By Steve Kemme
The Cincinnati Enquirer

HAMILTON - Butler County commissioners want to find out how much money a judicial decision to yank Domestic Relations Court cases off the Internet has cost the county and taxpayers.

Some county officeholders - including Clerk of Courts Cindy Carpenter and Dan Cade, director of the Butler County Child Support Enforcement Agency - say the action has created an enormous amount of additional work for their staffs.

"Attorneys are calling us to do research they used to do over the Internet," Carpenter told commissioners Thursday. "They're asking us to track their cases and to fax documents to them. It's nonstop all day long."

In a memo to county commissioners, Cade complained that the absence of domestic court records on the Internet has forced his staff to go to the clerk's office to look up records. He said this is an inefficient and time-consuming way to operate.

Citing concerns about identity theft, Domestic Relations Judges Leslie Spillane and Sharon Kennedy last week ordered the clerk's office to remove documents from the clerk's Web site.

Commissioner Mike Fox, who recently issued a scathing report about Domestic Relations Court's procedures and policies, is furious that Spillane and Kennedy pulled the court's cases.

"This is costing us money and it's costing the taxpayers money," Fox said. "They've created a mess."

Fox said there are technical ways to block the public's access to people's Social Security records without removing documents from the Internet.

Commissioners Courtney Combs and Chuck Furmon supported Fox's suggestion to ask the county departments and agencies to report how much the extra work has cost.

Kennedy said it shouldn't take any more time to call the clerk's office for information than it would be to get it from the Internet.

She said she has told Carpenter that if the calls about domestic relations cases are too burdensome, to refer them to her office.

Furmon and Combs rejected Fox's motion to ask Prosecutor Robin Piper to request an opinion from the Ohio Attorney General's Office that would resolve the dispute over the county's Internet court records.

Furmon and Combs said they thought Spillane and Kennedy already had made that request, and they didn't see a reason to duplicate it.

Kennedy said she had not make the request, and she didn't know if Spillane had done it before leaving for vacation.

E-mail skemme@enquirer.com