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,___,"_~7_~__,~_,~,"______"___'._'_"_'''M'' -....'.._~.. 1. From: John T. Shockley [mailto:jshockley@ohnstadlaw.com] Sent: Thursday, August 17, 20069:45 AM To: Burdick, Birch Subject: RE: Mapleton Court Agreement Dear Mr. Burdick: Thank you again for taking time to review this issue Please find attached the proposed municipal court case transfer ordinance The first reading was held on August 14th, 2006. The First reading was approved with all members voting in favor of adoption. The Second reading is to be held on Sept 11. 2006. In the past the ordinances have been enforced by a Cass County Sheriffs deputy writing out the ticket. (as per contract with the sheriffs office). Any contested cases were heard by the Mapleton Municipal Court. In the past, the Mapleton City Council has appointed the West Fargo Municipal Court Judge to be Mapleton's Municipal Court Judge. Under this arrangement the city only paid for court time in the event that a ticket was contested. The city of Mapleton's budget has not in the past included an item for a full time municipal Judge. (monthly pay and continumg education expenses) In the past three years I believe that there has only been one contested ticket. The City of Mapleton will continue to contract with the Cass County Sheriffs office for police services The city has been very satisfied with the services provided by the Cass County Sheriffs office. With respect to Mr. Kirkeby, he IS currently the Municipal Judge of the City of Mapleton, he has been signing the tickets. The city council has recognized him as the Mapleton Municipal Judge. Further, he has had opportunities to speak at several city council meetings on the issue of the municipal judge position. In fact, he was on August 14th. 2006 agenda as an item and was given a significant amount of time to discuss the issue with the city council prior to the first reading of the ordinanc.e and the council's review of the proposed contract. Further, the mayor is always willing to discuss issues with any elected city official as are the individual council members. The decision by the City council is not personal to Mr. Kirkeby, had he not been elected,the City of Mapleton would still be in the process of evaluating the costs of the court and transferring its municipal court cases. This is because over the past two to three years the city has received a declining amount of revenue generated from the issuance of citations. As such the amount of revenue generated can no longer support utilizing the time of the city auditor to process the tickets in addition to paying a judges monthly salary I believe that Mr. Kirkeby has made suggestions of 100- 200 dollars per month for his salary in addition to other requests. Although I cannot find any authority, I suspect that the agreement of the board of county commissioners is required under the statute because of the role of Sheriffs department in enforcing traffic and criminal law I suspect that the statute's requirement of county agreement is to insure that the Sheriffs office is aware that the district court will be handling all of the municipalities cases. In that respect it would relate the transport and holding of suspects prior to trial and to and from trial. In a sense, I suspect that the North Dakota legislature, inserted this language to ensure that the County is aware of the transfer Further, I agree that part of the reason the county was included as a part of the agreement was likely due to the county's role in the clerks office at the time of the enactment of the statute. I would be available to attend the meeting on Monday, I will check to see if the Mapleton Mayor IS available also. I have a 530 p.m. West Fargo city commission meeting to attend and then at 7:00 p.m. I tlave to attend the city of Moorheads city council meeting. So I would respectfully request that If the item is put on the agenda that it be placed close to the top of the agenda. Once again thank you for your time in this matter. If you have any questions please feel free to contact me at anytime. Thanks John T. Shockley Attorney at Law Ohnstad Twichell, PC. 901 - 13th Avenue East P.O. Box 458 West Fargo, ND 58078-0458 TEL (701) 282-3249 FAX (701) 282-0825