Albany City Commission to discuss municipal court issues

(ALBANY, GA) – Some clarity may be coming soon to Albany’s Municipal Court, pending a decision from the city commission.

City Manager, Sharon Subadan says that the time for reorganizing the municipal courts has already passed.

“…And then the pandemic subsequently occurred and I think opportunities to revamp and re-institute new procedures has been missed. Part of that I think is a lack of clarity as to who’s on first…”

Local Attorney, Phil Cannon brought the issue forward at Tuesday morning’s meeting, providing the idea of clarifying the operational responsibilities of the court.

As well as how something like this is needed beyond the courtroom

Cannon told the Commission, “The court not running properly affects other departments. APD, DCP, I’ve talked about those. But it affects animal control, ti effects code enforcement…”

Commissioners voiced their concerns about where responsibilities would lie in the court system.

Tentatively the responsibilities would be split between the chief judge of the municipal court and the city manager in a six month period.

“So what we need to do is hold those people accountable who need to be held accountable, and who are responsible for doing those things. So if it goes back to a supervising issues, if it comes back to a personnel issue, then they need to be addressed,” says Ward 6 Commissioner, Demetrious Young.

The City Commission will discus the issue during the December 15th Regular Meeting.