Commissioner Catherine Conklin

• Protective orders are Monday and Wednesday mornings. They are in person.
• In person motion hearings are Monday and Wednesday afternoons and all day Tuesday. Commissioner Conklin doesn't differentiate between motion types.
• Thursday is Commissioner Conklin's WebEx day. She typically does pretrials in the morning and motion hearings in the afternoons.
• Friday mornings Commissioner Conklin does the civil commitments at the hospital, and then will have two or three motion hearings.

• Half an hour for regular motions.
• Fifteen minutes for motions like appointment of a GAL or custody evaluator or SODIs.

If counsel is present, Commissioner Conklin doesn't require the parties to attend. They can appear by phone (Commissioner Conklin's courtroom isn't set up yet for hybrid hearings) or just have their attorney appear for them. The disadvantage is that counsel can't proffer for someone who isn't there.

All hearings are in person except on Thursdays, when Commissioner Conklin does pretrials remotely and motions where the parties are out of state or have requested a virtual hearing.

The clerk sends the link for Webex out a couple of days in advance. They do not use a static link. For telephone calls, Commissioner Conklin initiate the calls.

When it's a non-evidentiary hearing, Commissioner Conklin will grant a motion to appear remotely for a party. Commissioner Conklin is less willing to grant for counsel because they chose to take the case in a different location. If both attorneys want to appear remotely, the team will likely try to reschedule the hearing (or schedule it in the first place) on the Thursday WebEx calendar.

None. They will all come to a Commissioner first unless a clerk made a mistake.

Only when it's a TRO or a relocation issue where the "expedited" hearing is permitted by statute.

Commissioner Conklin's evidence clerk requires physical binders.

A request should be filed in the docket, followed up with an email to the clerk. Commissioner Conklin will typically review the request for a review hearing to see if it's appropriate or if counsel really needs to file a new motion.

Pretrials are typically scheduled now either at the CMC (which is done with a law clerk) or in open court. Otherwise, the clerk sets the pretrial via email and then sends notice.

• Please keep an eye on the page limit. Don't bother filing a motion to strike additional pages, as Commissioner Conklin will only read to 25 pages anyway. If you are requesting additional pages, please request a specific number and explain why the additional pages are necessary rather than a boilerplate "this is the most complicated and serious case, and I need blanket permission to file however many pages I want."  
• Also, please remember that the statute requires all parenting plans to contain a provision that the parties engage in some form of ADR before bringing a case back to the court for modification or enforcement. Even if the parties' parenting plan skipped this provision, Commissioner Conklin views it as mandatory and will reschedule hearings if parties haven't mediated.