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ELECTION 2020: Black, Bauer face off for judgeship

Ed Black

ALPENA — The incumbent and an attorney with 17 years of trial experience will square off in the race for the 26th Circuit Court judge on the Nov. 3 ballot.

Ed Black, appointed to the judgeship in February by Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, served as Alpena County prosecutor for 11 years before being tapped for the judgeship. That experience, Black said, provided him the wide knowledge of the law and quick decision-making skills needed in a judge.

His opponent, Joel Bauer, is a lifelong Alpena resident who has practiced many kinds of law in his hometown. A generational knowledge of the community’s families — paired with years of exposure to many sides of the law — makes him ready to continue serving his town in the black robe of a judge, Bauer said.

Black has spent 20 years working in Michigan courts. Leaving a downstate private practice to move to Alpena in 2004 to be near his wife’s family, he worked part-time as an assistant prosecutor in Montmorency County before being elected Alpena County prosecutor.

The number and breadth of cases handled by a prosecutor makes an excellent training ground for a judge, said Black, who, in his former position, prosecuted 1,400 cases each year.

Joel Bauer

Prosecutors are present in court for almost every criminal case that comes before a judge and must have an ingrained and practiced knowledge of law, Black said.

When he was prosecutor, Black said, he learned first-hand the connection between the underlying causes and the long-term effects of crime. Many of the people he prosecuted appeared in his office previously as victims of assault, sexual abuse, or some other trauma.

Courts need to attack the root of crime, not just punish it after the fact, he said.

He wants to help the community continue its efforts to help people struggling with addiction recovery and hopes to improve the court’s processing of child abuse and neglect cases, helping parents to keep their children when possible and moving cases more quickly through hearings for the sake of the children involved.

During his tenure as prosecutor, Black helped start the 88th District Court drug court, the Child Advocacy Center, and the Alpena Sexual Assault Response Team, and brought a regional victim advocate to the prosecutor’s office.

Bauer is a fifth generation Northeast Michigander who followed his father’s footsteps into law. He handles all kinds of law — criminal, family, municipality, and wills and trusts.

His practice takes him to eight counties, where, Bauer said, he has practiced before as many as 30 circuit, district, and probate judges.

Watching many judges do their job — and noticing what judicial behavior is effective and which isn’t — has prepared him to know how to run a courtroom, Bauer said.

As an attorney who works with many criminal and family cases, he’s seen how lawbreaking often walks hand-in-hand with destruction to the family unit. Drunk driving and domestic violence are, many times, accompanied by divorce or other family-related court cases.

As judge, Bauer said, he would work toward strengthening the friend of the court system to expedite the court portion of divorce and custody situations to reduce the trauma those place on couples and children.

Bauer said his longtime connection to the community and his upbringing — surrounded, as he was, by judges and others in the legal profession — help him know what his community needs from a judge.

During his lifetime, he’s seen the community become “horribly addicted” to the opioids that, in the 1990s, it didn’t know existed, Bauer said. Alpena needs an opiate task force to unite law enforcement and mental health professionals in combating the addiction problem, he said — a task force he’d like to help create as judge.

Both Black and Bauer expressed a need for improvement to the court’s response to mental health issues, citing the need to break cycles to reduce the crime and addiction that often accompany mental health struggles.

Both candidates agree that cases need to move more quickly through Alpena courts.

Ed Black

AGE: 45

RESIDENCE: Alpena

OCCUPATION: 26th

Circuit Court judge

ELECTED EXPERIENCE: Alpena County

prosecutor, 11 years

FAMILY: Married, three children, ages 16 to 19

Joel Bauer

AGE: 48

RESIDENCE: Alpena

OCCUPATION:

Attorney

ELECTED EXPERIENCE: None

FAMILY: Married,

four children, ages

9 months to 18

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