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NEW COURT BUILDING NEARS COMPLETION, COULD BE FINISHED EARLY

By Ray King/OF THE COMMERCIAL STAFF
Thursday, November 19, 2009 11:06 PM CST

A new court building that will house both divisions of district court could be ready as early as mid-January, one of the judges who will use the building said Thursday.

Speaking to the West Pine Bluff Rotary Club, Division One District Judge Kim Bridgforth said while the anticipated move in date for the new court building on East Third Avenue is March 1, “it could be as early as Jan. 15.”

“This is one of the first places we talked about having a new court building and you let your feelings be known, you supported it, and now it’s finally going to happen,” she said.

When it’s completed, the building will house both Division One, which handles Jefferson County cases, and Division Two, which will handle all cases from Pine Bluff.

“I can’t tell you how needed this is,” Bridgforth said. “We’ve had two floods and a lot of the files got wet and can’t be replaced.”

Currently, Division One is housed in the Joe Thomas Public Safety Building (at the civic center) and Division Two meets in the council chambers at city hall.

“As it is now, people get confused as to which courtroom they’re supposed to be in, and if they want to pay a hot check, they have to go to the county courthouse,” Bridgforth said. “When the new building is opened, people can check in at the front and find out exactly where they’re supposed to be.

“It will also save a lot of money on officers transporting people to courts because they will be able to walk them down a hall from the jail right into a holding cell, rather than having to put them in cars and taking them to my courtroom, or Judge (John) Kearney’s courtroom,” she said. “Plus, it will free up officers to be able to do other things.”

In addition, Bridgforth said she will be taking over felony first appearances which are currently done by Circuit Judges Jodi Dennis, Berlin Jones and Rob Wyatt Jr., when the new building is opened.

“That will free up the circuit judges and maybe help them clean up their dockets,” she said.

Jefferson County will own the building and the city of Pine Bluff will lease space in it at a rate of $1 per year. In addition, each party will be responsible for paying the operational costs of their division.

“Without a lot of help from people like you, I don’t know that this would have happened,” Bridgforth told the Rotarians.

Bridgforth also explained a number of new laws, including a prohibition on text messaging while driving that affects both teenagers and adults, and laws regulating the use of cellular telephones by teens.

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