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Eastern Division

BELMONT COUNTY Commissioners defused a potential bomb last week when the board announced the decision to drop a plan to consolidate Eastern and Northern division courts for now.

The commissioners had planned to consolidate the two courts in an effort to save money. The plan was initiated this year after current Eastern Division Court Judge William Davis announced that he planned to retire at the end of the year.

With that in mind, work had already begun on the construction of the new Eastern Division Court in Bellaire. County leaders had met with the judges and had planned to eliminate one judge’s position after Davis retired and have county divisional court duties picked up by Northern Division Court Judge Frank Fregiato, with some of the jurisdictions split between Fregiato and Western Division Court Judge Harry White.

Everything seemed to be in order for this plan, but the Belmont County Bar Association expressed its opposition to the plan after examining it. The attorneys felt the plan would not save much money, if any, in light of the fact that the judges’ positions are largely funded by state allocations. If the county would have to hire a magistrate to help out with additional workloads in the divisional courts, the magistrate’s salary would have had to be funded entirely from county funds.

The explosive factor in the mix was the fact that state legislators would have had to act on the measure to eliminate a judgeship in the county. This action was not placed in a state bill and acted upon before local attorneys had a chance to file for candidacy for the presently still-existing Eastern Division Court seat.

Although the request to eliminate the county court judgeship is now in a state bill awaiting action, three local attorneys – Charlie Bean, David Trouten and John Vavra – have filed for their candidacy, are running for election to the judge’s position and are actively campaigning.

County leaders obviously made the right move by letting this consolidation plan go for now. They understood that it would not be right to pull the position out from under the candidates while election season is already upon us. State legislators are still expected to act on the judgeship elimination measure, but they are expected to let it die during the next session.

While this is the right move for now, don’t be surprised if the measure comes up again in the future. A closer eye will be kept on the timing of things if and when it comes up again.

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