Nineteen Pennsylvania judges — including Luzerne County Judge Thomas Burke — can remain on the bench instead of being forced to retire at the end of this year, officials said Wednesday.
By a slim margin, state voters Tuesday approved a state constitution amendment, increasing the mandatory judicial retirement age from 70 to 75, according to unofficial results.
With results reported from 99.66 percent of the state’s 9,163 voting districts, the question passed with 50.86 percent, or 2.44 million, votes. Another 2.36 million voters — 49.14 percent — rejected the change.
The retirement age increase applies to judges from the local to state level.
The 19 judges who would have been forced to retire the end of this year include Supreme Court Chief Justice Thomas Saylor, Burke and 12 other county Court of Common Pleas judges, three magisterial district judges and two judges on the Philadelphia Municipal Court, said Art Heinz, spokesman for the Administrative Office of Pennsylvania Courts.
The office did not have statistics on the number of other sitting judges who would have been forced to retire in future years before their terms expired, although Heinz confirmed Supreme Court Justice Max Baer won’t have to step down when he turns 70 next year.
Burke, who won a 10-year retention term in 2009 and turns 70 next month, has said he will respect the will of voters but would be “highly honored to continue to serve.” He has pointed out many aging adults have become more active and are living longer.
Advocates of the increase maintained courts will benefit from keeping more experienced judges working full-time. Judges can switch to senior status after mandatory retirement, but they must remain part-time.
Opponents argued an increase would delay the election of new judges and reduce the possibility an unfit judge would remain on the bench too long.
State legislators’ rewording of the ballot question in Tuesday’s general also drew criticism.
The legislators’ decision to move the question to the November ballot came too late to remove the question from the April 26 primary election ballot. The question was defeated in the primary, but the results were invalidated.
The general election question wording no longer stated judges currently must retire at age 70, which may have caused some voters to mistakenly believe they were imposing a mandatory retirement age for the first time, critics said.
Luzerne County voters were more supportive of the proposed change, with 56.41 approving an increase, according to unofficial results reflecting 179 of 180 voting precincts countywide.
