Spring Lake Heights Reverses Vote to Share Wall Township Courtroom

The deal to move the is off.

The borough will instead maintain its own courtroom and judge, prosecutor and longtime court administrator, an 18-year municipal employee.

Faced with annual savings to taxpayers estimated at $40,000 to $44,000 and the possibility that the tenured court administrator could file a wrongful termination lawsuit, the borough council voted 3-1 to vacate the shared services agreement to hold municipal court in Wall.

The much-debated agreement, approved 3-2 along party lines when it first came up for a vote two weeks ago, had never been executed by Mayor Frances Enright and Wall Township officials, according to Councilman John P. Brennan, Jr.

As Brennan, a Democrat, led the charge to reverse the June 27 decision, Republican Councilman Richard Diver, who had earlier predicted yearly savings of $55,000 to taxpayers, tried to salvage the agreement.

The council opted by a 3-1 tally to vacate the earlier decision with Diver casting the lone dissenting vote. Councilwoman Sara King abstained. Councilman Gavino Maccanico was absent.

Citing revenues of $115,000 garnered last year by the court, Brennan urged his colleagues to keep one of the town's better sources of revenue and the employees operating it.

"That's because we have really dedicated people who have been doing this work," Brennan said.

As an attorney who regularly appears in area municipal courts, Brennan recalled negative experiences dealing with Wall Township's court. The township's court employees must process paperwork for cases originating in their own municipality and for the Borough of Sea Girt, which also uses the township's courtroom under a shared services agreement.

If Spring Lake Heights were to join that mix, its cases might get lost in the shuffle, he said.

"Once we move from here to there, we are going to be a stepchild. We're not going to be a priority there," Brennan said.

Wall courtroom employees are capable of providing Spring Lake Heights and any other contracted community with efficient service, Diver countered. He also disputed Brennan's predictions that borough revenues would drop if the courtroom is moved.

The pressure is on smaller New Jersey municipalities to merge services as a means of controlling the cost of government and not duplicating services, he added.

"Shared services are the wave of the future," Diver said.

Over time, the taxpayer savings might turn out to be closer to $60,000, when the borough considered what it might save through using Wall's facilities and resources, he continued.

Wall could offer the use of a bailiff, rather than having a borough police officer present during court hearings as is currently the case in Spring Lake Heights, he said.

"Our police chief would rather have our officers out on the street," Diver said.

He also disputed Brennan's assertion that the borough would have to pay overtime to its police officers if they transport a defendant from the Monmouth County Correctional Institution in Freehold to Wall for a court hearing.

The township has closed circuit television between its courtroom and the county jail that eliminates the need for police to transport defendants, Diver said.

Brennan agreed and added a suggestion.

"That's true. But we could have closed circuit TV here," Brennand said. "We don't have to transfer many people from (the county jail) to here."

Diver still pointed to $40,000 as substantial savings from the taxpayer's point of view.

"I think $40,000 to everyone sitting here is a lot of money," he said.

That amount covers salary and benefits for the municipal court administrator, according to Brennan.

"The idea that she was going to walk away from an 18-year position without litigation is naive," Brennan said.  

Diver declined to address any forthcoming wrongful termination litigation. Existing case law on the issue would help the borough make its case, he said.

Because borough Attorney John Lane is also municipal attorney in Wall, he was prohibited from drawing up the now-abandoned shared services agreement. Former borough attorney Fred Raffetto, now working on a contractual basis, crafted the original contract.

The borough had been scrambling for another shared services agreement for its courtroom since earlier this year when neighboring Spring Lake ended its arrangement in favor of holding court in Belmar Borough.