Judge Cowan Re-Elected To State Council Position
Wednesday, June 22nd, 2022
Rob Cowan has been re-elected as secretary of the Georgia Council of Municipal Court Judges. The judge of Dalton’s Municipal Court was first elected to the post in March of this year to fulfill the unexpired term of the previous council secretary who stepped down to pursue other career opportunities. Now Cowan will serve his own full one-year term. Cowan previously served as northwest Georgia’s district representative on the council.
“It’s exciting and it’s an honor,” said Judge Cowan. “Now I feel like I can work with the leadership to promote legislation in the general assembly that will benefit municipalities and in particular municipal courts and how they’re viewed with jurisdictional issues that may arise.”
Judge Cowan says that he also hopes to use his term as council secretary to help build better connections between different communities’ municipal courts.
“One thing that I’m really excited about doing is creating better communication with other municipal courts so that we can share resources and ideas in a more timely fashion rather than waiting for us all to gather together. That seems to be lacking sometimes,” Cowan said. “Hopefully through this next year we’ll create some building blocks for better sharing of ideas and resources so that we can just make everyone’s experiences in municipal courts better than they are already. Like I’ve said before, municipal courts see more people than any other court in the state of Georgia. The idea is to make it the most pleasant experience while still making sure we protect due process and that we handle what we need to handle to make our community safer.”
Judge Cowan and Dalton’s Municipal Court have taken leadership roles in the state in recent years, pioneering first the process to use technology to go paperless and later leveraging technology to lead the way in bringing court back into session during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. Judge Cowan worked with members of the council as he and his staff developed those plans.
“We’re here to help not only the people who find themselves in front of the court but also other courts around the state with innovation in how to address situations whether it’s COVID or technology in moving towards more of a paperless court,” said Judge Cowan.
According to their website, the Council of Municipal Court Judges was formed in 1994 after beginning as part of the Georgia Municipal Association in 1983. Established and given jurisdiction by OCGA § 36-32-40 to further improve the administration of municipal courts across the state, the Council assists judges in the execution of their duties and promotes professional training. All judges serving in municipal and special courts in Georgia are members of the Council.
