Last night’s public hearing on judicial retention was
uneventful. There were only three witnesses, all of whom testified in support
of Judge Teachout. No other witnesses appeared to speak for or against the
other judges or magistrates.
Before the public hearing began, the committee interviewed
our newest judge, Judge Waples. She will be interviewed by the senate judiciary
committee on Friday morning and hopefully confirmed soon thereafter. As she is
filling the superior court seat once held by Judge Crawford, which term expires
31 March 2015, she needs to go through the retention process. Obviously, she hasn’t
even sat as a judge yet so there is not record on which to base a retention
vote. It’s just one of those quirks of our system.
Also, tomorrow the senate judiciary committee will interview
Justice Eaton for confirmation. Neither should present any problems.
There are a couple of things of note for all of you to take
a quick look at. The house government operations committee is working on a bill
presented by the secretary of state; H. 206 would change the way notaries are
commissioned; set qualifications, including continuing education; set out what
may be accepted for identification, among other things. The bill can be read
here: http://legislature.vermont.gov/assets/Documents/2016/Docs/BILLS/H-0206/H-0206%20As%20Introduced.pdf
This bill will affect each of you and the notaries in your
office. You should read it and send me your reaction. I testified yesterday
preliminarily and addressed the cost issue, the examination for first time
notaries (yes really!), the continuing education, etc. I think we can support
the online registration, the qualifications and standards set out in 206 but
there is some dispute as to the remainder of the bill. Please let me know your
thoughts.
Our Family, Juvenile, and Criminal Law Sections have been
following S. 9 since the first week of the session. The senate judiciary
committee voted the bill out yesterday unanimously and sent it to the
appropriations committee. It’s there because of funding included in the bill
for a legislative oversight committee. Here’s a link to the amended version of
S. 9:
I’ll keep you posted as we move into the last week before
the Town Meeting break. Thanks for reading.
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