The employees of the Florida State Courts System are exempt from the State of Florida Career Service System under Chapter 110, Florida Statutes. In accordance with recommendations of the Auditor General, it is the intention of the Supreme Court of Florida to create a uniform Florida State Courts Personnel System which shall govern, regulate, and coordinate all personnel and employment practices and activities with respect to recruitment, examination, appointment, training, promotion, retention, separation, or any other employment practice.
All employees of the Florida State Courts System are at-will employees and serve at the pleasure of the appointing authority. The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Florida, the Chief Judges of the District Courts of Appeal, and the Chief Judges of the judicial circuits of Florida exercise administrative supervision over court personnel in their respective jurisdictions. In the First Judicial Circuit, the Trial Court Administrator and the Chief Deputy Court Administrator are charged with the responsibility of human resource management, including the recruitment and retention of all personnel except judicial assistants and appellate law clerks who serve as personal staff to their individual judicial officers and are subject to their individual officer’s plenary authority over the employment relationship – including all hiring, supervisory, and firing decisions.
It is the policy of the State Courts System (SCS) to provide a workplace free from any and all forms of illegal discrimination, and to provide equal employment opportunity to every employee and applicant for employment based solely on his or her qualifications to perform the job, and without discrimination on account of race, ethnicity, sex, religion, national origin, disability, marital status, or age, except as provided by law, with respect to recruitment, appointment, training, promotion, retention, separation, or any other employment practice.
In accordance with Title I of the ADA of 1990, the SCS will not discriminate in any employment practice against qualified individuals with a disability, individuals regarded as having a disability, or individuals with an association with a person with a known disability. Furthermore, it is the policy of the SCS to provide a reasonable accommodation, if necessary, to all qualified individuals with a disability in order to assure equal opportunity in the application process, to enable a qualified individual with a disability to perform the essential functions of a job, and to enable an employee with a disability to enjoy equal benefits and privileges of employment. A reasonable accommodation will be made, on a case by case basis, if it does not impose an undue hardship on court operations.
It is the policy of the SCS to make the workplace free of sexual harassment. Sexual harassment occurs if there are unwelcome sexual advances; unwelcome requests for sexual favors; or unwelcome verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature from or involving an employee’s supervisors, peers, subordinates or other persons in contact with an employee during the course of the conduct of the employee’s business.
It is the policy of the State Courts System that all complaints of discrimination shall be treated seriously and acted upon promptly.