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| Few
Arkansans will ever enter the doors of a circuit or chancery court
and fewer still will find themselves in the Supreme Court or Court
of Appeals. It is fairly likely, however, that many Arkansans will,
at some point, come into contact with a limited jurisdiction court.
For this reason, these courts may be the most important part of our
judicial system. Unfortunately, they are totally funded by local and
county governments and the amount of support given to any particular
court varies tremendously from one area of the state to the next. The passage of Amendment 80 to the Arkansas Constitution creates the possibility of bringing substantial change to the structure of our limited jurisdiction courts. The extent of that change, however, will be left to the decision of the General Assembly. The current Constitution of 1874 provides for six different types of courts of limited jurisdiction, the most prevalent are the municipal court and city court. Municipal courts are served in most cases by part-time judges who are required to be attorneys and exercise county-wide jurisdiction. In 1999-00, there were 126 municipal courts served by 113 judges and 126 clerks. There are currently 112 city courts served by 90 judges which serve communities which do not have a municipal court. These courts exercise city-wide jurisdiction. Under Amendment 80, the jurisdiction of these courts will be consolidated into one court known as the district court. The number and location of these courts is left to the General Assembly and the specific jurisdictions set by both the General Assembly and the Supreme Court. The caseload of municipal and city courts has grown tremendously in the last several years, particularly since the civil jurisdiction of municipal courts was raised from $300 to $3,000 in 1987 and again to $5,000 in 1997. Municipal court filings, however, declined in 2000 to 942,834 cases, from 995,971 in 1999. City court filings, however, increased from 62,391 to 70,981 cases. |
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two courts also generate a tremendous amount of revenue for local
and county government and for several special state programs. In 2000,
$87,737,120 was assessed and $67,123,263 was collected by these courts
in fees, costs, and fines. The financial accounting and disbursement
procedures of these courts was impacted greatly by the passage of
the Uniform Cost and Fee Act of the 1995 General Assembly. The Act
began a phase-in of the state funding of the court system and simplified
the disbursement process for court generated funds. The Arkansas Municipal Judges Council is made up of all municipal court judges in the state. The Council acts as the general body representing the state's limited jurisdiction courts. Formal business by the Council is conducted in the spring and fall meetings each year. The 1999-00 President of the association was Judge Robert Gladwin. The Arkansas Municipal and City Court Clerks Association also works to represent the interest of limited jurisdiction court clerks. The body is also responsible for the certification of these clerks. Their President in 1999-00 was Ruth Calloway. |
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