They blend quietly into the courtroom background, as much a part of the scene as the lawyers at the table and the judge on the bench. They're the ones who keep the record, designed to last through eternity, or at least until the appeals run out.

But if they're silent in the courtroom, there's nothing nondescript about the way court reporters play California politics. "Extraordinarily powerful," is how one critic described them.

It's true they've spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on top-level lobbyists. But the spending has come in response to forces in the Capitol that have zoned in hard on them, trying to put them out of business forever.

In an era of multibillion-dollar budget shortfalls, the Legislative Analyst's Office has recommended a switch from stenographic to electronic court reporting. The LAO says the move would save the state $113 million a year.

Lawmakers junked the idea this year, but two Republican Assembly members have since submitted bills that pick up on the LAO's suggestion.

While budget hawks have targeted court reporters, one Democratic assemblyman has put in a bill on their behalf. It would prohibit lawyers from disseminating court transcripts without somebody paying the reporter first.

Tall and friendly, and a fixture in Sacramento Superior Court Judge Trena H. Burger-Plavan's courtroom, Cheryl Redlich, a 30-year veteran of the job, is used to finding her profession at the center of cost-cutting debates.

"Unfortunately, it never seems to go away," said Redlich, the former president of the California Court Reporters Association. "We've faced these battles in the past, and we've shown time and time again that we are the most cost-effective way."

Assemblyman Don Wagner, R-Irvine, is a lawyer who does business litigation. His Assembly Bill 803 would phase out reporters at a rate of 20 percent a year for all non-felony trials.

"I'm not really surprised there is organized opposition to it – I know at the end of the day those jobs are likely to go away," Wagner said. "They do contest significantly the amount of the savings, but everybody has their own assumptions when they make their own accounting. I believe there will be savings."

Digital recording starts

California's 58 counties currently employ some 7,600 court reporters, according to the state Court Reporters Board, which licenses them. Pay varies from county to county. They are employed by the courts but are allowed to sell the transcripts for profit.

In Sacramento, the county's 78 reporters earn a base pay ranging from $72,413 to $87,998 a year, with 70 of them coming in at the maximum rate. In 2009, the most recent year for which the information is available, they made around $1.3 million off their transcripts, with 16 of them taking in more than $25,000 each. Two earned more than $40,000 in transcript fees.

In a Jan. 24 report to the Legislature, the LAO cited a 1991-94 pilot study in California that said electronic reporting could save the state from $28,000 to $42,000 a year per courtroom.

Analyst Drew Soderborg said as many as 45 states, as well as the federal government, already use at least some electronic reporting. California is one of them. In Sacramento, the county has gone digital in eviction and traffic court and electronic on the daily misdemeanor calendar.

"Given the tough budget choices the Legislature has to make, this option becomes more and more palatable," Soderborg said.

Electronic court reporting is widely used in states like Kentucky and Utah, while other states like Florida and Arizona are studying the possibility, according to a 2009 report by the Conference of State Court Administrators.

The California Court Reporters Association strongly disputes claims of significant savings. The courts still must employ monitors to run the recording machines, the group says, and then a transcriptionist if someone wants a document.

A comparison study commissioned by the court reporters lined up the costs in electronic Florida courts against stenographic Los Angeles Superior Court.

While reporters cost more than monitors, when transcription fees per 1,000 pages are factored in, it's slightly cheaper to go with the reporter, the report said. The costs of computer upgrades in the electronic system tilt the advantage even more toward the reporters, the study found.

Friends, foes, lobbyists

The reporters have at least one key ally in their corner. Sacramento Superior Court Presiding Judge Steve White said that "it would be a disaster" to switch to machines from humans.

"Almost to a person, judges are loath to see even the prospect of that, to even see it discussed, because it's a bad idea," White said.

Under the current system, testimony flashes at the judge's bench as soon as it is written. Past rulings and testimony are available at the click of a button. White said it would take "hours" to retrieve such information if courts relied on recordings.

Lining up against the reporters is Peter Scheer, executive director of the San Rafael-based First Amendment Coalition. He sees them as "extraordinarily powerful, although small and below the radar."

"They've been just enormously effective in a whole series of laws over the years, creating for themselves a monopoly industry that is reinforced every which way not just by private agreements and contracts, but by laws and statutes that make it at this point very difficult for the courts to modernize and operate efficiently," Scheer said.

In the last legislative session, the California Court Reporters Association spent $92,000 on lobbying, on top of $430,000 earlier in the decade. Its lobbying firm, Capitol Strategies Group Inc., takes up half the 15th floor of the Empire building on 13th and K streets.

The reporters distributed a modest $13,345 in political contributions last year to 13 Democrats and one Republican running for office. Only one reporter-backed candidate lost.

One winner, Assemblyman Michael Allen, D-Santa Rosa, this year submitted Assembly Bill 990 to restrict the dissemination of court transcript copies unless the reporter gets paid.

"We're trying to protect the intellectual property of the court reporters," Allen said in a written statement.

The First Amendment Coalition's Scheer says they shouldn't be allowed to own the transcripts, a situation in place in most states. The arrangement "allows them to commercially exploit (transcripts) for maximum profit," Scheer said, and own them "in a way that would allow them to manage wide open access to the information."

In Sacramento, anybody who wants a transcript can buy it from the reporters' H Street office at 41 cents a page. If the customer wants an original copy, considered an official court document, reporters charge a "folio" rate of $2.75 per page, multiplied by .85 cents. The formula – set in the state Government Code – would result in a cost of $23.37 for a 10-page document.

An original plus one copy would have a $1 multiplier. Two copies would have a $1.15 multiplier. Reporters say the "folio" rates are designed to compensate them for the cost of their equipment and for producing the documents on their own time.

Reporter licensing fees have financed a "transcript reimbursement fund" for poor people who can't afford transcripts. The fees have put nearly $7.5 million into the fund over the past 30 years, the reporters say.

Redlich, the Sacramento reporter, said her profession has nothing to apologize for.

"We take our jobs seriously," she said. "We go above and beyond to make sure the record is accurate and that we're doing a good job and not just cranking out tapes and putting down words that we think we hear.

"We make a record, and we make a good record."

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