The latest round in a long-running dispute over operation of Fulton County Magistrate Court could cut that court’s budget, change state law to expand the cases other judges can oversee, and potentially topple Chief Magistrate Judge Cassandra Kirk.
Fulton County commissioners Dana Barrett and Bob Ellis are sponsoring a resolution that’s up for consideration Wednesday. Among its provisions it would ask state legislators to change Chief Magistrate Judge from an elected position to one appointed by the State Court of Fulton County.
Kirk has been a magistrate court judge since 2015, when the court became independent of State Court. Reelected in 2022, her current term runs to the end of 2026.
Ellis sent Kirk a letter Sept. 1, saying the Magistrate Court budget has grown from $3.1 million in 2019 to $5.4 million in 2023, along with staffing; but the number of cases the court concludes is lower than in 2019.
“Additionally, while the Board of Commissioners have heard from several landlords and tenants about extreme delays in getting their cases addressed, the data reveals that the number of slots on the calendar for these cases for 2023 is 52.1% less than it was in 2019 and that attorney slots have been reduced by 62%,” Ellis wrote. Kirk has not cooperated with efforts to improve things, he said.
On Monday Kirk provided Magistrate Court case numbers from 2019 through 2023, though without breaking them down by type.
Those figures show wide variation in the number of cases filed each year, 49,437 in 2020 which was down from 80,093 in 2019. The other three years fell in between those extremes.
The numbers also show a steady drop in the percentage of cases closed, from 99.8% in 2019 to 90.5% in 2022 — and down to 64.45% in 2023, with two weeks left in the year. That leaves 26,224 cases open, many times the number in previous years.
Ellis’ letter was followed by a Dec. 12 memo from Chief Superior Court Judge Ural Glanville to county officials, saying that the three magistrate judges who have been helping with preliminary hearings and minor crimes will “either be eliminated or reduced to a single magistrate judge” by Kirk.
That will slow down the work of Superior Court, Glanville warned. Like all county courts, Superior and Magistrate courts have substantial backlogs, lengthening the time people spend in jail waiting for their cases to be heard.
Glanville urged a redirection of funding for two proposed new judges from Magistrate Court to Superior Court, and equivalent funding for one more full-time judge. He also asked to change state law to let Superior Court judicial officers handle felonies. They are now limited to family law cases.
Barrett, on Friday, released a statement accusing Kirk of responsibility for a “significant backlog” of court cases and called for her to step down. Kirk’s actions “add up to extortion,” the latest move in a long-running campaign to increase her budget and seize control of court clerk functions, Barrett alleged.
Kirk responded Friday.
“Contrary to recent claims, we have never stated or intended to halt the provision of judicial support for services for preliminary hearings or the noncomplex Superior Court trial division,” she said. Her court remains “fully committed” to supporting Superior Court, Kirk said.
But she acknowledged her move had to do with the upcoming budget, which county commissioners are scheduled to approve in January. Kirk said Magistrate Court officials believed they were on course toward an agreement on allocating court resources.
“During these discussions, our primary objective was to highlight the significant utilization of our resources in assisting the Superior Court,” she said. “Since 2019, Magistrate Court has dedicated 37.5% of our full-time judge resources (to Superior Court), resulting in an allocation of $3 million from the Magistrate Court budget over time.”
The resolution says that, on Dec. 12, Kirk issued an order “purporting to appoint a Clerk of the Magistrate Court,” although under a 2016 county resolution the Superior Court Clerk also serves as clerk of Magistrate Court.
If the resolution passes, it would grant Glanville’s wishes for moving Magistrate Court funding for judges to Superior Court, and for asking that Superior Court judicial officers be allowed to handle felony cases.
And it would ask the state to again make chief magistrate judge an appointed position.
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