§ 45-52-84 — Duties and Compensation of Judge of Probate; Clerical Assistance

(a) On and after October 1, 1943, the judge of probate shall collect all moneys, fees, compensation, commissions, allowances, costs, percentages, emoluments, and other items allowed to and provided for a judge of probate by the general laws of Alabama then and thereafter in force, except as otherwise provided by local law applicable to Morgan County, and shall pay the same to the Chair of the Board of Revenue and Control of Morgan County, who shall promptly deposit the same in the general fund of the county. All such money collected during one calendar month shall be paid to the chair of the board on or before the tenth day of the following month.
(b) For failure to pay the money herein required to be paid to the county within the time herein fixed, the judge of probate shall be subject to a penalty of five per centum of the amount unlawfully withheld by him or her for each month the same is unlawfully withheld, the penalty to be recovered by Morgan County and covered into the general fund of the county.
(c) The Board of Revenue and Control of Morgan County, Alabama, or other like governing body of the county, shall provide the judge of probate with the necessary books, records, equipment, furniture, fixtures, stationery, postage, and other supplies, and with sufficient clerks and assistants. The judge shall have the authority to select and employ and discharge at will his or her clerks and assistants, and to fix their compensation, but the total compensation of such clerks and assistants shall not exceed such sum as the board of revenue and control or other county governing body shall allow therefor. The board shall have authority and it shall be its duty to make an allowance for such compensation and to raise and lower the same from time to time, as conditions and circumstances may warrant.
(d) The clerks and assistants, for the compensation herein allowed, and without further expense to Morgan County, shall perform all services with reference to preparing all lists of qualified electors required by law to be prepared by the judge of probate.
(e) The compensation of the judge of probate and of the clerks and assistants shall be paid by the chair of the board of revenue and control out of the General Fund of Morgan County in semi-monthly installments, as nearly equal as may be, on the first and fifteenth days of each month, the first of the installments to be paid on October 15, 1943.
(f) The compensation of each such clerk and assistant shall be paid upon the filing with the the chair of a written claim therefor, the correctness of which shall be verified by the oath of affirmation of the judge of probate and of such clerk or assistant making the claim.
(g) The judge of probate shall be liable for the payment of all fees, commissions, percentages, allowances, and other items which he or she shall be by law authorized to collect, whether collected by him or her or not, except costs in judicial proceedings in the Probate Court of Morgan County, the payment of which costs he or she shall be liable for only in the event he or she collects the same, subject to the provisions of subsection (h).
(h) The judge of probate shall by the first day of August in each year file with the chair of the board of revenue and control of the county in triplicate a list of all costs in judicial proceedings in the court which accrued and became payable on or before the first of June preceding the filing of the report and which he or she has not collected at the time of filing the list, which list shall be termed list of insolvents and shall contain the names of all persons responsible for the costs, the amount for which each person is responsible, and the style and docket number of the proceeding in which the same respectively accrued. The chair of the board shall cause a copy of the list of insolvents to be published one time in one or more newspapers of general circulation in the county, together with a notice to the effect that the judge of probate has reported the costs as unpaid and that he or she cannot collect the same; the notice shall omit the style and number of the proceedings in which the costs accrued. It shall be the duty of the board of revenue and control to carefully examine the list and to investigate whether or not the costs or part of the same could have been collected by reasonable diligence, and by the first of November following the filing of the list, the board shall by resolution allow or disallow the items shown on the list, and the chair of the board shall notify the judge of probate of all items disallowed and the judge of probate shall pay the same within 30 days thereafter. The action of the board in allowing or disallowing any item on the list shall be final and not subject to review. The cost of publishing the list of insolvents shall be paid out of the general fund of the county.
(i) It shall be the duty of the judge of probate at the time of making each remittance to the county under this section to file with the remittance an itemized report showing the amount of money being remitted by him or her and the separate items making up the amount, and the reports shall be filed and preserved by the board for a period of at least six years, and it shall be the duty of the board to determine at least once in each four years, by examination made by it, or an auditor employed by it, or from an examination made by auditors of the Department of Finance of the State of Alabama, whether or not the judge of probate has properly accounted for all money required by this section to be paid by him or her to the county, and the board and its employees shall at all reasonable times have the right to examine all books, records, and papers in the office.

Legislative History

(Acts 1943, No. 70, p. 34, §§ 2-10; Acts 1949, No. 492, p. 717, §§ 1, 2; Acts 1951, No. 408, p. 734, §§ 1, 2; Acts 1955, No. 520, p. 1170, §§ 1, 2; Acts 1959, No. 67, p. 117, § 1; Acts 1959, No. 278, p. 841, § 1; Acts 1961, No. 539, p. 636, § 1; Acts 1969, No. 646, p. 1178, §§ 1, 2.)