Allen County Common Pleas Court Judge Jeffrey Reed said the backlog in cases seen by the court a year ago during the Covid-19 pandemic has eased.
The Lima News
LIMA — The deadline for Ohio courts to apply for federal funding through the American Rescue Plan Act to ease docket backlogs due to Covid-19 came and went last week and no applications were submitted from Allen County.
The funds simply weren’t needed, court officials say.
Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine announced last month that grants totaling $10 million were being offered to courts throughout the state in an effort to help jurisdictions reduce overcrowded dockets.
Funding for the Ohio Court Backlog Reduction Program was made available as part of the $250 million in ARMP funding the Ohio General Assembly allocated to first responders last year to help offset various issues exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. Among the needs identified were increases in court backlogs attributed to upticks in violent crime and decreases in staffing levels in criminal justice fields.
Judges Jeffrey Reed and Matt Staley, who preside over Allen County general division and domestic relations courts, respectively, said grant funds were not sought because their courts are in generally good shape.
“The good news is, while there is still a backlog it’s not as bad as it was a year ago,” Reed said recently. “I think we’re pretty well caught up now, whereas if you’d asked me a year ago I would have been in a panic. But I think we’re out of the worst of the backlog that we experienced during the pandemic.”
Staley said he has been pleasantly surprised that the pandemic did not result in a backlog of cases, primarily because of other events taking place in his court.
“In 2020 we took over child support cases from juvenile court,” he said. That change took place at the peak of the pandemic.
“That added a couple of thousand cases a year to our workload,” the judge said, “so there was a genuine concern. But two of our part-time magistrates were elevated to full time and our docket is in good shape.”
Reed said the establishment of a county public defender’s office “was a big help” in keeping cases moving swiftly through the criminal side of the court system.
“They’re doing a great job,” he said.
There were some 450 new criminal cases introduced in common pleas court in 2021. Through the first six months of this year that number stands at 160.
“I think maybe the prosecutors are presenting fewer cases to the grand jury, which is indicting fewer people. But the charges overall are more serious with more counts” than in recent years, Reed said.
“Jury trials are up, or maybe even with where they were pre-Covid,” he added.
Reed said court officials have been working closely with the Allen County commissioners to find uses for federal ARPA funding previously secured. Much of those discussions have centered on the expanded use of a fourth-floor courtroom in the courthouse.
“With the installation of enhanced electronics devices and an improved security system we could utilize the fourth-floor courtroom as a third courtroom and have visiting judges come in to hear cases,” Reed said. “We’ve looked at that as a possibility but we haven’t pinpointed any specific improvements yet.”
The Lima Municipal Court similarly did not apply for federal funding to ease docket backlogs, said Court Administrator Lisa Deters.
“We looked into it (grant funding) but we did not qualify because we have no backlogs,” Deters said. “Our cases are right on track.”
