Court Clerk: What you need to know

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If elected, life-long Cordell resident feels confident in leading Court Clerk’s offce

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  • Kim Batt
    Kim Batt
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Kim Batt feels being the Washita County Court Clerk is in her blood.

She practically grew up in the courthouse, she says.

“My mom worked in the county assessor’s offce for 29 years. My grandmother was also the court clerk. I’ve worked in the clerk’s offce for 9 and ½ years,” she said.

Former county clerk Carol Corbett hired Batt as a clerk.

“It was somewhere I always wanted to work,” Batt said. “I grew up in the courthouse. I just wanted to work there when I grew up.”

Now, Batt, a lifelong Cordell resident, is running for the County Clerk as a Democrat in the Nov. 3 general election.

“I love the citizens of this little town. It’s a small little town, and everyone knows everyone. It’s comfortable,” she said. “Things happen here, but we still all have each other’s back.”

Batt graduated Cordell High School in 1995. Her daughter Lauren graduated in 2019. Her other daughter, Lacey, will graduate in 2021.

She never had an itch to really leave Cordell for big-city trappings or greener pastures of other towns.

“I wanted to raise my kids in a smaller community, the same way I was raised,” she said.

Besides her experience in the clerk’s offce, Batt points to a year of business school she completed at the Western Technology Center in Burns Flat, where she lived for a short time after the 2001 tornado wrecked half of Cordell.

Though she is running as a Democrat, Batt wants voters to realize the Clerk is not a partisan position.

“It should not matter if you are a Democrat or Republican. That has nothing to with the job whatsoever. That’s one message I want to get out there right now. Don’t straight party vote,” she said.

She has a good reputation at the courthouse and with the other employees, she says.

“I’m respected.” Batt thinks she is the right person for the Clerk’s job.

“I believe that I am a knowledgeable candidate for court clerk. It also requires solid business skills, accounting and budgeting of funds. I generally value working for and serving the residents of Washita County. I look forward to serving them.”

Batt recently sat down with the Beacon to talk about her candidacy and answer a few questions. The answers are in Batt’s own words.

What is the essential role of Court Clerk?

Preserving records. There’s a wide range of important duties regarding district court proceedings. The offce possesses and generates paperwork, lots of paperwork daily. Criminal cases, divorces, attorneys, marriage licenses, anything you can think of, while serving the public and working with other state and local offces. It requires leadership. And the ability of effciently manage and maintain all the records that we have. We have records dating back from when people came over from Russia. Naturalization records. We try to preserve those the best that we can. We are the keeper of the records.

I’m the cost administrator, also. When people don’t pay their fines, I have to send them a letter that if you don’t pay, then you’re going to get a warrant. I don’t like that part of it. That is the toughest part of the job, especially when you grow up here and know everyone. Sometimes you have to issue a warrant for someone you know, a friend. It’s tough.

Will there be bad blood between your opponent and you after the election?

It won’t be bad blood on my end, but I have a feeling on the other end. I’ve already been told I won’t have a job. If I don’t win, I won’t have a job. It’s been quite the fun time over there. I’m trying to get the offce back to the effciency that the former court clerk left it in. And that’s very important to me to have an effcient offce. If I don’t know something, I will make sure that I find out, and do it right.

What is the No. 1 issue facing the offce?

Leadership. Effciency. Knowledge. You must be knowledgeable about anything that might come across the counter.

If you are elected, what direction will you take the offce in the next four years?

I want to make sure that the records are preserved correctly. I want to be there to help my employees, because we are not always helped. We are left with things that should have been done that are not done. For instance, I have a co-worker that had COVID and missed a couple of weeks. She came back to a mess on her desk because the court clerk didn’t know how to handle it all. I just want to be there for my employees, and if I must stay until midnight to get things done, then I’ll stay to midnight to get them done.

What else should voters know about your candidacy?

I will provide leadership that they can trust. I am the right experience, the right choice.