RCC to discuss city secretary position

The city of Rusk is without its secretary for the moment.

Rusk council members will discuss the vacant City Secretary position during the first regular council meeting of 2020, to begin at 5:30 p.m., Thursday, Jan. 9, at the Rusk Civic Center, 555 Euclid St.

Former City Secretary Rosalyn Brown tendered her resignation from the job late last month, citing health reasons. Her last official day was Tuesday, Dec. 31. She had been on medical leave prior for several days prior to resigning.

“I hate to see her go,” City Manager Jim Dunaway said Monday. “We wish her well and good health for the future.

“On Thursday, the Council will discuss what they’d like to do concerning the position. We’ve got people who can pick up the load at City Hall in the interim, so there’s no problems there.”

Brown had served as City Secretary since August 2018, when she was appointed by the City Council after then-City Secretary Cinda Etheridge resigned.

Rusk City Council will adjourn into executive session to discuss the personnel issue; as well as to consult with City Attorney Anthony King concerning a request to name Rusk a sanctuary city for the unborn and certain claims for damages from Wesley Cumby and Harry’s Building Material.

In other business to be discussed during Thursday’s meeting, council members will consider recreating a municipal court of record, the reappointment of the court judge and court administrator.

City council members in May 2017 approved to make Rusk’s municipal court a court of record, at the recommendation of Rusk Municipal Court Judge Forrest Phifer. The Rusk City Council in May 2018 voted 4 to 1 to dissolve the court of record and re-vert back to a court not of record.

A court of record is a trial court or appellate court that requires a written or audio record be made of the proceedings, for the possibility of appeal. In courts not of record, oral proceedings are not recorded, and the judge makes his or her decision based on notes and memory.

District 3 Councilman Martin Holsome addressed the matter during the meeting held in 2018.

“I don’t think this is good for people who want to argue their traffic cases,” he said. “I’m not an attorney, I can’t afford an attorney. Neither can a lot of our citizens. I think (being a court of record) benefits the city more than the citizens.

“I think it’s in our best interests to go back to the way it was, so citizens can represent themselves in court, if need be.”

Judge Phifer told council members in May 2018 one benefit of being a court of record is if the municipal court’s guilty verdict is upheld by the appeals court, the city’s court collects the fees and fines assessed in the case.

“Once a guilty verdict is handed down at the municipal level,” Phifer explained, “the defendant has to prove mistakes or errors made in the first trial, resulting in a wrong verdict. If justice was done, and the guilty verdict is upheld by the appeals court, the fees and fines generated come back to the city. Otherwise, the appeals court, in this case the County Court at Law, keeps those funds.

“As a court not of record, if a defendant appeals his or her case, it essentially begins as a new trial, which means a police officer would have to return to court to re-testify – taking the officer off the streets and away from the job – and all the time and effort of the city’s court was for nothing.”

Area municipal courts that are courts of record include Alto, Cuney, Wells, Bullard, Euless, Tyler and Longview.

Other items on Thursday’s agenda include:

• a resolution requesting financial participation from the Texas Water Development Board;

• an ordinance renaming Weems Street to Adams Lane;

• a resolution formally accepting repairs to Ground Storage Tank #5 and setting the warranty period for said repairs; and

• an ordinance formalizing the city’s public information request policy.

The Rusk City Council holds its regular monthly city council meetings at 5:30 p.m., every first Thursday of the month, at the Rusk Civic Center. The public is welcome.