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Rolling Meadows, Skokie courts to stop weekend bond hearings

Rolling Meadows and Skokie are among the suburban Cook County courthouses that will stop holding weekend and holiday bond court effective May 5, Cook County Chief Judge Timothy C. Evans announced.

Closing Saturday and holiday court at the Rolling Meadows, Skokie and Maywood courthouses has been in the works for some time as a cost-cutting measure that county officials estimate will save $1.9 million a year.

The Markham courthouse will cease weekend and holiday bond court operations on June 9, and the Bridgeview courthouse ended weekend and holiday services earlier this year.

Suburban police departments, including Arlington Heights, Hoffman Estates and Wheeling, had protested the closings, saying it would cost them more to deliver detainees to bond hearings at the Cook County Criminal Court Building at 2600 S. California Ave. in Chicago.

An announcement from the West Suburban Chiefs of Police Association indicated law enforcement officials and the Cook County Board had reached an agreement in which suburban police departments can take detainees to 24-hour county lockups in either Maywood or Markham. Sheriff’s deputies would then transport those individuals to bond hearings in Chicago.

Through a spokeswoman, county board President Toni Preckwinkle said an “amicable agreement” had been reached to “result in savings without compromising public safety.”

Sheriff’s police will not charge municipalities per prisoner as originally proposed, said Thomas Weitzel, president of the West Suburban Chiefs of Police Association.

Also, “prisoner transport officers from police departments will not have to face an increased public safety issue while driving prisoners a longer distance into Chicago,” said Weitzel in a prepared statement.

North Suburban Police Chiefs President Mike Alsup, chief of police at Harper College in Palatine, and South Suburban Chiefs of Police Association President Bill Joyce, chief in South Chicago Heights, also participated in negotiating the agreement.

No more marriages or civil unions will be scheduled at suburban courthouses, either. Those will be performed at Marriage Court, 119 W. Randolph St., Chicago.

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Weekend Cook County court closings under scrutiny

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