ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. — 9 Investigates the expensive new electronic records system that is keeping track of things in your local courtrooms. Critics told WFTV Tuesday that it was supposed to save time, space, and paper, but that's if judges and lawyers actually used it.
Florida lawmakers ordered county courts to stop wasting paper, so Seminole County spent nearly $1 million on a new paperless system. There's just one problem; many judges and lawyers can keep using paper.
"I might as well take ten 100,000 bills and light them on fire," Seminole County Clerk Mary Ann Morse said.
Morse bought new servers, software and assigned three employees to work on programming full-time for several months. Now, anyone can file and view civil court records online and, if needed, print them from their own computers.
But the law does not require it, so many judges and lawyers don't plan to use it.
"Older attorneys I know who are adverse to technology at some level have refused to use it entirely so far," attorney Jeff Sirolly said.
And that defeats the purpose of saving ink, paper and space.
Orange County already keeps 20,000 square feet of case files in a warehouse. The boxes of documents go from the floor all the way to the ceiling in the huge building.
"The taxpayers of the state of Florida really have wasted a lot of money," Morse said.
Former Tampa Senator Victor Crist sponsored the e-filing bill. He did not return WFTV's call. But under the law, the state's high court can set additional rules.
Orange County Chief Judge Belvin Perry said he has used the e-file system for three months.
"I had some hesitations, some reservations at first, but I found the more I got into it, it worked fine," Perry said.
Perry has been using the paperless system for several months and is now encouraging all of his judges to use it as well.
The clerk for the Supreme Court told WFTV he does expect the court to make e-filing mandatory, but he does not know when.
After WFTV alerted state lawmakers to the issue, they also plan to discuss it this session.