PRESIDIO COUNTY — At Wednesday morning’s Commissioners Court meeting, Presidio County officials continued to debate the prospect of partially funding a second assistant for the 394th District Court. Commissioners David Beebe, Deirdre Hisler and Franky Ortiz voted down the roughly $10,000 annual commitment last week, but District Judge Monty Kimball and Court Coordinator Lori Holguin came to the meeting in person to ask them to reconsider.
The commissioners did not approve the request for funding as written but did vote in favor of a $10,692.60 one-time payment “to promote necessary efficiencies.” The measure includes a stipulation: that Presidio County’s obligation to the court not exceed a 3.5% increase from its current contribution to the court system ($75,711.76) for next year’s budget.
The 394th District Court hears felonies and higher-dollar civil cases in Presidio, Jeff Davis, Brewster, Culberson and Hudspeth counties, and relies on funding from each of these local governments to operate. The dollar amount requested by the court for the new assistant was calculated according to a formula that weighs how much each county individually contributes to the system’s caseload.
Nine supporters of Holguin wrote The Big Bend Sentinel in support of a new assistant. Holguin — who has served as court coordinator for eight and a half years — works long hours and has taken exactly one vacation during her time on the job. Hiring another assistant, she and Kimball believe, will help keep the court running efficiently while fostering a healthier and more sustainable work environment.
Echoing concerns pulled from national headlines, Kimball said that funding a robust court system was more important now than ever and was frustrated that Presidio County was the lone holdout, with the other counties approving the expense. “This issue is very sensitive in a lot of ways,” he said. “You want to have an independent judiciary, but on the other hand you don’t want to pay for it.”
Attorney James McDermott of the Far West Texas Regional Public Defender’s Office also spoke in support of the new position. McDermott has worked alongside Holguin for seven and a half years, and throughout that time, has known Holguin to go above and beyond in running the district court — he argued that Holguin’s work ethic and savvy practices had saved the court system a significant amount of time and money. “She’s done an amazing job to push the efficiencies of that office as far as she can,” McDermott said.
Precinct 4 Commissioner David Beebe and Precinct 1 Commissioner Deirdre Hisler agreed that Holguin was an exemplary employee but still held reservations about how the issue was presented — they felt snubbed by the fact that Kimball had only approached the county judge before asking for money, rather than approaching the whole Commissioners Court. (County Judge Joe Portillo took the fall, saying that he had encouraged Kimball to save time and gas money by skipping last week’s meeting.)
Beebe — who previously served the county as Precinct 1 justice of the peace — said that he wasn’t comfortable footing the bill to create a position from scratch that pays more than existing jobs in Presidio County. Over the past 10 years, he’s watched working conditions and wages for county employees languish. “There’s no heating or air conditioning in this building,” he said of the historic courthouse. “We’ll have people working in a situation in the summer that’s frankly kind of dangerous.”
Beebe also took issue with the fact that the $10,000 obligation could be expected on an indefinite annual basis and encouraged Judge Kimball to seek outside funding as outlined in the Texas Government Code. The county can only raise its budget 3.5% annually without taking measures that require voter approval — he wanted Kimball to approach budgeting in his office in the same way. “We can’t have every single person or department asking for more than 3.5%” without some circumstances that are very, very extreme,” Beebe said.