Commissioners discuss reopening

RITZVILLE – County commissioners heard input from district and superior courtroom staff on the opening of county facilities at their May 10 meeting.

The commissioners were in consensus at the end of April to continue with courthouse procedures currently in place with the Courthouse in Ritzville and the Public Services Building in Othello open Monday through Friday, with Phoenix Security Services available to screen the public entering county facilities.

Blankenship said with discussing with Phoenix Security the process of allowing people in to the building depending on what Phase the county is in, concern was expressed about when court is in session, those rules didn't apply. The commissioners wanted to be sure the court officials were involved in the discussion.

Blankenship said one approach might be to have a two-stage check-in for people entering the building, with those going to court to check in with one Phoenix Security screener, and anyone going to any of the other offices, check in with a second security screener.

“So that folks trying to get in and out of the courtrooms are not being subjected to the limit, because we know we can't really restrict people, witnesses, family members or others from being able to get to the courtroom,” Blankenship said.

Carolyn Benzel, District Court Judge in Othello said they are not running into a problem.

“We stream our hearings, so I right now do not allow family members to come in with the defendants,” Benzel said, adding witnesses arriving for a hearing was a whole different ball game. “But just on our docket days, no more girlfriends, no more mothers, no more children. It's only the defendant.”

Benzel said six to eight defendants were allowed in the courtroom at a time, and she still has chairs spaced six feet apart.

“Our courtroom doors are still open to the public; they just have to view it via video. But we stream our dockets every week. So the public can appear that way,” Benzel said. “That's how we're taking care of that. And I have to say, it's been working quite well the past few months.”

“We obviously have a little different situation here, in that there's more offices here in the courthouse that people would tend to matriculate in and out of then versus down in Othello,” Blankenship said.

Superior Courtroom Clerk Katie Sloan said having Phoenix Security screeners in place solved her problem of having to run up and down the stairs to make sure the defendants were in the courtroom and anyone else who wanted to be there.

“The Phoenix experience for me is they are the problem solver, where I didn't have to ensure that no one was missing,” Sloan said, adding she didn't anticipate any issues.

“We don't stream our hearings at this point in time. We were set up to, but the Judge has declined to. He says that some of the high profile cases that we have going on right now, you can't ensure that anyone is recording what you are streaming and then replaying it at a later date,” Sloan said. “But we've been doing fairly well, we think. If we have too many people they're just very good about it; some of them just sit in the hallway, and people do not sit together if they're not a family group.”

When asked about people coming to the third floor when court was not in session, Sloan said they mainly go to the office of Paulette Teske, the Adams County Clerk.

“A lot of people are mailing their ex parte requests, for a protection order or whatever,” Sloan said. “So we haven't really had a lot of foot traffic through my office.”

Teske said in her office, every day was different.

“Some days we get very little foot traffic, and other days we get a bit more,” Teske said, adding beginning May 18, her office would begin accepting passport applications again, but only by appointment. “That way we can kind of keep a little bit of a handle on it with restrictions on people coming in.”

Asked how many people on average come to her office on days when no court is in session, Teske estimated between five and 15.

Asked how that compared to pre-COVID levels, Teske said it was quite a bit down.

“I think word has gotten around that the courthouse has been closed. When people call on the phone, we tell them we've basically been doing things by mail as much as we can at this time. So a lot of things that normally would be driven up from Othello they're mailing, and the same thing with local Ritzville paperwork,” Teske said, adding, “Then once we're back open again, that will increase.”

Blankenship thanked those in attendance for their input.

“I did not want to leave you folks out of the conversation before we push forward,” Blankenship said.