RAINY RIVER — Efforts to make satellite courts in the Ontario Court of Justice system more accessible in the Northwest region are advancing, according to Rainy River lawyer Jeffrey Marchuk.
Marchuk said that this greater accessibility through both virtual and in-person court is happening through renovations to the Legion in Rainy River and with the support of people such as Justice Terry Waltenbury.
Makeshift satellite courtrooms are set up periodically in remote or rural locations that don’t have permanent court facilities nearby. For Rainy River, the closest courthouse is 90 km away in Fort Frances, and a satellite court is held once every two months.
Marchuk was called to the bar in 2023 and said that in his experience, the court in the area ran only virtually, through Zoom. The first in-person court happened in Rainy River at the end of March.
“That was at the Legion, and then they had to switch back because they’re doing the renovations at the Legion, but the thing they’re doing there is putting in an accessible washroom, so that is a laudable thing.”
Marchuk said it will benefit the community to have in-person features like the accessible washroom, but ideally, court would run as an in-person/virtual hybrid.
“I would like to see the virtual option and the in-person option happening at the same time, and I do think that there’s the potential for that,” he said. “Our residential Judge in Fort Frances, Justice Waltenbury, should be commended because he’s working really hard to make sure that we do have in-person courts at the satellite courts because they are valuable.”
Marchuk said access to justice is extremely important. “If we expect these people to subject themselves to the court’s rule, we should be making the court as accessible as it possibly can be.”
He said he’s seen both ends of the spectrum “where you have people who don’t have a ride to get to court because even though they’re satellite courts and they service communities outside of the core town which in my practice would mostly be Fort Frances, and sometimes people from those communities are driving upwards of 45 minutes to an hour, so bad weather and whatnot could really be a pain if things are only in person. But at the same time, I’ve dealt with the elderly people that are dealing with charges and they don’t know how to use Zoom.”
He said that striking a balance between virtual and in-person court is something we’re still working on. “I think the level of virtual court that we had before was relatively unheard of until COVID.”
The next court date scheduled for Rainy River is over Zoom on May 28.
