The verdict has been rendered.
A mayor’s court will not be established in the city of Eastlake, at least not anytime soon.
That was the recommendation of a citizens task force appointed by Eastlake City Council to study the cost of establishing a mayor’s court, along with the potential revenue it could generate.
In its report, the committee listed the primary benefit as the city being able to keep all of the court costs assessed to misdemeanor and traffic defendants instead of them being paid to a municipal court. Additionally, the city would be able to retain a portion of the fines collected.
While Eastlake has experienced its share of financial struggles in recent years, we believe that the task force reached the proper conclusion in advocating that the city not launch a mayor’s court.
Although Eastlake undoubtedly would have generated more revenue through a mayor’s court, this concept might have adversely affected the city in other ways.
Clearly, a mayor’s court would not have enhanced the city’s image.
As the Eastlake task force noted in its report, the reputation of mayor’s courts among the general public is that they tend to issue an overabundance of citations, which raises concerns about how fair the proceedings are.
Let’s dissect the statement above and examine two key parts, the first being the overabundance of citations.
It’s no secret that some communities which operate mayor’s courts gain reputations for becoming speed traps. Perhaps the most famous example in Northeast Ohio in recent years was the diminutive village of Linndale in Cuyahoga County.
Linndale comprises less than a square mile and is home to about 180 residents. Within the village is a quarter-mile section of interstate, where Linndale police regularly pulled over a plethora of motorists for speeding violations.
In 2012, Linndale’s mayor’s court handled about 4,600 traffic and misdemeanor cases, or enough for about 26 per resident. An estimated $800,000 of the town’s $1 million budget that year came from ticket revenue, according to cleveland.com.
Coincidentally, 2012 also marked the year when the Ohio Legislature approved legislation banning mayor’s courts in villages with fewer than 200 residents. The law closed mayor’s courts in Linndale and six other Ohio villages.
We’re not saying that Eastlake would have become the new Linndale if it had established a mayor’s court. Nor are we suggesting that motorists who disobey speed limits don’t deserve to be ticketed. But having a mayor’s court certainly does create the possibility of police going to extremes in patrolling for speed violations and issuing tickets. And would Eastlake taxpayers want their police officers to spend the extra time on traffic enforcement if it diverted them from protecting the city in other ways?
Regarding the issue of fairness, the structure and oversight of a mayor’s court raises doubts as to whether impartial justice can be rendered to those whose cases are being decided.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio noted in an article how mayor’s courts can create a conflict of interest.
“During times of economic stress, the mayor or magistrate may not be able to look past the fact that more guilty pleas equals more money for the town,” the ACLU stated.
Former Ohio Supreme Court Justice Paul Pfeifer also was a vocal critic of mayor’s courts.
“The judge is sitting there running a court in which his or her principal objective is what’s in the cash register at the end of the evening,” Pfeifer said in a Columbus Dispatch story.
Creating a mayor’s court could have provided a source of easy and plentiful revenue for Eastlake, but it wouldn’t have contributed to the positive atmosphere and spirit of cooperation that have started to emerge in the city.
We would urge Eastlake’s administration and City Council to continue building on successes that have been achieved in recent years — such as attracting new businesses, including a medical marijuana growing facility and Moldmasters International, a manufacturer of precision molds and patterns for the aerospace and investment casting industries; collaborating with the cities of Willoughby and Willowick to improve Vine Street between Erie Street in Willoughby and Lake Shore Boulevard in Willowick; and an increase in residential construction.
Activities like these will help bolster Eastlake’s economy and create more tax revenue for the city government, making it unnecessary to establish a mayor’s court.