Save our Local General District Court!

The Town of Herndon, The Town of Vienna and the City of Fairfax are all at risk of losing our local General District Courts because the State Budget does not include funding for 2 judicial vacancies in the 19th Judicial District of the Fairfax County General District Court.

Collectively, these three court divisions handle over 34,000 cases - the General District Court is literally “the people’s court.” It handles traffic cases, misdemeanor crimes and civil cases under $25,000 in value. It also has original jurisdiction over landlord/tenant disputes.

If there is no funding provided, there will not be enough judges and Herndon, Vienna and Fairfax may lose our local District Courts, which means two bad and expensive outcomes for us:

1) Massively inconvenient: Everyone will  now get to go to Fairfax District Court for all of these cases, even to contest a speeding ticket, and we all know how convenient that will be.  Herndon's Traffic Court meets every Wednesday am right here in Town at the Ingram Chambers.  In addition, if you have a traffic violation + another violation, you will have to go to 2 separate courts and court dates; currently in Herndon, traffic and other smaller transgressions are combined into one court date

2) Increased expense to taxpayers:  All of our HPD who have traffic cases will now have also to go to Fairfax District Court and often will have to go twice for the same case.  HPD estimates that overtime cost for this alone could be over $100,000 per year!

Senator Chap Petersen estimated that "simply adding another GDC judge for Fairfax would cost Virginia less than $200,000 in terms of salary, benefits and pension. Let’s hope the Governor can find that money before we return on April 2nd for the veto session."

Please WRITE to the Governor and ask that he and the General Assembly fund these two open judge spots so we can continue to have a local General District Court in the Town of Herndon.

Here is the resolution passed 7-0 last night by your Town Council.  On behalf of the Town, we have formally asked for funding to be restored for these two judicial positions.

Please write and add your voice to the request before April 2.  You can email the Governor at http://www.governor.virginia.gov/aboutthegovernor/contactgovernor.cfm

RESOLUTION
WHEREAS, the Citizens of the Town of Herndon have fostered a strong local oriented government and sense of community benefitting Fairfax County citizens for over 130 years; and

WHEREAS, the Herndon Division of the Fairfax County General District Court is an integralpart of the community; and

WHEREAS, it is imperative citizens have access to a court of competent jurisdiction in theircommunity; and

WHEREAS, the Town of Herndon has had a court located in the Town of Herndon for many years to hear misdemeanor, traffic and selected zoning and building code matters that the citizens of the Town who are also Fairfax County citizens face ; and

WHEREAS, on March 7, 2013, the Town Council for the Town of Herndon, Virginia, became aware of the possibility that due to the reduced number of General District Court judges in the Fairfax County General District Court, the Court might not be able to provide a judge to sit in the Herndon Division of the Fairfax County General District Court; and

WHEREAS, transferring all Herndon Division General District Court matters to the Fairfax Judicial Center will cause great inconvenience to Herndon and Fairfax County citizens: and

WHEREAS, transferring all Herndon Division General District Court matters to the Fairfax Judicial Center will add significant personnel costs for the Town of Herndon to pay its police officers to leave its jurisdiction and appear in a court miles away from the corporate limits of the Town of Herndon; and

WHEREAS, transferring all Herndon Division General District Court matters to the Fairfax Judicial Center would require the Town of Herndon to add additional police officers to those who are assigned to be on duty in the Town of Herndon during court to avoid there being an insufficient numberof on-duty officers in the Town; and

WHEREAS, in coordination with the Fairfax General District Court the Town ofHerndon added improvements and security measures to the Herndon Ingram Council Chambers to accommodate the Fairfax County General District Court; and

WHEREAS, it has also been proposed to transfer the cases from the Town of Vienna General District Court Division to the Fairfax County Judicial Center; and

WHEREAS, estimated the combined number of cases for both the Vienna and Herndon Divisions that would be added to the Fairfax County General District Court Criminal and Traffic docket would be approximately 19,000 cases per year; and

WHEREAS, the elimination of the Herndon Division of the Fairfax County General District Court would threaten the ability of the Town to provide professional prosecutorial services due to the possibility inability at the Judicial Center to segregate the Town’s docket from the rest of the docket, raising the prospect that the Fairfax County Commonwealth Attorney would need to consider prosecuting the 19,000 cases per year as this official does for traffic and misdemeanor cases arising in other important communities of Fairfax County

WHEREAS, the Mayor, Town Council, Town Manager, Chief of Police and Town Attorney for the Town of Herndon are unanimous in their opinion that the ends of justice will not be served by the transfer of the Herndon and Vienna Division court cases to the Fairfax County Judicial Center.

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED BY THE COUNCIL OF THE TOWN OF HERNDON THAT:

1. The Herndon Town Council does not wish the General District Court matters currently held in the Herndon Division of the Fairfax County General District Court to be transferred to the Fairfax County Judicial Center ; and

2. The Herndon Town Council respectfully requests the Governor and Virginia General Assembly to fund the two judicial vacancies that currently exist for the Fairfax County General District Court; and

3. The Clerk shall cause a certified copy of this Resolution to be delivered to Governor Robert F. McDonnnell, the Honorable Speaker of the Virginia House of Delegates William J. Howell, Lieutenant Governor William T. Bolling, the Honorable Delegate Thomas Davis