Friday, January 30, 2015

[Plumas County]: New association aims to support county grand jury


Civil grand juries have been around for centuries. They came to America with the first settlers from Europe.
The grand jury plays a vital watchdog role to help ensure local government — along with public schools, police and special districts — does the best job possible for its citizens.
“If you want to do something productive, to help the county be a better county, one way you can do that is by being a grand juror,” said former grand juror Debbie Brownrigg.
Brownrigg said her time as a grand juror for Plumas County was one of the most challenging and rewarding experiences of her life. She acknowledged it was one of the most important jobs she ever had.
It’s that belief that prompted Brownrigg to join seven other former jurors in forming the Plumas County Grand Jury Association in February 2014.
The association was formed to help support the county grand juries and streamline the jury selection process.
Plumas County is currently gearing up to pick a grand jury for the 2015-16 year. The goal is choose the jurors by March so they can be seated and get to work July 1.
Picking the jury is a time-consuming job. About 300 summonses are sent to qualified county residents, who are then interviewed by the Superior Court judge.
The interview process ends with the selection of 19 jurors and two alternates. They jury spends a year investigating and producing a report that highlights important issues involving county government.
The grand jury association members, who held their monthly meeting Jan. 8 at the Feather Publishing office in Quincy, said one of their goals is to end the need for summonses.
They want future juries to be made up entirely of volunteers who are willing to devote 10 – 20 hours per week for a year.
“That’s where we are right now,” said association member Dennis Doyle. “If we could somehow bring to (the judge) 50 qualified people, and he only has to select 19 of them, his workload would be reduced by more than two-thirds.”
Many larger counties in the state don’t have to summon citizens for grand jury duty because they get more than enough volunteers.
“They place an ad in the paper and people come in and fill out an application,” Doyle said. “But some of those counties have millions of people to choose from. Here we have fewer than 20,000 to choose from.”
A prospective juror must be a U.S. citizen over 18 years of age, have been a county resident for at least a year and be able to speak and write the English language.
A person convicted of a felony is not eligible.
Once a jury is selected, the jurors receive a week of training by members of the California Grand Jurors’ Association.
After the jurors take the oath and get to work, they will receive support from the new county grand jury association. The association members are not part of the sitting grand jury and have no influence on the issues the jury chooses to investigate.
“The association would like to be a local resource for grand juries to have so that they don’t have to go somewhere else to get information,” Brownrigg said.
The local association will apply its experience to help new jurors with interviewing and investigation techniques. They will lend advice on how to write reports.
The local association will also have the support of the state association. “And they have amazing resources,” Doyle said.
What the local association can’t do is help new jurors find the time needed to do the job.
“And that’s a big one for some people,” Doyle said. “I had a full-time job when I was on the jury for two years. You know, it’s amazing what you can do when you put your mind to it.”
Because of the time commitment, the grand juries tend to be comprised of retired residents.
Ideally, the association members said they would like to see more young people apply for the job, even if they are working full time.
Most of the grand jury meetings are held in the evenings. And some employers have allowed jurors to work flexible schedules.
How to apply:
County residents who want to serve on the jury can sign up by visiting a new grand jury association website, grandjuryassoc-plumas.org, or they can call the court at 283-6305.
January 23, 2015
Plumas County News
By Dan McDonald, Managing Editor

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