AUSTIN -- Travis County District Clerk Amalia Rodriguez-Mendoza says she will not seek re-election in 2014.
Rodriguez-Mendoza has served six terms and will retire at the end of 2014.
I am proud to have been selected as the 19th District Clerk of Travis County since the office was created in 1840. When I came to the District Clerk s office, I had two primary goals: updating our technology and establishing a culture of providing excellent customer service, Rodriguez-Mendoza said.
She was elected in 1991 and was one of the first clerks in Texas to make e-filing of documents available. Rodriguez-Mendoza implemented a new case management system for both criminal and civil cases in 2004 and 2005, respectively, and established a paperless system for civil cases in 2005.
Even though there is and always will be more work to be done, I feel that I have fulfilled my goals that I set out to do and at this point I am ready to turn the leadership of my office over to the next District Clerk. I would like to thank the voters of Travis County for having confidence in my abilities, Rodriguez-Mendoza said.
Her office is currently working to develop a new system designed specifically for Texas courts. She also helped to institute an internet-based case search of Travis County District Court records to help Attorneys.
The one project Rodriguez-Mendoza points to as one of her proudest achievements is the I-Jury system introduced in 2002. The award winning I-Jury was the first in the nation to allow jurors to use the Internet to respond to a jury summons and receive a court assignment. Developed from the point of view of the juror, it allows jurors in Travis County to go online to handle the preliminaries of jury service and list any schedule conflicts.
We understand incorporating jury service into busy lives can be challenging. Having a system to allow jurors to do as much as they can from home or work before reporting to the courthouse would make jury service much easier, Rodriguez-Mendoza said.
In addition to her duties as District Clerk, Rodriguez-Mendoza has been active in the community, having served on the boards of the Austin Public Library Foundation, the Austin History Center, Austin Museum of Art, and Hispanic Women s Network of Texas. She is a graduate of Leadership Austin, Leadership Texas, and Leadership America. Currently, she serves as the Table Director for the Pan American Roundtable of Austin and as a Board Trustee of the Austin Lyric Opera.
