Little Rock is suing three local district judges who are seeking vacation and sick-leave payouts, a step that will take to court a disagreement that dates back to 2016.
Because of a change in the law, the judges became state employees on Jan. 1, 2017. City Attorney Tom Carpenter, citing state law, maintains that the judges were never city employees in the first place and not entitled to pay for accrued time off.
The three judges are Vic Fleming in traffic court, Mark Leverett in environmental court and Alice Lightle, the criminal-court judge who retired in April 2017. Their argument points to a different statute to argue that the judges were city employees.
The dispute began when the city refused to compensate the judges for accrued sick leave and vacation time in December 2016. Carpenter had flagged a line item in a 2016 budget amendment, saying the judges weren't owed that money.
The payments the city would have to make to the judges total more than $78,000, according to Tuesday's court filing.
The complaint filed by the city seeks a declaratory judgment, meaning the goal is to resolve the matter by getting a written opinion from a judge.
The city's argument stems from Arkansas Code Annotated 16-17-108, which sets a salary range for judges but makes no mention of benefits.
"No judge in Arkansas gets vacation pay," Carpenter said Friday, holding that similar payments to judges in the past were improper.
He also cited Amendment 80 of the Arkansas Constitution, which in 2000 vested the judicial power of the state in various courts.
The city paid the judges' salaries, but Tuesday's filing maintains that they were not entitled to the same benefits and subject to the same rules and regulations as regular, full-time employees of the city.
Heartsill Ragon, the judges' attorney, said Friday that the judges had a lawful employment contract with the city and should receive the same benefits as other employees.
Fleming has told the city board that the judges have been constantly referred to as employees by the city administration, were assigned employee numbers, received employee handbooks and were instructed to keep track of their hours, sick time and vacation time to turn in to the Human Resources Department.
He and the other two judges have written to Carpenter citing Arkansas Code Annotated 16-17-1107, which states that except for state district judges, "a judge serving in another full-time or part-time local district court position shall continue to be an employee of the cities or counties, or both, that he or she serves."
Since the issue was raised in 2016, Carpenter and Ragon said they were trying to figure out how to resolve the issue.
"We always kind of hoped that we could get this done without litigation," Ragon said.
Both sides will present evidence, then the parties plan to file a joint motion to submit to court-annexed arbitration, Carpenter said.
Metro on 01/13/2019