A pilot program that paid jurors $100 a day in seven California counties has been cut from next year’s budget as Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA) works to address a multibillion-dollar deficit.
Launched through legislation Newsom signed three years ago, the Jury Duty Pilot Program was supposed to boost juror participation by increasing daily pay from $15 to $100. The aim was to create a more representative jury pool by alleviating some of the financial strain that comes with jury service.
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The program, which began in September 2024, was designed as a legal experiment to restore fairness in a system that critics claimed was lopsided at best. Killing the program saves about $27.5 million, according to the Democratic governor’s latest budget proposal, which was revealed earlier this month.
Democratic Assemblyman Alex Lee, who sponsored the original bill, called Newsom’s decision to ax it “extremely disappointing,” CalMatters reported.
“Juror pay hasn’t been increased in 25 years,” Lee said. “Because of the incredibly low pay of just $15 a day starting their second day of service, jurors are being excused for financial hardship. This decreases the economic and demographic diversity of our juries and can lead to trials that are not as representative of our communities.”
Alameda County Chief Public Defender Brendon Woods called Newsom’s decision to cut the program in his revised May budget “absolutely shameful.”
“When you think about the cost of this program — about $27.5 million, and the cost that, as a state, we pay nearly $14 billion to incarcerate people in prison — it’s kind of ridiculous that this small amount was being cut to make sure that our juries are more diverse,” Woods said.
Woods addressed not only the consequences of losing the Jury Duty Pilot Program but also the broader implications in the context of Proposition 36, which voters approved last year. The ballot measure strengthened penalties for people who have repeatedly been convicted of shoplifting or caught using and dealing hard drugs such as fentanyl. The measure undid some of the changes the state made 10 years ago through Proposition 47, which decriminalized a lot of offenses.
“As a state, we just passed Prop. 36 — a law that will lead to the incarceration of more low-income and black and brown individuals,” Woods said. “Because of that law, more people will end up in prison and jail. And at the same time, we’re cutting funding for a program that would have empowered those very communities — giving low-income, black, and brown people a voice in the justice system. We’re ramping up incarceration while stripping people of their power. I can’t think of anything more insidious than that.”
San Francisco launched its own “Be The Jury” program in 2022, offering jurors a $100 daily stipend and conducting a study to evaluate its impact.
The findings showed that the increased pay led to a jury pool that more closely reflected the city’s demographics. The city reported that jurors who received the higher stipend tended to have lower household incomes than those who did not.
Additionally, people of color were more likely than white jurors to say the extra compensation helped eliminate “barriers” to serving.