Oklahoma County Court Clerk

[richosh]

Oklahoma County has a primary election on June 26th 2012. I have looked up the candidates on the internet for County Clerk and only one candidate has a web site. Candidates are, Salome Vaughn, Tim Rhodes, Kelly Barlean, Charles Key and Nathan Schlinke. One has dropped out of the race. Anyone have any information on the candidates?

[kevinpate]

Vaughn -
http://news.deercreekchamber.com/201...ces-candidacy/

Rhodes -
http://www.edmondsun.com/local/x1690...or-court-clerk


Key -
http://www.edmondsun.com/local/x1940...or-court-clerk


Schlinke -
http://www.schlinke.net/


Barlean - campaign suspended. Came from Colorado in Aug. 2011
http://newsok.com/oklahoma-county-co...rticle/3678165


ALSO, I located this meet the candidates presser on an OKC atty's blog -

OCBA TO HOST OKLAHOMA COUNTY COURT CLERK CANDIDATE FORUM


Ronald J. Norick Downtown Library, 300 Park Avenue,

4th Floor Auditorium, JUNE 15, 12 NOON

The 4 Candidates for the OK County Court Clerk position behing vacated by Patricia Presley have agreed to attend this forum in an effort to assist the voters in making their decision. This election will be decided by the primary or the run-off election since all candidates are running on the Republican ticket. Candidates are:

• Charles Key
• Tim Rhodes
• Nathan Schlinke
  
• Salome Vaughn
  

Registration is NOT required for this free event and it is open to the public. For more information, please feel free to contact the OCBA at 236-8421.

You should enter the library at the East side door and take those elevators to the 4th floor. The main entrance to the library is closed for construction.

Hope that helps you some.

[Midtowner]

Rhodes is the only one with experience. Charles Key has been an embarrassment in the legislature and reading through his profile, he wants to cast a vote to lose our court case with the feds over the jail, he wants to bring negative attention to Oklahoma County by rolling back workplace protections for LGBT folks and most of all, he wants to extend hours and open up satellite court clerk offices. The idjit doesn't even know we're headed towards electronic filing, that we already do have satellite offices and that there's no money for this "conservative" to expand government. Salome Vaughn.. never heard of her. Her campaign doesn't look at all professional. Schlinke has a lot of nice stuff on his website and I know just about everyone who has endorsed him. I've seen him around, nice guy, but his website is pretty much the same boilerplate kid-tested/mother-approved crud you see on other Okie 'pubs sites.

I'll be voting for Rhodes as he's the only one who seems to know what the heck he's talking about. The Court Clerk should be more of a technocrat than an ideologue.

[adaniel]

That's the thing I really don't get about politics here. I looked at Charles Key's website and it just drones on and on about freedom, liberty, gun rights, abortion, blah blah blah. WTF? What does this have to do with getting a marriage licence filed faster? Mentions absolutely nothing about the duties of a county clerk. Does he even know what a county clerk is? Or does this "conservative" need to stay on the government payroll a little while longer? Just ridiculous.

I hoping that this county may be the only one in the state where stuff like this is becoming ineffective, but who knows?

[Midtowner]

Key has a good shot on name recognition only. In the legislature, he was a John Birch tard. As Court Clerk, he will fight UN Agenda 23.

As for Schlinke, he's a nice guy, a good lawyer, his dad's a good lawyer, but again, there's not a wit of substance.

Rhodes has been up there for quite some time and would make for the most seamless transition.

[tdbcrb99]

As a practicing attorney in Oklahoma County for over 15 years, I'm very familiar with the job done by the current Court Clerk and Deputy Court Clerk. 15 years of a bad experience is long enough!! Rhodes has basically been running the office for the last several years and has, in my opinion, only served to decrease customer service and decrease efficiency. I do not know much about Vaughn, Barlean, or Key, but I know that Nathan Schlinke not only has the ability, but the desire to ensure that the Oklahoma County Court Clerk's office is ready to transition to electronic filing and to make customer service and efficiency a top priority. I have seen some of the emails sent out by Rhodes boasting of his "accomplishments" as Deputy Court Clerk and find the same laughable at best. His "accomplishments" are nothing more than taking credit for the hard work of others when he had merely an advisory role at best in relation to those "accomplishments." While I find that the individuals who work at the Court Clerk's office are genuinely helpful and want to provide good customer service, the current regime does not engender, nor foster, that same desire. It's time for real and positive change. Schlinke is the best candidate in my opinion.

[Midtowner]

You can't have it both ways. Either Rhodes is "practically running" the office or he's not and taking credit for others' accomplishments. I get it. Schlinke is a nice guy and his dad's a great guy as well. Both are well loved and respected by the legal community. The facts are that Schlinke has zero experience behind the desk at the Court Clerk's office and has chosen to run a campaign which appeals to the lowest common denominator. As an attorney, when I file a document, all I care about is that 1) someone scans it and puts it online (which the folks in Cleveland County should be considering a different court clerk for a lack of that) and that 2) it ends up in the right file. I also would like to be correctly charged for items I file. The only place I can really fault Rhodes is that he charges motions for partial interlocutory summary adjudication as if they were motions for summary judgment (if they were the same thing, they'd be called the same thing). But that's something I might only do 2-3 times per year.

For someone who is running for basically a technocrat position, putting "I will stand up for conservative values as Court Clerk and am pro-life, blah blah blah" just doesn't cut it.

[kevinpate]

None of the candidates are particularly impressive to me, a rare occasion visitor/consumer of the office. I don't have a dawg in the fight so as a need arises, I'll deal with whomever gets the nod.

If Rhodes prevails, he wouldn't be the first deputy in the state to follow in the footsteps of a long serving official and contiue with business as usual, for better or worse.

If Vaughn or Schlinke prevail, I doubt the office would fall apart. In truth, I doubt 99% plus of the general public would even notice any changes at all.

If Barlean were to prevail, well I would ponder why people elected someone who publicly suspended the campaign and then just hope for the best.

That leaves Key. A bit tin hat for my personal taste, but hey, if enough voters in the county want him, then they can have him, just like any of the others.

[RadicalModerate]

I would like to see a "Court Clerk" who doesn't direct and/or allow Their Staff to send out Official Form Letters, with Your Name on them, that you receive, via snail mail, The Evening Immediately Prior to Your RESCHEDULED for 9:00 am the next day (original date two weeks later) Court Appearance to answer "the charges" related to a seat-belt violation or have an ARREST WARRANT issued for you for failure to appear . . . especially since you planned to send in the $20 check anyways.

Trust Me: My phone call to them "straighten this out" was not a happy one. =)

I guess this means: Anyone but the current Court Clerk.

[BDK]

Why are there so many candidates for this position? Does the Court Clerk get paid a disproportionately large salary or something?

[RadicalModerate]

No. It only provides an extra good opportunity for "MalFeesSent" In Office.
And, of course, the collection of "the vig" . . . as they would say on the East Coast. =)

Not that there is anything "wrong" with that . . .
Or--as if--it has ever occurred.

[kevinpate]

It's an open seat this go around. When just about any political seat is wide open, more folks turn out to toss their hat in the ring than will turn out to challenge an incumbent who desires to stay in office.

My guess is if Rhodes or some other long time staffer were not in the race, the field might be even larger.


on edit: forgot about the financial Q. The clerk annual salary falls somewhere between 88,000 and 118,000 IIRC.

[RadicalModerate]

"toss their hat in the ring" . . . i love that expression. it is both quaint and sort of mysterious at the same time. it could have something to do with bullfights . . . or the residue of bullfights.

it inspires me to think . . .
"i'd like 'to toss my cookies' into the "tossed into the ring" hat of the last [azzole] occupying that office, then upside it onto their head and shove it down over their ears so they could hear my dissatifaction with their office protocols.

but i get over it
and accept whatever pogue "the people" pick.
for that office

[tdbcrb99]

Just to clarify a few points. In my previous post, I was not attempting to "have it both ways." Rhodes claimed "accomplishments" are things such as: "Generating $70 million in new revenue while reducing the Court Clerk's operating budget." While Rhodes my have played a part in reducing the operating budget, he has no power or authority to "generate . . . new revenue" other than if he illegally made up new charges and fees, which Midtowner alludes to in his statement that Rhodes treats different motions the same. Rhodes also claims responsibility for: "Helping Tinker stay open - assuring the old GM plan was used by Tinker for mission expansion," and "Supporting the Easter Oklahoma County Turnpike gate to improve economic development." These are things upon which the Court Clerk, much lest the Deputy Court Clerk has absolutely no power or authority. And FYI, Bennett Schlinke, Nathan's father, passed away about 4 and 1/2 years ago. Nathan Schlinke didn't "toss his hat into the ring," in any sense of the term. Nathan Schlinke shares my same issues and concerns with the Court Clerks office, which are: customer service, accountability, and bringing electronic filing to Oklahoma County as soon as possible. If Rhodes is a technocrat, why hasn't he done anything in the last 8-10 years to make electronic filing a reality? For the most part, I get frustrated with the rhetoric of politics, but I know Nathan Sclinke personally, and I know that his intentions with regard to the Oklahoma County Court Clerk position is not for personal gain. Nathan is a very well respected and capable attorney who can make a lot more money as a private attorney, but I believe it is his personal integrity and true desire to ensure that even the smallest of political offices are filled with capable people, who are more interested in what they can do for their County and Country than what can be done for them, is his driving force.

[Midtowner]

Sorry, i didn't know that Bennett Schlinke had passed. I always heard good things.

As far as electronic filing, c'mon, now you're just throwing stuff out there to see what sticks. If you're even tangentially aware of what is going on in the Administrative Office of the Courts, we're working on a 77-county centralized system complete with electronic filing. You can go down to the Oklahoma Supreme Court building and tour the cubicle farm and server rooms where all of that stuff is going to go. To develop something now would be incompatible with OSCN and a redundant effort to something the Supreme Court has already undertaken.

I'd criticize Rhodes if he was trying to develop some sort of system apart from OSCN. You probably would as well, no?

I'm less concerned with good intentions, I don't think there's a bad intentioned candidate in the race except maybe Key who somehow hasn't landed a Deputy-something position somewhere usually reserved for term-limited legislators who hate big government (but can't seem to get by without a government salary). I'm more concerned with ability and experience and there's only one candidate with any kind of a track record.

[kevinpate]

Most anyone running for office will arrive to the race with both pluses and minuses. With a bit of luck, necessary since most folks don't educate themselves about the candidates, the ultimate office holder will end up having more + than - about him or her.

Again, no pup in the fight, thus no advocacy for one candidate over the others in this grouping of folks. I doubt any of them could totally wreck the place, even if they had a mind to try.

[NoOkie]

I don't care who wins. I just want a functional court website where I can pay my tickets and get information, not a damn vanity page for Patricia Presley or whoever replaces her.

[Midtowner]

Tim Rhodes wins.

--and tdbcrb99 (Steve Long?), shame on you for taking me out of context in your blog post.

[HewenttoJared]

Key has a good shot on name recognition only. In the legislature, he was a John Birch tard. As Court Clerk, he will fight UN Agenda 23.

this guy sounds awesome