Fulton business court to seek new fees

The case of the Fulton County Business Court could be characterized as this: Too much of a good thing, and not enough money to pay for it.

The Business Court was set up in 2005 to be a special tribunal to try complicated and corporate-related litigation without creating a new judgeship. It also was intended to lighten the caseload for Fulton County Superior Court judges.

“It puts judges in place who have the time to deal with civil litigation issues,” said Donald A. Loft, a partnerat Morris, Manning & Martin in Atlanta who has filed numerous motions before the Business Court.

But the Business Court, which operates as a division of Fulton County Superior Court with a full-time staff of two and two retired superior court judges, has been funded largely by state grants that have dried up.

Now Fulton County Superior Court officials propose changes — including a new fee — that they believe will help the Business Court pay its own way. The Georgia Supreme Court, which would have to approve, could take up the issue as early as May 6, said Don Plummer, a spokesman for the Fulton County Superior Court.

Civil litigation attorneys, like Loft, say the main benefit of the Business Court is that over time, judges have developed deep expertise in Georgia business law, and they can use it without also dealing with criminal, domestic relations and other civil cases.

“One of the frustrating things about commercial litigation is that it takes so long to reach a conclusion and so the Business Court is really a breath of fresh air,” said Loft, whose clients have included HBO, Georgia-Pacific and Wachovia. ” Everything moves much quicker and you’re getting judges who are used to seeing more complex commercial cases.”

To keep the Business Court going, Fulton County wants to establish a transfer fee for cases shifted onto its docket. It also wants to expand the pool of judges who could sit on the Business Court to include those who are still actively working — similar to those who rotate onto cases in Fulton County’s family and drug courts.

Currently, a case in which more than $1 million is at issue is transferred to the Business Court. But the Business Court collects no fees. To stretch dollars and shorten the time to resolve cases, the Business Court has held telephone hearings or had the judges work from remote locations.

With the proposed change, which would take effect in June, the Business Court would collect a $1,000 transfer fee per case. Based on the current caseload of some 40 cases, that would be $40,000. That would more than cover last year’s costs cost of $33,000 to pay the retired judges for their time and this year’s projected spending of $38,000, Plummer said.

“We have funds that will expire in December 2009,” Plummer said. “By collecting fees in June 2009, we anticipate that we will be able to fund the [Business] Court as required going forward.”

Funding is critical because state cutbacks have eliminated funding for senior judges. In July 2008, Gov. Sonny Perdue froze funding for the retired, or senior, judges used to supplement county court systems.

The Georgia legislature gave the Fulton Business Court $100,000 annual grants from 2005 through 2007, but those ended with the current fiscal crisis, Plummer said.

“Through a series of extensions and budget-saving measures, we continue to utilize those funds. The Fulton County Board of Commissioners awarded the Business Court with an enhancement for July 2009 to December 2009 to help cover the costs of our senior judge time,” Plummer said.

“At the time the court was created in 2005, the funding issues we face as a court and as a state were simply not present.”

At the same time, a 2007 change in the rules for which cases could go to Business Court led to a spike in cases, from 11 in 2006 to more than 40 now.

Allowing active judges to rotate in and out of the court could speed up pending cases and lower the average cost, Fulton officials say.