New court case software puts strain on clerk’s office staffing

A new software system for handling court documents is putting a staffing strain on the Putnam County Clerk’s Office, Clerk Heather Gilbert told the commissioners Monday.

The county made the decision to switch to Odyssey case management software, which the State of Indiana utilizes.

The switch came at the urging of judges Matt Headley and Denny Bridges, but Gilbert was against the switch from the start.

Gilbert said the changeover seems to have gone smoothly for the courts, but that it has created extra work for her department.

“The transition worked well for the court system,” Gilbert said. “However, the financial data did not transfer over well.”

While speaking to the commissioners at their second November meeting Monday morning, Gilbert had with her a large stack of paper.

That stack is a report featuring 13,982 cases, each of which has to be audited by a clerk’s office staff member.

Besides this rather time-consuming audit, Gilbert said the day-to-day operation of the new system is also more time-consuming.

“I used to be able to close all my books in 10 minutes, 20 minutes if it was a complicated case,” Gilbert said. “Now it takes two hours.”

There is also a report that the Odyssey system generates that requires a staff member to print out a number of different court documents and then distribute them to the appropriate party. That process takes another two hours.

“Right there are four hours of our day that weren’t there before,” Gilbert said.

Additionally, with the financial data not transferring correctly, each time someone comes in to make a payment, the differences in the two systems must be reconciled.

“This is a long process for us,” she said

Adding to her exasperation, Gilbert said Odyssey representatives have been of little help in the process.

“The judge and I did sit down with Odyssey on Friday in a conference call and see if there’s anything they can do to help me,” Gilbert said. “Odyssey’s answer to me Friday was, ‘Your judgment package is not our friend.’”

The clerk’s purpose in coming to the meeting was to request overtime for her employees. She said they have already been working extra, even without extra compensation approved.

Gilbert said morale is getting low.

Commissioners David Berry and Don Walton approved the request 2-0, pending county council approval. Commissioner Rick Woodall was not in attendance Monday.

Gilbert added that besides asking the council for overtime, she plans to ask for funding for an additional employee.

The employee was already requested in the 2019 budget and denied.

“I’m coming back to the council in December to ask for that person again,” Gilbert said.

In other business, County Highway Supervisor Mike Ricketts reported that the county was denied in its application for a 2019 Community Crossings grant from the state.

Ricketts said this seems to be common in this round of funding, as counties and larger cities and towns were denied, while smaller communities such as Roachdale were approved.

County officials intend to apply again in January for another round of 2019 grant funding.

Putnam County received $541,623.74 in Community Crossings funding in 2018, which helped resurface quite a bit of road.

“For people that don’t know, we redid 74 miles of road this year,” Ricketts said.