Special Committee approves final Family Division report, 8–1

The Special Committee on the Family Division of the Circuit Court voted 8–1 to accept its final report, with members agreeing to incorporate minor grammar and spelling changes before publication. Chairman Pearson moved to accept the document and Representative Gregg seconded; the committee adjourned after the roll-call vote.

Chairman Pearson opened the meeting saying, “Our purpose today is to look at the final report and make a decision on it,” and noted the large report had been emailed to members the previous afternoon and that roughly 95% of its content had already been approved in earlier actions. The chair said a small number of recent updates and subcommittee rewrites had been included to reflect changes in the judiciary.

During a brief procedural exchange, Representative Cattab raised two clerical items that she asked to be corrected in the final text, including the spelling of Judge Luneau’s name (“Judge Luneau’s name was spelled incorrectly. It should have a u in there.”) and a missing hyphen for consistency in other entries. Members and the chair treated those as factual or formatting fixes appropriate to incorporate into the final acceptance.

For the record, Chairman Pearson noted Representative Deborah DeSimone was sitting in for Representative Ball. The clerk then called the roll. The committee recorded the following responses: Chairman Pearson — yes; Vice Chairman Smith — no; Representative Lynn — yes; Representative Greg — yes; Representative DeSimone — yes; Representative Lonza — not present; Representative Cootab — yes; Representative Long — yes; Representative McMahon — yes; Representative McBeath — yes. The chair announced, “Motion passes 8 to 1.”

The committee made no substantive policy amendments at the meeting; members limited changes to typographical and clerical corrections described on the record. After the vote Chairman Pearson adjourned the special committee. No subsequent meeting date was announced at the session.