Vermont assistant judges tell Senate panel they manage aging courthouses, small county budgets and limited judicial duties

Joyce McKimann, president of the Vermont Association of County Judges and an Orange County assistant judge, told the Senate Committee on Government Operations on Feb. 12 that assistant judges hold a dual role: county executives responsible for courthouse upkeep and limited judicial officers who act as finders of fact in civil and family dockets.

McKimann said the Office of Assistant Judges is a constitutional office whose duties are statutory. "It is a constitutional office. We've existed since the founding of Vermont. However, our duties are statutory," she said, describing a statewide corps of 28 elected assistant judges who serve four-year terms and are up for reelection in 2026.

Why it matters: Assistant judges oversee many of Vermont's old county courthouses and the limited county budgets that sustain them. McKimann told the committee that courthouse condition affects the judiciary's ability to operate and access to justice for Vermonters.

McKimann described two broadly separate sets of responsibilities. On the county-administration side, assistant judges oversee maintenance of courthouse buildings when counties still own them and help fund basic overhead for sheriff's departments (heat, utilities, plowing, some training). She said county budgets are assessed to towns based on grand lists and that Vermont law gives assistant judges statutory authority "to tax the towns up to 5¢ per hundred dollars of assessed valuation," though few counties levy near that limit; she said Orange County's rate for the fiscal year under discussion was 1.1¢.

On the judicial side, McKimann said assistant judges no longer participate in criminal sentencing. Instead, they sit with presiding judges in civil and family matters "as finders of fact," helping determine the facts while the presiding judge applies the law. She also described assistant-judge participation in the Judicial Bureau (Vermont's unified traffic and civil-violation adjudication system), saying four people statewide are trained to sit as Judicial Bureau hearing officers, including two assistant judges.

McKimann described facility challenges in multiple counties: many courthouses are historic and need modern HVAC, elevators or other renovations. She cited Orange County's courthouse (built in 1847) as an example of an older building that requires ongoing care. She said some counties used COVID-relief funds to update HVAC systems, and she detailed a recent emergency response when the Washington County courthouse suffered flood damage and assistant judges worked long hours to restore operations.

McKimann also discussed accountability for elected county officers. She noted the limits of remedies for alleged malfeasance when offices are constitutional: impeachment or the ballot box. She referenced public debate over a prior constitutional amendment (referred to in testimony as Proposition 1) and said that, while those concerns are not active legislation now, they reflect ongoing tension about removing officers from office.

Committee members asked about historic changes to assistant-judge roles and criminal jurisdiction; McKimann said she was not certain of the precise date when criminal duties were removed but that the criminal role had been whittled back over time and that some post-conviction relief matters now proceed as civil matters in superior court. She told the committee the statutory framework for county budgeting is laid out in Title 24 and referenced the Vermont Supreme Court decision Stowe v. Lamoille (1976) as a precedent that addresses county budgeting and the care expected of assistant judges.

Ending: McKimann told senators she had no specific legislation to request from the committee at this time but offered to return to discuss assistant judges or county government matters in the future.

"I don't have anything right now," she said, adding that she was available to speak further about assistant judges or county government needs.