Professionalism After the Statewide Judicial Emergency

• Jurisdiction: Georgia,United States
• Citation: Vol. 27 No. 3 Pg. 0066
• Pages: 0066
• Publication year: 2021

Professionalism After the Statewide Judicial Emergency Order No. Vol. 27, No. 3 Pg. 66 Georgia Bar Journal December, 2021

Professionalism After the Statewide Judicial Emergency Order

The Chief Justice's Commission on Professionalism hosted a CLE in September to explore the issue of professionalism following a series of statewide judicial emergency orders.

BY KARLISE Y. GRIER

On Sept. 28, 2021, the Chief Justice's Commission on Professionalism hosted a free CLE to explore the issue of professionalism after the statewide judicial emergency order.^[1] The CLE program was co-chaired by State Bar of Georgia President Elizabeth L. Fite and by Hon. T. Russell McClelland, vice chair of the Judicial Council COVID-19 Task Force; chair of the Task Force's Civil Sub-Committee; past president of the Council of State Court Judges; and chief judge, State Court of Forsyth County. Judges from each class of court, as well lawyers from diverse practice areas from around Georgia participated in the CLE.^[2]

Program Co-Chair Judge Russ McClelland gave opening remarks. He traced the history of the previous Statewide Judicial Emergency Orders (SJEOs) and reminded the audience that on March 14, 2020, the Supreme Court of Georgia entered its first SJEO in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Approximately 15 months later, the final SJEO ended on June 30, 2021. McClelland told the audience that at the time of the CLE, the Supreme Court did not anticipate entering future SJEOs since the Supreme Court's authority by statute [O.C.G.A. § 38-3-60, et seq.] to enter the SJEO was based on the governor determining that a Public Health State of Emergency existed. When the pandemic first began, McClelland said, "We as lawyers and judges came together to learn how to work in this new environment, how to keep the courts open, how to continue representing our clients, presenting our cases to the court, having the court decide cases and dispose of cases. It took all of us coming together as lawyers and judges and as associations of lawyers and associations of judges to learn how to do this and to operate in this new environment."

"Now we have to learn how to operate without an SJEO," he said, "and we hope we will not have a need for another SJEO. Therefore, processes and procedures that were previously provided for under Supreme Court's SJEO are now up to local courts to do."

McClelland said confidently that he anticipated that the local bench and Bar would work together going forward to determine the processes and procedures that would work best in each local judicial circuit. Finally, McClelland discussed the ongoing work of the Judicial COVID-19 Task Force^[3] and resources available from the Administrative Office of the Courts to assist lawyers and judges during the ongoing pandemic.^[4]

A panel of judges from each class of court then addressed the audience after McClelland concluded his remarks. The judges explained the work that each class of court was considering in terms of changes to court rules or the Georgia statutes and/or court rules related to the class of court. The purpose of the changes would be to maintain the practices that the Court wanted to continue post-SJEO. The judges also...