Finance committee hears municipal court requests for carpet, metal detectors and citation software as part of 2026 budget review

Judge Georgia Constantakis, the municipal judge, told the Franklin City Finance Committee the courtroom carpet is original to 2001, is separating and ‘‘a tripping hazard,’’ and urged the committee to approve replacement as part of the 2026 budget. She also asked the committee to consider metal detectors for courtroom safety, saying ‘‘we do have other municipalities that do have these metal detectors’’ and suggesting it may become a state requirement in time.

Amanda, the court clerk, described operational inefficiency in processing parking citations and proposed an interface between the police software and the court system to import citations automatically. ‘‘Roughly 6 for the first year. I think it comes to about 5,800 for the first year and then to keep the software thereafter would be a thousand dollars a year,’’ she said, citing the vendor estimate and projected annual maintenance.

Council members and police supporters urged prioritizing the citation interface. One committee member said the city keeps parking citation revenue and highlighted efficiency gains from eliminating manual entry; Finance staff confirmed parking‑citation receipts through July were about $27,143 this year and the previous year was near $30,000.

Constantakis also warned the committee that the coming rollout of police body‑worn cameras will generate a substantial open‑records burden. ‘‘When that does happen … that's gonna be a lot of work for the records department. … That information is considered open records. People are entitled to that information,’’ she said, urging the committee to consider resources for records management and to reallocate capital funds if needed.

Finance staff noted the City of Franklin Capital Improvement Plan includes roughly $200,000 in a year‑two allocation for municipal court access and remodel and suggested departments could reallocate capital funds if quotes and priorities change prior to final adoption.

Next steps: committee members asked staff to pursue quotes, consider consolidating carpet bids across departments to lower costs, and move the parking‑citation interface request forward as a high priority. The committee agreed to revisit outstanding items at the follow‑up meeting scheduled for Wednesday at 5 p.m.