Proposal calls for elimination of one MDJ office in Franklin County and changes to others

A proposal calls for one of Franklin County's magistrial district courts to be eliminated and for several others to be realigned.

The report is now available for public comment. At the end of February, the proposal will be submitted to Pennsylvania's court administrator and, ultimately, a final recommendation will be made to the state's Supreme Court.

Reestablishment of the state's magisterial district courts is considered every 10 years, a year after the results of the U.S. census has been certified.

The Administrative Office of Pennsylvania Courts provided president judges data on the caseloads and workloads of the magisterial district courts within their judicial districts. President judges -- the role is held by Judge Shawn Meyers in the Court of Common Pleas for Franklin and Fulton Counties -- were asked to use that data to determine how many magisterial districts their county needs to handle cases over the next 10 years and where boundaries should be drawn to ensure work is distributed equally. MDJs were to be consulted.

Franklin County and Fulton County comprise the 39th Judicial District in the Pennsylvania Court of Common Pleas. That would not change per this proposal, although the counties were considered separately to produce the report.

Each county has multiple magisterial district courts that cover cases within their geographical boundary or that arise during on-call times. These judges handle all traffic and non-traffic citations, parking violations and civil and landlord-tenant complaints. MDJ offices are also where criminal cases are initially filed; the judges are responsible for preliminary arraignments and preliminary hearings, where they decide whether there is sufficient evidence for a case to move up to the county court.

Proposed changes were based on the number of cases each office handles, their workloads, and population and anticipated growth over the coming years. Data covering 2014 to 2019 was used; 2020 was excluded because of the COVID-19 judicial emergency's effect on statistics that year.

Among the guidelines: A district can not be eliminated during a judge's six-year term, and an incumbent judge's residence must remain in their district. Also, a district must be contiguous, meaning its municipalities must be grouped together geographically.

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Changes proposed in Franklin County

Franklin County has seven magisterial district courts. The proposal calls for one -- 39-3-03, currently led by MDJ David Plum for Fannett, Hamilton, Letterkenny and Lurgan townships -- to be eliminated. This would go into effect in 2028; Plum was just re-elected to a six-year term.

Four offices would be realigned:

• 39-4-04: MDJ Kristin Nicklas, boroughs of Orrstown and Shippensburg (West End) and Greene and Southampton townships;

• 39-3-05: MDJ Duane Cunningham, Borough of Greencastle and Antrim Township;

• 39-3-06: MDJ Jody Eyer, Borough of Mercersburg and Montgomery, Metal, Peters, St. Thomas and Warren townships; and

• 39-3-07: MDJ Kelly Rock, Borough of Mont Alto and Guilford and Quincy townships.

The magisterial district courts of Judge Glenn Manns for Chambersburg (39-3-01) and Judge Annie Gomez Shockey for Waynesboro and Washington Township (39-3-02) would be reestablished, meaning there would be no changes for them.

Nicklas' office would gain Fannett, Lurgan and Letterkenny townships from Plum's office. Hamilton Township would move to Eyer's office from Plum's.

The first and fourth precincts of Greene Township would move from Nicklas' office to Rock's.

Lastly, the first, third and fourth precincts of Guilford Township, with the exception of non-interstate traffic filings, would move to Cunningham's office from Rock's office.

Here are some of the statistics that were considered to determine proposed changes:

• Rock's office had the most cases filed, followed by Manns' office.

• The offices of Manns and Gomez-Shockey had the highest workloads.

• Plum, Eyers and Cunningham's offices had the lowest workloads and caseloads, which ranged from 91% to 100% smaller than those at the busiest offices.

• Consistent growth is expected in the areas covered by Cunningham and Eyer. The proposal points to renewed operations at the Norfolk Southern Intermodal Terminal, construction of a warehouse that should bring 1,000 new jobs and the addition of 600 homes in Antrim Township and Greencastle, and the opening of Herbruck's Poultry Farm and other commercial entities in the Mercersburg area.

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Changes proposed in Fulton County

Fulton County would keep all three of its current MDJ offices, but they would be realigned to even out the case and workload.

Court 39-4-01 (Wells, Taylor, Dublin and Licking Creek townships), Judge Devin Horne, would gain turnpike traffic filings from Brush Creek Township.

Court 39-4-02 (Borough of McConnellsburg and Todd and Ayr townships), Judge David Washabaugh V, would gain Thompson Township and traffic cases from Bethel Township.

Those jurisdictions would come from court 39-4-03 (Borough of Valley-Hi, Union, Bethel, Thompason, Brush Creek and Belfast townships), Judge Tamela Mellott Heming.

The caseload of MDJ 39-4-03 was 139% of that of 39-4-02 from 2014-2019, according to the report.

How to see the full report

The full proposal and information on how to make a comment can be found at franklincountypa.gov, under "press releases and announcements."

Amber South can be reached at asouth@publicopinionnews.com.

This article originally appeared on Chambersburg Public Opinion: Magisterial district court in Franklin County would be cut, per proposal