The Supreme Court Ohio Annual Report

In 2009, the Office of Public Information also:
• Designed and published nearly 480 print publications
and materials
• Provided design services and other assistance for the
joint swearing-in ceremony of Justices Evelyn Lundberg
Stratton and Maureen O’Connor, the Forum on the
Law events, the 2009 Summit on Children and other
special events hosted by Court staff
• Worked with Judicial College staff to design and make
operable the Judicial e Cademy
• Researched, wrote and distributed 281 previews of oral
arguments before the Court and summaries of merit
decisions
• Fielded 620 media inquiries
• Answered 17,975 phone calls, an average of 63 per day,
to the Court’s main phone lines
• Prepared 184 written responses to constituent letters
and e-mails.
Public Information Director Chris Davey was selected from a
national field of candidates to research and produce a 2½-day
Court Management Training course for the Institute of Court
Management. The course will teach court managers about
the importance of court community communication and
train them on specific skills in building and managing a court
communications program.
Davey also is chairing the CCPIO New Media Project, a
year-long collaborative research project to systematically
examine and analyze the potential effects of new and emerging
digital media on U.S. courts. The project is sponsored by the
Conference of Court Public Information Officers.
New Public Access Rules Take Effect
New rules on public access to court records (Sup.
R. 44-47) took effect July 1. Designed to ensure that
Ohioans continue to have open and ready access to
court records, the rules say that court records are
presumed to be public, unless they fall within a specific
exemption. A court or clerk may deny access to a court
record only if the record is specifically exempted from
public access under the rules. The rules do not require
additional personnel or extra costs for the courts.
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