AUGUSTA, Maine — All of the courthouses in Maine will remain open for now.
That was the unanimous decision Friday of a committee made up judges, legislators, county officials and members of the legal community charged with considering whether some of the least busy District Courthouses should be closed to save money.
Closing courthouses is a difficult issue for legislators, said House Minority Leader Joshua Tardy, R-Newport, a member of the committee.
“I reject the idea that closing any of our courthouses is the right thing to do,” Tardy, a lawyer whose practice is based in Newport, said after the meeting. “I think it’s pretty clear that the cost savings are minor compared to the need for judicial services in rural Maine.”
The committee rejected closing the District Court in Madawaska, the state’s least used facility, but agreed that the judiciary should look for a less expensive facility in which to convene. Closing the facility would have saved about $46,000 a year in rent and operating expenses, according to figures presented at Friday’s meeting.
The approximately 300 cases a year that are handled in Madawaska could have been moved to the District Court in Fort Kent about 25 miles away. The facilities have shared a clerk for several years, according to Chief Justice Leigh I. Saufley, who presided over the meeting held at the Judicial Center in Augusta.
A judge has been needed in the Madawaska court an average of only two days a month for the past couple of years, Saufley said. The court system’s Web site states that “individuals with business pending before [the] Madawaska DC are advised to call ahead for public hours.” Saufley said that her staff is working with town officials to find a less expensive facility and to find a tenant to replace the court in the privately owned building.
The committee also discussed shutting down the District Court in Millinocket, but unanimously voted against closing that facility, which rents space on the top floor of the municipal building. About 1,100 cases in the fiscal year ending June 30, 2008, were handled in that court, which is open 8 a.m.-4 p.m. five days a week.
The advisory committee on court facilities was formed in November after Saufley received a letter from Gov. John Baldacci asking the judiciary to consider cutting $400,000 from its budget next year by closing courthouses. The committee Friday directed Saufley to “politely reject the governor’s proposal to close courthouses.” The group also told the chief justice to write a report of the information the committee had considered and the recommendations it was making for Baldacci.
Baldacci’s spokesman David Farmer said Friday that the judiciary needed to find $1 million in savings in its proposed budget but had not directed the chief justice as to where that savings should come from.
“The governor believes that it is important for the chief justice and the judiciary to find the savings and to protect the administration of justice,” Farmer said. “If the judiciary can find the savings without closing courthouses and protect the administration of justice, that’s fine with the governor.”
Saufley said that the judiciary is very limited in what it can cut. “We have people, buildings and court-appointed counsel,” she said Friday in explaining the options for cutting funds. “We are constitutionally mandated to provide counsel, so we can’t cut that. That leaves us with people and buildings.”
Saufley told the committee that closing one small rural district courthouse would save an average of $50,000, about the same it costs in salary and benefits to employ a court clerk or court security officer. The chief justice said that once court facilities are closed it is nearly impossible to reopen them. Saufley said she would rather continue to achieve savings by not filling positions and by cutting back on the number of hours courthouse clerks’ offices are open than by closing courthouses.
There are now 40 to 50 vacant positions that are not being filled because of a hiring freeze. All of those vacancies are in courthouses south of Bangor, Saufley told the Bangor Daily News earlier this year. The committee also endorsed Saufley’s proposals to:
• Fund renovations at courthouses in Kennebec, Piscataquis and Washington counties with $67.5 million in bonds that would not need voter approval.
• Seek funds in the next biennium or in later years to renovate courthouses in Oxford, Franklin and Waldo counties.
• Sell the former state-owned liquor store that now houses the District Court in York and use the proceeds from the sale to construct a new building in the community.
990-8207