Greg Allbright Appointed To Metrocare Services Board of Trustees

Posted By: Marsha Bills

Chief Deputy Greg Allbright has been appointed to the Board of Trustees for Metrocare Services, the tenth-largest non-profit organization in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Established in 1967 as the Dallas County Mental Health and Retardation Authority, Metrocare currently provides services to more than 23,000 individuals annually. The nine-member Board of Trustees provides oversight of programs and activities of the group, which serves North Texans dealing with challenges of mental illness or developmental disabilities.

Greg was appointed to the board of trustees by Dallas County Commissioner Mike Cantrell. “Greg will be a great asset to the mental health community,” says Commissioner Cantrell. “I know that he is a conscientious individual with a high degree of personal integrity and has a track record of working through complex issues with confidence.”

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October Department Spotlight - Passport

Posted By: Michael Lindley

Being named “Best Public Office” by a leading community publication sets an extraordinarily high standard for any organization. But despite the loss of more than 80 years of combined experience with the recent retirements of Emily Ingram, Angie West and Mayfair Mullican, the passport division – winner of this accolade -- has continued to provide stellar customer service.

Federal regulations affecting travel to Mexico, the Caribbean and Canada enacted in 2007 created an overwhelming spike in demand for passports by customers whose primary language is Spanish. The District Clerk responded to this demand quickly by recruiting young bi-lingual deputies to serve in all three of its locations. Denise Alvarez, Irma Torres, Lizeth Garcia and Oscar Tovar have joined veteran Christopher Garza to develop a highly effective team that is the future of this office, reflecting its commitment to serving a growing and diverse customer base.



Shown in the photo, from left to right, are Passports deputies Lizeth Garcia, Denise Alvarez and Irma Torres, part of a new team committed to serving our diverse customer base

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District Clerk Investments Safe in Uncertain Times

As a result of recent alarming events on Wall Street, the District Clerk’s Trust department has been overwhelmed by calls from individuals concerned about the safety of their funds held in trust, especially on behalf of minors. Fortunately, our conservative investment strategy protects funds we manage on behalf of courts and individuals from the kind of catastrophic losses many stock market investors are now experiencing.

The duty of the District Clerk is to preserve the value of funds deposited over time, not to make money off the investments. By law, the District Clerk is prohibited from investing funds in corporate stock. The value of these stocks and other more speculative, higher-return investments can fluctuate widely from day to day, especially in the current uncertain economic climate.

Most of the District Clerk’s investments, especially the minor trust accounts, are in Certificate of Deposits (CDs) and Treasury Bills (T-Bills). CDs are FDIC-insured and T-Bills are government- backed securities. Both are among the safest types of investments offering a consistently stable return.

Currently, the District Clerk’s trust department manages more than $43 million in funds. Under Section 117 of the Local Government Code, the clerk’s office maintains a registry of these funds deposited in connection with a court proceeding. Those funds include:

• funds of minors or incapacitated persons;
• funds tendered in an interpleader action;
• funds paid in satisfaction of a judgment;
• child support funds held for more than three days;
• cash bonds;
• cash bail bonds;
• funds in an eminent domain proceeding;
• any other funds tendered to the clerk for deposit into the registry of the court.

Almost 75 percent of those funds are kept in interest-bearing accounts maintained in several different types of investment instruments. Under the Local Government Code, investment options are limited to the safest instruments, which include:

• interest-bearing savings accounts insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC);
• United States treasury bills (T-bills);
• a government investment pool that meets the criteria set out by the Texas Government Code;
• a no-load (no fee-for-purchase) money market mutual fund that is regulated by the Securities and Exchange Commission, has a dollar-weighted average stated maturity of 90 days or fewer, and includes in its investment objectives the maintenance of a stable net-asset value of $1 for each share.

Half of the money managed by this office is in minor trust accounts, which are generally held until the minor’s 18^th birthday unless the court has stipulated otherwise. Other funds include bonds and interpleader funds, which are the sums of balances contested by multiple claimants for which the court has been asked to determine the appropriate distribution.

Bonds and interpleader funds are generally invested in interest-bearing savings accounts, also known as money funds. To offer maximum security, our office separates funds greater than $100,000 and places them in different institutions to guarantee that they are FDIC-insured.

Authorized for our use by the Dallas County Commissioners Court this month, our newest investment instrument is TexPool, a government investment pool in which governmental agencies deposit funds from throughout the state.

TexPool is the largest government pool in Texas, is monitored by the State Comptroller, invests only in government-backed securities, and offers unlimited liquidity and a stable return. Because it provides these solid advantages, TexPool will become the preferred option for our largest accounts and largely replace the use of money funds.

In addition to funds already described, the District Clerk maintains at Bank of America approximately $10 million in funds in our registry depository, which is a non-interest bearing account maintained by the Dallas County Treasurer. Funds in this account are not FDIC-insured, but are collateralized with government backed securities at a rate of 102% of the total deposit. This depository is intended for sums of any denomination held on behalf of parties for very short periods of time, usually measured in days or weeks.

Unfortunately, some depositors either misjudged the length of their cases or misunderstood the nature of our investment strategy or liquidity of the deposits. As a result, much of the $10 million placed in registry’s depository has declined significantly in value since it was first deposited because the Dallas County District Clerk must have a signed court order to place funds in an interest-bearing account.

The District Clerk now recommends that all funds be placed in an interest-bearing account. with TexPool, which serves as a more solid repository for even short periods of time while maintaining the necessary liquidity.

We are now contacting depositors to ensure that they are aware of the all investment strategies offered by our department and to assure them that this office is doing everything possible to protect the investments of its customers in the most prudent and responsible way.

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Imaging Project Reaches Impressive Milestone

In order to accomplish District Clerk Gary Fitzsimmons' vision of a paper-less courthouse, a small group of people in the basement of the George Allen Courts Bldg. has been busily scanning Family District Court documents.

During FY 2008, the imaging group of the Records Department scanned and indexed 331,789 court documents comprised of 1,651,515 individual images (pages).

In total, more than one million documents made up of more than six million images are now stored and accessible through OnBase. Image number 6,000,000 was scanned and indexed into the system on September 12, 2008 - the first page of an Amended Petition for Divorce.

-Harold Denney, Imaging Supervisor

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First Dallas County Felony Collections Workshop a Success

The first multi-county collections work shop, held Wednesday, October 8, 2008 at Dallas County’s Frank Crowley Criminal Courts Building, generated strong interest and participation from neighboring counties, as well as numerous Dallas County collections divisions. Those attending included staff from Denton, Tarrant, Collin, Ellis, Johnson, Brazos, Cooke and Kaufman counties. Among Dallas County divisions, participants comprised staff from several Justice of the Peace precincts, District Clerk Juvenile Collections, District Clerk Trust Collections, and County Clerk Misdemeanor Collections.

This group of governmental collection officers, managers and support staff were instructed by Melissa Williamson, DFW Regional Collections Specialist with the Office of Court Administration. Training focused primarily on delinquent calling and usage of scripts. “Finely tuned scripts are an important part of a sound strategy for increasing staff production, maintaining quality assurance and providing staff with greater self-confidence when dealing with people who don’t want to make their payments,” said Debra Parker, host of the event and head of Dallas County Felony Collections.

The workshop also informed those in attendance about the upcoming inaugural State Comptroller audits to measure compliance with Article 103.0033 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, which establishes all model-program standards specifically defined by the Office of Court Administration.

This event to help regional Counties enhance their collection programs will be held annually, with even more counties invited to participate in the future. Dallas County Felony Collections Department’s goal is to provide a forum in which governmental collectors can establish productive contacts, discuss mutual problems and receive the latest information about techniques, technology and legislative issues.

Collections managers can e-mail Debra Parker at DLParker@dallascounty.org to receive additional information or to be placed on the invitation list for the next collections workshop.

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October Supervisor Spotlight- Claire Moses

CLAIRE MOSES
Supervisor, Magistrate Court – Lew Sterrett

Claire (pronounced clair-ee’) came to the Dallas County District Clerk’s office in October, 1989, after 10 years of service as a felony court clerk for the Harris County District Clerk.

In Dallas County, she has assumed progressively more responsible roles, moving from chief clerk in the Drug court, to court trainer, to Process supervisor, then to her current position as Magistrate Court – Lew Sterrett supervisor, which she has held since the fall of 2000.

In this position, Claire supervises Lew Sterrett’s arraignment court, which is a
24-hour-a-day, 7-day-a-week, operation. She regularly alternates shifts she works – day or night – in order to stay in touch with the staff and keep the department’s workload current.

Claire is very active in her church, Rose of Sharon Missionary Baptist Church, where she is the church’s youth coordinator and Community Affairs liaison. If not at work performing her demanding duties, she is normally at church serving in her roles there.

A proud mother of two daughters, Claire has four grandchildren, ranging in age from 5- to 16-years old.

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Felony Collections Hosts Workshop

The District Clerk’s award-winning Felony Collections Department will host a collections workshop on Wednesday, October 8th. Participants from numerous other Dallas County collections divisions, along with a number of neighboring counties, will receive specialized training from the Office of Court Administration on delinquency-calling techniques and script usage.


When: Wednesday - October 8, 2008
Where: Frank Crowley Criminal Cts Bldg, 133 N Industrial, Dallas 75207
Room: DSO Training Room, 1st Floor, Room A-5
Schedule: 8am-1pm & 1pm-4pm
Presenter: Melissa Williamson, Office of Court Administration
Hosted By: Debra Parker, Dallas County Felony Collections Dept
Special Topics: Delinquency Follow-Up & Script Usage
Accomodations are limited to 50 per session. If you would like to attend, please RSVP so we can reserve a seat for you.

RSVP to Debra Parker @ dlparker@dallascounty.org


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