By the Honorable Anthony J. McDowell, 7th Circuit Court, Genesee County
After over 10 years at the Genesee County Friend of the Court (FOC) in several different roles, I decided to throw my hat in the ring for a judicial appointment to the Family Division of the 7th Circuit Court in the summer of 2024. It was not an easy decision, as I loved the work that we were doing at the Genesee County FOC. We were taking steps to educate the families we serve about the FOC, make the office more trauma informed, and become more accessible to families. As much as I wanted to see the improvements to the office come to fruition, I knew that we had built a wonderful team that was going to be able to make those goals a reality. I also hoped that moving to a judicial role, I would be able to find a new vantage point to be able to continue to make those same efforts, albeit with a different lens.
In October 2024, I was fortunate enough to be appointed to the Family Division of the 7th Circuit Court, leaving my role as the director of the Genesee County FOC. I jumped into the new role and hit the ground running as quickly as I could. Within two days of being appointed, I was on the record hearing cases. Within two weeks of being appointed, I had multiple trials concluded. And within two months on the bench, I was the new presiding judge of the Family Division. The new role came with a new pace and lots of lessons to be learned in the transition. Some notable lessons came in the categories of information, scale, and connection.
When it comes to information, there is a big difference between the breadth and depth of information the FOC has versus what a judge might have. The CAPS screen in Michigan Child Support Enforcement System (MiCSES) can give you information about all of a parent’s cases at one time. Within a few minutes, you will have an idea of all of the interconnectedness of the family, their income history, their address history, and much more.
As a judge, there is no easy button for gathering information about the parties before you. You have to get testimony from witnesses and receive legally admissible evidence. You will not know how a family is interconnected with another family. You will, however, find out the inner workings of the personal dynamics of a family. You will get a deeper understanding of the family situation. So, you may not get the information easily or be able to connect all of the dots, but you will get a richer story of each family before you. Both are necessary and valuable for a functioning court system.
As it relates to scale, as an FOC in a large county who was working on statewide projects and then moving into the courtroom, there is a stark difference to working individually with families who appear before me as a judge. As an FOC director serving 40,000-plus families and supporting 80-plus team members, a policy or procedure change could have wide reaching changes for many people.
At the FOC, if we cut some unnecessary red tape, we could ease the system for thousands of families. If we decided to prioritize events in the community, this could make the FOC accessible to hundreds or thousands of people. In the courtroom, we might serve as few as one and as many as 30 families in a day. Actions or decisions regarding an individual family will not have immediate wide-reaching effects. Instead, the scale of the impact is smaller and more individualized.
In the judge role, the impact might look like helping a juvenile who was afraid to come to court to engage with the court for the first time. It might look like making coming to court less traumatizing for a minor child. Over time, the goal is to make families feel like they will be heard and treated with respect. It will look like people finding that a day that will likely be one of their most traumatic days will be a little less traumatic. The scale of change that can be made in an FOC office is expansive, the impact of an individual judge could be deep for a specific family. Either way, the goal is to make a lasting impact over a long time by showing up every day to make the system a little better.
Going from being the FOC to being a judge results in some different ways you connect with other people. First, as FOC, you work with a team of people in your office and you work with colleagues around the state of Michigan. As a judge, you have a team of people who support the court – including the entire office of the FOC, but you are also spending much of your time on the bench – not working directly with anyone else.
Second, a strange thing happens the day you are appointed to the bench – your name becomes “Judge.” Most people, as a sign of respect, will refer to you as “Judge” or ‘Your Honor” and most of your conversations will be surface-level to avoid any appearances of impropriety. It creates a barrier between you and other people, but then a new type of connection also emerges. As a judge, you are there for people to treat them with respect and dignity on a difficult day. Many days in the courtroom will involve people baring their soul and as a judge, you can be there, not as an advocate, but as a gentle observer who honors their experience. It is a new type of connection that can be incredibly meaningful, even if I still miss my time with my colleagues from the FOC.
The most important lesson I have learned from the transition from the FOC to the bench has been that no matter what role we play in the judiciary, it matters. When people come to the court for help, whether that is the FOC or the courtroom, they are in a difficult situation and need assistance. No matter what role we play in the judiciary—front counter at the FOC, caseworker, leading an FOC office, or sitting on the bench—when we show up for people, follow the law, and treat them with humanity, respect, and kindness, we make a difference. We make the judiciary a little stronger every day.
