perceptions of my generation about the role of African Americans in US politics. I feel the same way about the ill-fated runs of Jessie Jackson (1984 & 88), Lenora Fulani (1988 & 92), Alan Keyes (1996 & 2000), Carol Mosely Braun (2004), and don't forget the Rev. Al Sharpton (2004). I think they all knew that they were in some subtile way laying the ground work for someone they knew would someday exist who would run and win. I very much doubt they dreamed that Barack Obama would come along so soon.

Racism runs deep in our national psyche and our institutions. It pervades the subconscious life of us all. In my view racism can be gradually overcome only by successful modeling of the possible future of people of all races living and working together. This can only be achieved practically, not by aspiration. We learn to live together in harmony by actually doing it. That's why so much rides on Obama having a successful presidency.

As of Friday, there was no official office announcement about whether, where or how ODAR staff could watch the Inauguration. I'm sure some staff members have already decided to stay home from work Tuesday. In the end Karen had agreed if I wanted to set up a TV with possibly poor reception and the staff wanted to watch on their lunch break, she was fine with that, but it was apparent the office would take no steps to facilitate such arrangements. I am troubled that the value of having the entire office staff watch the Inauguration together does not seem to even have occurred to the SSA bureaucracy. In a more perfect world all federal employees would pause, gather together and listen as their new boss explains his or her plans for the future.

I was heartened when one African American staff person told me her husband, who works for the Army, was going to watch the Inauguration on a big screen TV set up especially for the occasion at work. I am glad the Army recognizes the value of watching their new commander-in-chief be sworn in.

Right now I plan on unofficially watching the Inauguration on Tuesday on the TV in the claimant's waiting room. I'm sure many ODAR staff will join me. Together we launch our imperfect future.

Rocket docket

Hello friends. This week I've written a sketch of recent courtroom activities for those of you that are interested in that sort of thing. If the minute details of social security procedure don't rivet you, just skip to the end where you will find a fun picture of the birthday cake made for me as a surprise by my court room hearing monitor (whose other business is cake baking). Otherwise, read on. You have been warned.

Yesterday five of the ten St. Louis Social Security judges conducted what we term a “rocket docket.” The idea was to schedule as many preliminary hearings for unrepresented claimants as possible on one Saturday morning. We would bring them in, advise them of their right to counsel, review their medical evidence briefly and order consultative examinations for those who needed them. Their cases would then be rescheduled in two or three months.

Gary Jewell, our Hearing Office Chief Administrative Law Judge (HOCALJ) is the brains behind our rocket docket. He realized that a significant part of the backlog of cases is created by unrepresented claimants who show up at their first hearing only to announce they now want to hire counsel. By law we must adjourn their case to give them time to find a lawyer. This means we set aside an hour for their hearing, but the hearing only lasts ten minutes. They later get another hour hearing. This may not seem like a big waste of time, but the true waste is behind the scenes. Each ALJ spends at least an hour reviewing medical evidence in preparation for each hearing. When hearings are adjourned or cancelled not only has the judge spent time needlessly preparing but the staff spent hours and hours obtaining medical evidence, preparing the files and sending notices for hearings that never happen.

About 30% of our claimants are unrepresented. An astounding 50% or more of unrepresented claimants simply never show up at their hearings. Of course, we don't know they are not coming, so we soldier on, spending hours preparing for hearings that never happen. The result is that court rooms often sit empty. Courtroom staff sit twiddling their thumbs. We prepare and wait for those who never come. Other claimants who need hearings are delayed while we process claims that never go anywhere. Enter the rocket docket.

Yesterday each of the five rocketeer judges had 20 – 25 unrepresented claimant cases scheduled for the morning from 8:00 – 11:30 at 10 minute intervals. In all 110 cases were scheduled. Since our office completes about 285 cases a month this is a pretty significant docket. Between the time notices went out and yesterday's hearings about 30 of these claimants hired counsel, so we adjourned their cases for a future hearing leaving 80 cases to hear. Of these, only 35 actually showed up so we only averaged 7 hearings apiece. We dismissed the other 45 cases. Of the 7 cases I heard only 1 decided not to hire a lawyer. We gave everybody a handout about how to contact lawyers. We scheduled independent consultative exams for about half of the people we saw. In all a very productive morning, 65 cases moved forward efficiently, 45 dismissed without a lot of wasted effort.

Going in I expected this process to be pretty easy. I imagined I would give a short talk on the right to counsel, glance over the medical records to see who could benefit from an exam, and done. My first case actually followed this pattern. But, as you all know, life has a tendency to be a little more complicated than that. My second hearing involved a claimant who only spoke Arabic. We had no access to a translation service on a Saturday. Fortunately he brought a friend who spoke English to translate. We began. I said a sentence. The friend turned to the claimant and whispered into his ear. “No, say it out loud, so I can hear,” I admonished. Things went pretty well after that until I asked the key question, “So, do you think you want to hire a lawyer?” This provoked an extended conversation in Arabic between the two friends. I stopped them and explained that the conversation had to be between me and the claimant. Many apologies later the claimant decided it would be best to hire a lawyer. Whew.

All the remaining cases were also fairly complicated. I struggled to help these folks understand their rights in Social Security's byzantine system, including a 23 year old woman with developmental disabilities and irritable bowel syndrome and a man with psychosis accompanied by his only somewhat less psychotic brother and sister.

The last case of the day for me involved a 35 year old man. Small and mild mannered he explained that he had hired a lawyer, but that they recently refused to keep representing him. I checked the file and sure enough found a withdrawal from representation. What happened? He didn't know; they didn't tell him. I looked at his records: blind in one eye, deep vein thrombosis in the left leg with chronic pain and anti-coagulant therapy, and HIV+. From the point of view of a claimant's lawyer a pretty good case on the face of it. So why had his lawyers fired him? After a few more questions I discovered that he had returned to work for a few months. Now he was out again. Work had proved too strenuous for him. His only work was as a day care provider. His employer does not know of his diagnosis, and he doesn't want to tell them. In fact, other than his doctor and the Social Security world no one knows of his diagnosis.

I explained his rights. He plans to get a new lawyer. I suggested he get some counseling to help him deal with his situation and directed him to some local HIV/AIDS resources. He thanked me and left.

As I stepped outside into a suddenly blustery day, I could not help but wonder about our so-called social safety net for citizens with disabilities of our county. Are we serving them well? Do we dare call ourselves a civilized country? Just a block down Broadway on the steps of the Old Courthouse where Dred Scott was tried about 300 gay rights activists were demonstrating in the cold.

We're a young and foolish country still, I mused, but the idea of civil rights for all is still warm, deep in our national consciousness. We will grow up some day and grant those rights freely to all. I turned my coat collar up and carried my surprise birthday cake back to my car.

Being Represented

Merry has been back in Syracuse this week getting 303 Summit ready to rent. I've been holding down the fort, walking the dog and deciding more cases. I think I'm starting to get the hang of it. Knowing how to effectively prepare for hearings is surely an art not a science. I've asked the lawyers who appear before me to send me briefs and medical records well in advance, but invariably I get them the day of the hearing. Actually that doesn't surprise me, I did the very same thing in my own practice.

When I review files for a hearing I find the cases can be divided fairly easily into three broad groups: (1) those that should obviously be paid, (2) those that should obviously be denied, and (3) hard cases.

I puzzle a short time about the small number of cases, maybe ten percent, that should obviously be paid. Why were they ever denied? Were they really that much less disabled just two years ago when they applied? I usually conclude that it is just very bad luck with the SSA bureaucracy.

About a quarter of the cases I review fall into the obvious denial category. I'm sure these folks think they are disabled. They are generally young, have no more than a high school education and have worked at unskilled, strenuous jobs. They are hurt enough not to be able to keep doing what they know how to do. Lighter work is hard to find. They are not motivated to get retrained for something they can physically manage. They have no savings and no back-up plan. Many are working for a temporary service or at odd jobs. When they come before me, I listen to their story, tell them about vocational rehabilitation and turn them down.

Because Social Security only pays attorney fees when a case is won, virtually none of these people are represented at their hearing. A few have tried to get legal assistance but were unsuccessful, presumably because the lawyer they consulted was smart enough to discover the case was going no where. Most have never even consulted a lawyer. They show up at their first hearing and are advised of their right to counsel. Their hearing is rescheduled, then they come back a second time without a lawyer and lose, or just never show up again. This pattern is so predictable that our office schedules an occasional special hearing day just for this type of case.

At least two thirds of the cases I review are quite difficult to decide. Most of these cases can probably be won with skillful representation. I'm fascinated by which of these claimants manage to hire competent counsel, which hire incompetent counsel, and which seem unable to find counsel even with significant effort. I've not heard enough cases yet to even form a theory about why this happens.

Let me give just one example of a case that looked like one I would deny when I reviewed it, but which was won easily by competent counsel. This week I held a hearing for a young (40) man who dropped out of school at age 12 (after sixth grade). He never worked at a real job, but sold drugs on the street. He spent nearly the entire rest of his life in and out of jail for petty offenses, mostly burglary. He has a congenital spine disorder that has gotten worse over the years, but is not now disabling. He has hepatitis C and is HIV+, but is not now symptomatic. His IQ was tested in school at 80, a low average. He is mentally ill, but his prison records did not show any loss of function. When I was reviewing the case all his medical care had been in prison and looked pretty routine. Now he was out of jail and applied for SSI benefits.

He tried a few times to get private lawyers to represent him, but failed. Fortunately, a legal aid lawyer took the case, got a competent psychological evaluation and easily won the case in my courtroom. Without representation he may well have lost. Being represented made all the difference.

Judging

My “training” period came to an end at last after 7 hard weeks of not sleeping in my own bed. This last week our furniture arrived and I started hearing cases.

Let me set the stage. The Office of Disability Adjudication and Review (ODAR) in St. Louis is located downtown in a modern office tower called St. Louis Place (picture attached). It occupies three quarters of the ninth floor. The office is roughly shaped like a “U” with a waiting room and elevators in the center. There are ten judges organized into two work groups with five judge's offices located on either long end of the U. There are about 45 support staff including ten decision writers (all lawyers) and 10 clerks called Senior Case Technicians (SCTs), one assigned to each judge. Tara Achembo is my SCT. She is essentially my paralegal helping get cases ready for hearing and following up afterwards. The rest of the staff is general clerical workers and managers.

Along the long flat side of the “U” adjacent to the waiting room is a row of five identical courtrooms. Claimants, their lawyers and any witnesses enter the courtrooms through locked doors from the waiting room. Judges enter from the inner office through a wooden door with a peephole that allows a fish-eye view inside. The judge's courtroom doors are unlocked from the office side but cannot be opened from inside the courtroom unless you have an electronic key.

The courtrooms each have the judge's bench on a raised platform at one end with a large desk, a computer hooked up to the SSA mainframe and a seat for a hearing reporter and their computer. In front of the bench is a large table with a seat for a vocational expert witness (VE) and seats for the claimant and their representative. Since 90% of our files are fully electronic, the attorney's seat and the VE's seat are equipped with computers, and they often also bring their own laptops. Each seat has a microphone to allow for electronic recording of the testimony.

On Monday I put on my new Judge's robe for the first time and headed for courtroom #2 a few minutes before 1:00, the time for my first hearing. I opened the door and was surprised to find the morning hearings had not yet ended. I apologized for the interruption then went to find my group leader to figure out what to do. I was quickly assigned a different courtroom and a different court reporter, but we couldn't get the computers to work. Finally, a half-hour later I was on my way. The confusing start took my mind off being nervous. I looked out at the claimant and his lawyer, introduced myself and started my questioning. I had perhaps over-prepared for a routine hearing but I wanted to really know the case. After about 15 minutes I knew what my decision would be. It was not this claimant's lucky day. His lawyer knew it was not going well. I gave the lawyer, who was very well prepared and comfortable, plenty of time to question his client, then granted his request for more time to try to get key evidence. They thanked me and left. The first hearing was over. It was 2:15. Not bad.

The next case involved a very mentally disturbed very young man. After he testified his mother testified and told me that virtually everything the claimant told me was a delusion. The file was devoid of adequate evidence. The claimant could not afford medical care so this time I ordered the client to get psychological testing paid for by Social Security. Another hour gone. The last claimant failed to show up. I dismissed his case. I walked out of the courtroom at 3:30, half an hour ahead of schedule. I felt great.

It's been pretty much like that every day since. After the hearings I issue orders for further development of cases and write decisions (actually I mostly write instructions to decision writers who draft decisions for me). Before the hearings I read files and make notes to prepare and occasionally decide a case without having to hold a hearing. I expect to decide at least 12 cases a week, or about 600 per year.

The work is inherently interesting and it suits me. I have a fair amount of compassion for claimants, but I've seen enough to not be a fool. I know what claimant's representatives go through and how they think. What's so different about judging is the realization that I'm the one who decides what will happen next for these folks. They need to move forward, and until I decide their life is on hold. Win or lose, after I decide, their story continues.