The future of Goshen City Court is looking bleak.
Goshen Mayor Allan Kauffman received a letter this week from the Elkhart County Commissioners stating they will not recommend to the Elkhart County Council that the county provide financial support to continue the Court.
“Until receiving the letter, I was cautiously optimistic that the decision would be favorable,” Kauffman said in a memo to Goshen City Council members. “It seemed to me it would be less costly and more efficient to support an existing operation than to absorb the workload in county government.”
The Goshen City Council members are expected to take a vote during their Tuesday meeting on whether to continue the court after 2007. The mayor said recently that he is not willing to approve a budget that includes a large property tax subsidy for City Court.
In 2005, the court had an operational deficit of $65,000. With a budget this year of $431,000, a property tax subsidy of at least $40,000 is expected.
Kauffman said he was disappointed with the commissioners’ decision, particularly because he said they reached a decision before looking at an interlocal agreement that they suggested Goshen City Attorney Larry Barkes draft for the county attorney, Gordon Lord, to review.
In the memo, Kauffman said that if the City Council does decide to close the court, city officials will make a good effort to transition current court employees to other positions within city government as transition happens, or as new positions may be added. He said county government may also have openings if they need to add staff to handle increased case load.
“Our request for county reimbursement seemed reasonable. Without it, it seems the financially responsible decision for Goshen taxpayers is to allow this service to be consolidated into county operations,” Kauffman said.
Commissioner Mike Yoder said there are two main reasons the commissioners have decided not to recommend the County Council provide funding for the court.
“We did not want to establish a precedent of subsidzing city courts and we also learned that Elkhart was running their court without a need for a subsidy,” he said, explaining that the commissoners felt that perhaps there were some operational aspects of Goshen City Court that can be improved.
Yoder said that if the City Council decides not to continue to subsidize City Court, there are a couple of options that county officials will consider in order to move forward.
Also on Tuesday night’s City Council agenda is a resolution to require verification of employee payroll exemptions in cases where companies request property tax phase-ins from the City Council.
At a recent City Council meeting, council members expressed support of the proposal. Members of the Goshen Community Relations Commission also showed support for the proposal at a meeting earlier this week.
The City Council will meet at 7 p.m. Tuesday at the City Police and Courts building, 111 E. Jefferson St., Goshen.
Respond: (574) 533-2151, ext. 313
tara.layne@goshennews.com
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