The Oglethorpe Echo
The petition for mandamus filed against the Oglethorpe County Board of Commissioners calls for the BOC to fund and construct a dog impoundment facility, among other things.
Fern Williams, an Oglethorpe County resident, filed the petition on May 17.
In addition, it states BOC Chairman Jay Paul and the BOC “provide for the implementation of procedures and reports required by (county ordinances relating to animals); hire an animal control officer to enforce such ordinances; and to fund and provide adequate vehicle and other equipment for the animal control officer to carry out his duties.”
“I think it’s 100% self-explanatory,” Williams said.
A petition for mandamus is a “request to the court to compel a public official to faithfully perform his or her official duties,” according to an email from Oglethorpe County Clerk of Superior Court Kelli Paradise Smith.
The petition would like the BOC to be required to show why the requests have not and should not be granted. It calls for a court date “not less than 10 days, nor more than 30 days from (May 17).”
The case was initially assigned to Harvey Wasserman. According to Paradise Smith’s email, he and the judges in the 10th Judicial District’s Northern Circuit were recused.
“The next step is for a judge to make some determinations of what the next step will be,” she wrote in the email. “A senior judge or other superior court judge will have to hear the case.”