There have been times when the First Department has had serious problems with excessive delays in the issuance of decisions.1 It may be a good time for the court to take affirmative steps to prevent the problem from recurring.
These delays have been caused by justices who failed, for months, to complete their assigned writing of an opinion or dissent. When even a few of our justices hold up decisions in this manner, the resulting backlog in the court's output can quickly become a systemic problem. Yet, the only procedure by which such delays are challenged is through informal conferences called by the presiding justice for each appeal remaining open for an excessive period, a procedure pioneered by then-Presiding Justice Jonathan Lippman. That approach has had success in the past,2 but in my view, it is not enough.
