HAMMOND | The City Court won't see its demise any time soon despite a recent veto by Mayor Thomas McDermott Jr.

With the veto against the court's renewal upheld by the City Council last week, it appeared the court would cease to exist by Dec. 31 of this year as prescribed by ordinance.

Instead, experts agree state law prevents the court from being abolished until 2010.

"It was too late anyway," said Tom Carusillo, director of trial court services for the state court administrator. "If you were going to establish or abolish a court you would have had to do it in 2006."

The next opportunity is 2010, he said. State law allows to establish or abolish a court every four years.

Once a state court is created, state law simply dictates it exists until it is abolished. It makes no requirement for four-year renewals as has been the city's practice.

The ordinance is expected to be amended to comply with state law when the council next meets March 12.

"The ordinance is (written) so everybody understands the court exists until the council decides it will not exist," City Attorney Kris Kantar said Friday.

Kantar said the court has been operating since at least the 1930s, though the original ordinance appears not to have been written until 1978.

Kantar said it's unclear why the city's ordinance has been calling for the court's renewal every four years when it hasn't been necessary since at least 1986.

"This is the way it's always been done," she said.

Kantar said it's hoped the ordinance's language will clarify the confusion over the court's status.

City Council President Dan Repay said a letter explaining the mayor's veto had been placed in council members' mail boxes at City Hall the Friday before the council met Monday. Most council members were not aware of the veto until reading of it in the morning newspaper, he said.

"That triggered our contacting our attorneys and others their attorneys as to how it pertained to ordinance and state statute," Repay said.

Repay said his own research indicated the council couldn't abolish the court until 2010 even if it wanted to.

Repay said he was looking forward to a debate on the question in public, but no council member made a motion when the veto came to the floor.

Lacking a motion, the issue died and the veto was sustained, but it didn't mean the court would be closing in his opinion, he said.

"The court is not in danger, and I'm glad because it provides a good service," Repay said. "The county couldn't handle 30,000 court cases."