Although East Lansing’s 54-B District Court caseload has seen a similar growth, Judge Richard Ball said it has been offset by an increase in resources.

The court is funded primarily by the city of East Lansing, which Ball said helps the court avoid a state budget crunch that has hindered many state-funded programs.

More than 90 percent of the court’s cases result in some form of probation, Ball said.

Matthew Brundage, chief probation officer for the court, oversees the caseloads of its four probation officers. The department saw a 38 percent increase from 938 cases in 2006 to 1,297 in 2007, but the hiring of another officer in 2007 helped keep individual loads steady, Brundage said.

Still, he said the department increasingly turns to technology to help monitor cases.

“That entire caseload is mostly technologically handled,” Brundage said. “You can’t go check on every individual because of the size of the caseload.”

Lorraine Brandon, an oversight officer for the 54-B District Court, said she focuses on getting her probationers through the system quickly to manage her 700-person caseload. For some cases, she allows probationers to report to her by mail or e-mail rather than conducting monthly meetings in person.

“We have to determine which ones require more supervision, and sometimes there are some that don’t require as much,” Brandon said.

While technological advances have helped her monitor a growing caseload, she said the court may eventually need to hire more officers.

“The technology is good, but what’s more effective is the personalized rapport that develops and the advancements in technology won’t take the place of that,” she said.

Even with the increase in technological resources, Ball admits the growth in probation sentences eventually could become a problem.

“As funding gets tighter and tighter, there may come a time when probation services are hurt by that,” Ball said.