TALLAHASSEE (AP) – Florida courts already are jammed with more criminal and foreclosure cases due to the sagging economy, but the backlog will get only worse if their budgets are cut again, judges told lawmakers Wednesday.

The jurists as well as prison and law enforcement officials took their turns before one of several appropriations committees beginning to look for ways to avoid a $2.3 billion deficit in advance of a special legislative session to revise the budget next month.

Senate Criminal and Civil Justice Appropriations Committee Chairman Victor Crist said his panel would avoid cutting core missions of the courts, prisons, prosecutors, public defenders and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.

“We understand our first line of exposure is keeping the doors shut on the prisons and keeping the doors open on the courts,” said Crist, R-Tampa.

Agencies have been asked to suggest ways to absorb a 10 percent cut, but Crist said actual reductions won’t be that much. Budget leaders in both chambers have yet to decide how much they want to cut from each part of the budget, but Crist said he expects about 4 percent for the justice system.

That’s how much Gov. Charlie Crist – no relation to the senator – asked agencies to hold back in anticipation of falling tax revenues just before the $66 billion budget went into effect.

One moneysaving suggestion by the Department of Corrections would increase prisoners’ time off for good behavior, but it drew opposition from Sen. Crist and Randy Ball, a lobbyist for the governor, who said his boss would never got for that idea.

“He will house them at the (governor’s) mansion before he’ll let them go,” Ball said.

Lawmakers instead will look for more affordable ways to house Florida’s growing prison population, possibly by leasing facilities or putting more inmates in work release and other community-based programs, Sen. Crist said.

Most agencies already are operating with less money because the current budget is about $6 billion smaller than the original 2007-08 version.

Law Enforcement Commissioner Gerald Bailey said his department has closed buildings, let pilots go, given promotions without accompanying pay raises and frozen hiring except for critical positions. He said a 10 percent cut “would bring us to our knees.”

Courts have cut back on support personnel such as clerks, security and staff lawyers. Prosecutors and public defenders also are short-handed.

Circuit Judge Belvin Perry of Orlando, chairman of the Trial Court Budget Commission, said that has resulted in backlogs for civil dockets as courts must give priority to criminal cases, particularly those involving violence.

Criminal defendants also have the right to demand speedy trials, so judges must put aside other cases to do those first, Perry said.

He said a 10 percent cut would mean that “all civil cases in the state of Florida would virtually be suspended.”

The state’s five district courts of appeal also are delaying civil cases. Getting caught up won’t be easy, said Perry’s appellate counterpart.

“If someone dumped a pot of gold on the state of Florida and we were restored to where we were, we would still have that backlog,” said 2nd District Court of Appeal Chief Judge Stevan T. Northcutt.

The full House, meanwhile, held a rare out-of-session meeting to get another dose of bad financial news.

Legislative economist Amy Baker briefed the House, as she did the Senate last week, on the economic woes driving the deficit.

Rep. Carl Domino, R-Jupiter, asked Baker if she had any positive news “because I don’t want to shoot myself this afternoon.”

Baker told him about the only good news is the state’s revenue forecast doesn’t include a small potential benefit that could result from an as-yet undetermined federal stimulus package and other steps the federal government may take to prop up the housing market.