Loading…
The region-wide rules adopted by the AJR-11 Council of Judges (Houston, September 5, 2018; Gov't Code § 74.048(c), RJA 4(c)): they apply to all district and statutory county courts of the region and set case time standards, recusal procedure, courtroom recording/broadcasting policy, the conflicting-engagement priority ladder, attorney vacation designations, and courtroom decorum. Adopted by reference in Wharton County's district Local Rules of Practice; posted on Matagorda County's court page (the unit's capture copy).
Texas > Eleventh Administrative Judicial Region (all district and statutory county courts of the region)
Adopted by the Council of Judges of the Eleventh Administrative Judicial Region on September 5, 2018, pursuant to Tex. Gov't Code § 74.048(c) and Rule of Judicial Administration 4(c); applicable to every district and statutory county court of the region. One instrument, two official prints: the TOPICs registration (doc. 328) and the county-posted copy on Matagorda County's court page. REGIONAL GOVERNANCE (verbatim from the registered print): "The Presiding Judge must call and preside over at least one annual regular meeting of the Council of Judges at a designated time and place." The Council "must consider those matters prescribed by § 74.048(c) and Rules 3 and 4 of the Rules of Judicial Administration." Visiting judges: "In accordance with § 74.055(a), the Presiding Judge must maintain a list of qualified Retired and Former Judges who are eligible to sit by assignment in the Region"; the list "must include the areas of expertise (criminal, civil, or family) for each eligible judge"; "a judge may not be assigned to a case or docket outside the judge's listed areas of expertise"; and such judges "must annually certify their continued eligibility for judicial assignment on the form provided by the Region." "The Board of Judges of each County must adopt a plan for judicial absences, vacation, and educational events and a method of notifying the Presiding Judge of the need for visiting judges." LOCAL-RULES CONFORMANCE: county Local Rules "must conform with the requirements of these Rules," "must be numbered to cover the same subject matter" using the same numbering system, and each county Board "must adopt Local Rules providing for regular meetings of the judges, committee assignments, and other designation of duties necessary to the work of the Courts of the County as required by Section 74.093 of the Texas Government Code"; the Boards giving preference to criminal, civil, and family/juvenile cases must each adopt and uniformly follow Local Rules achieving the Rule 7 time standards. JURY: each county Board "must adopt a Jury Plan governing the selection, management, assignment, and time of jury service; file the same with the District Clerk; and, when required, secure the approval of the Commissioner's Court." REPORTING: the Local Administrative Judges "must cause the proper Clerk to send the Presiding Judge a copy of the report sent each month to the Office of Court Administration," plus other docket-management information the Presiding Judge requests. RECUSAL REASSIGNMENT: "If a county has adopted local rules to govern reassignment of cases after the voluntary recusal of a judge, the case must be reassigned in accordance with the local rules." TIME STANDARDS (Rule 7): felony cases within 12 months of indictment; misdemeanors within 6 months; civil jury cases within 18 months of the appearance date and non-jury within 12; family cases "within 6 months from appearance date or within 6 months from the expiration of the waiting period provided by the Family Code where such is required, whichever is later" (uncontested: 3 months on the same terms); juvenile detention hearings the next business day, adjudication within 10 days for detained juveniles (30 otherwise) and disposition within 15 days — with the proviso that nothing "prevents a judge from recessing a juvenile hearing at any stage of the proceeding where the parties are agreeable or when in the opinion of the judge presiding in the case the best interests of the child and society shall be served." RECUSAL (Rule 11): TRCP 18a mechanics with reassignment on a rotation basis. RECORDING/BROADCASTING (Rule 12): local rules control; media requests require the presiding judge's permission with a one-camera pooling default. CONFLICTING ENGAGEMENTS (Rule 13): the priority ladder — criminal cases, statutory-preference cases, preferentially set cases, earliest-set case, earliest-filed case — and "Courts in metropolitan County areas should yield to Courts in rural County areas in all other instances of conflicting settings," with unresolved conflicts decided by the Local Administrative Judge or the Regional Presiding Judge. ATTORNEY VACATIONS (Rule 14): four weeks per year; summer designations filed by May 15 are protective; non-summer designations require advance notice, run at most two consecutive weeks, and are not protective against previously ordered settings. DECORUM (Rule 15): the Texas Lawyer's Creed and courtroom conduct standards apply. Registered instrument (8 pp.): https://topics.txcourts.gov/LocalRulesPublic/PreviewAttachment/328 | County-posted print: https://www.matagordatx.gov/upload/page/0138/11th%20AJR%20Regional%20Rules.pdf
Reviewer note: Region-close merge 2026-08-25: this instrument existed as two rules — tx-topics-328-11th-ajr-local-rules (recon 2026-08-20, TOPICs registration, sha ff889881…, governance-core excerpts) and this row (Phase 9, county-posted print, sha 0344ed53…, practice-standards excerpts). Full-text adjudicated as the same 2018-09-05 instrument; compositions merged; primary anchor = the TOPICs 328 registration; cross-proof = the Matagorda print (source_documents 336c71ff-9784-424c-9d9d-e374be1a44cd). The topics-328 row is archived with a successor pointer.
Establishes a Traffic Violations Bureau within the Clerk of the County Court under Fla. R. Traf. Ct. 6.100(a) (Burnstein, C.J., Nov. 1, 1988).
Approves the National Highway Safety Council Defensive Driving course as a school to which traffic courts may require attendance (Fla. R. Traf. Ct. 6.110(a)).
Designates the D.W.I. Counterattack School (Broward County Commission on Alcoholism) as an approved school for court-ordered attendance (Fla. R. Traf. Ct. 6.110(a)).