With over 16,000 open cases to begin year, solicitor asks Columbus Council for help
Muscogee County Solicitor General Shevon Thomas asked the Columbus Council Tuesday to increase the minimum starting salary for an attorney in his office, help fill a position and ease the caseload.
The office handles all criminal misdemeanor cases bound over from Recorder’s Court and Municipal Court in Muscogee County, according to the Columbus Consolidated Government’s website.
In his presentation to the council,Thomas said his office, as of Jan. 1, had over 16,000 open cases between serious traffic, other traffic and non-traffic misdemeanor cases.
Thomas asked the council to increase the salary of an entry level attorney in his office from just over $62,000 to match the entry level salary of the Chattahoochee Judicial Circuit District Attorney’s office of just over $72,000 to attract more applicants to the position that has been listed since July.
“I am just not in a place where I can compete for attorneys,” he told the council.
Thomas said he has received only one application for the position.
His office has six attorneys other than himself, Thomas said. If an attorney is hired for the position listed, he said, that attorney would inherit around 3,000 cases.
Thomas also asked the council for a discretionary budget like other Solicitor General offices have in other counties. Thomas said one attorney left his office to for a higher salary.
“I did not have a discretionary budget where I could say, ‘Look, what if I offer you this, would you stay?’” Thomas said.
Columbus Council reacts to solicitor’s request
Councilor Walker Garrett of District 8 agreed with Thomas about the pay being low for a starting attorney.
“You can’t get people to work for this salary with a juris doctorate,” Garrett said.
“Pay parity for the lawyers has to be there because we have people that are sitting in jail and may not be guilty of a crime, and their cases aren’t being prosecuted,” he said.
Revenue is being left on the table because there aren’t enough lawyers to prosecute the open cases, according to Garrett.
“Their attorneys could come to our office and make more as paralegals, and that’s not fair,” said Garrett, who is a lawyer.
“We don’t need to have a disparity in pay between public defenders, ADAs and solicitors because, otherwise, you’re gonna have people jumping from office to office,” he said.
Councilor Travis Chambers of citywide District 10 said it’s important to keep pace with market trends when it comes to pay.
“If salaries are below market rates, top candidates may choose other employers,” Chambers said, “and it leaves us in a position where we are filling positions with less experience or less capable staff.”
When asked by Chambers whether the workload is slowing down, Thomas said no but his attorneys are working more.
Thomas said the attorneys are being overworked.
“I just can’t hire anyone to help at this rate,” he said. “. . . The people’s work is not being done because I can’t hire the people to do it.”
Garrett motioned to consider Thomas’ request for the salary parity but amended his motion to move it to January as part of the midyear budget after other councilors expressed concern about the proper process.