The Lowndes County Board of Supervisors voted Monday to authorize County Administrator Ralph Billingsley to negotiate with the estate of Randolph Lipscomb for the final piece on private property held on the block occupied by the county courthouse.
A renewed effort to purchase the old Lipscomb law office building, located on the northeast corner of Sixth Street North and Third Avenue North, along the demolition of the county’s courthouse annex building last week has sparked new talk about possibly expanding the courthouse to add at least one courtroom, something court officials say is badly needed.
“There’s really not any expansion planned in the near future,” Billingsley said. “But at some point, I think it’s definitely going to happen. Really, it’s just a matter of when. I think the supervisors understand the need for another courtroom.”
Talk of expanding the courthouse complex goes back more than 10 years, Billingsley said.
“I’ve been administrator for 10 years, but there were plans to expand drawn up before sometime then,” he said. “In fact, I saw some old architectural drawings on what it would look like. It was really beautiful.”
That plan included purchasing Franklin Elementary School, expanding the current courthouse and moving all county offices to what would have been a complex covering two blocks. The Columbus Municipal School District would have located its administrative offices in a portion of Franklin Academy.
Since then, the county, as well as the school district, have found other locations for their offices and there is no need for a “one-stop” court complex.
The need for an additional courtroom, however, is still widely supported.
Case backlog
Currently, there are four courtrooms in the courthouse, two on each floor. Those courtrooms are used by three circuit court judges — Lee Coleman, Lee Howard and Jim Kitchens — as well as chancery court judges Dorothy Colom, Jim Davidson and Kenneth Burns.
Circuit court hears felony criminal cases, as well as civil cases. Chancery court hears civil and domestic relations cases, ranging from bankruptcy and land disputes to divorce and child custody cases. The local districts of both courts cover Lowndes, Clay, Oktibbeha and Noxubee counties.
While unlike the circuit court, which convenes at the courthouse for four three-week sessions each year, the chancery court is held at the courthouse throughout the year. Even so, the biggest backlog resulting from the lack of courtroom space is found in circuit court, which uses two courtrooms when in session.
“Technically, we only have one courtroom,” Kitchens said. “The two courtrooms downstairs both belong to the chancery court, but they are kind enough to let us use the bigger courtroom downstairs when we’re in session.”
Because there are only two courtrooms available, one judge is not in session during a court term. The three judges alternate sitting out terms.
The implications of that arrangement are obvious, said District Attorney Scott Colom.
“Having a third courtroom would move the docket along and that’s significant,” Colom said. “It would give victims closure sooner and it would also give defendants their day in court sooner.”
Colom said the impact of the courtroom shortage is equally obvious.
“Do the math: If we had a third courtroom, all three judges could work all four sessions,” Colom said “That would be an additional 12 weeks they could be hearing cases. We clear anywhere from 30 to 40 cases during a three-week session. So adding another courtroom would mean clearing, easily, 100 more cases.”
A matter of convenience
The lack of courtroom space means a fair amount of juggling for both the chancery and circuit court judges.
“We try to accommodate the circuit court judges when they’re in session, but it does create some stress,” Davidson said. “Sometimes, especially when Judge Burns is hearing cases or when a special judge is brought, it’s hard to find a place where a judge can sit down and look at files or review cases.”
Kitchens said the circuit court judges are often forced to schedule hearings “out of term” when the circuit court is not scheduled.
“The problem with that is the burden it puts on our public defenders,” Kitchens said. “They work hard, but when a case is set out of term that means they can’t pursue their normal practice at those times. These public defenders are part-time, and if you schedule too many things out of term, it really affects their ability to make a living. A third courtroom would reduce some of that stress.”
Kitchens said the circuit court not only needs another courtroom, but a large courtroom.
“Right now, we only have one courtroom that is big enough to impanel a jury in,” Kitchens said. “That means that the two judges have to wait on each other to finish jury selection before they can get started. That creates a bottleneck, too.”
Davidson said he expects the demand for courtroom space to only grow.
“In chancery court, we’re having more cases, more hearings of all types,” Davidson said. “I’m sure that’s true for the circuit court judges, too. Lowndes County is the busiest of all of the courts in the district and, typically, the other courts follow our lead. So, I hope we can address this before too long. It’s definitely needed.”
Clay County is in the process of adding another courtroom and while there are only two courtrooms in the Oktibbeha County court annex, the old courtroom in the county courthouse can be used, if needed.
Although Lowndes supervisors have entered no formal discussions, board president Harry Sanders has said adding a courtroom, which he estimated would cost roughly $2.5 to $3 million.
Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].
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