Experts recommend improvements in register of deeds office

By Lisa Majors-Duff

County leaders received the list of recommendations late last week from the team assembled to address chronic mistakes in the register's office, mistakes that were said by some in the legal profession to have placed the county in jeopardy of lawsuits.

Prompted by mistakes found by local attorneys and paralegals, commissioners asked Robert Hester of the N.C. Association of County Commissioners to evaluate the operations and procedures in the register's office. Hester agreed and brought with him Charles Moore, a retired internal systems consultant with the state's Land Records Management Division, and Ann Shaw, Randolph County's register of deeds.

The team met with Commission Chairman Stacy Buchanan, Register of Deeds Joe Hamilton and his staff, and a member of the Jackson County Bar Association for two days in late March. The results of those meetings were outlined in a five-page report to the board of commissioners dated April 21.

"I'm satisfied with it," Hamilton said. "It was a good report."

Some of the recommendations given in the report have already been initiated in his office, Hamilton said, including the suggestion that three proofreaders review all index entries against the originals.

"The register of deeds has many statutory duties, but recording and indexing real estate documents must be the first priority of the office," Hester wrote in his report. "Error and omissions in the permanent index can cause serious problems for the public, the county and can create liability problems for the register of deeds. The public and those charged with certifying title based on the accuracy of the records must have confidence in the integrity of real estate records."

Hester broke his recommendations down into four categories: reducing the number of misspelled names and transposed letters; indexing proper parties as "grantors" and "grantees"; corrections to the permanent index; and office personnel.

With regard to eliminating misspellings, the team recommended that the process of indexing and verification be done in an area not accessible to the public in an effort to reduce interruptions.

"The indexing process is technical in nature and requires uninterrupted concentration and strict attention to detail," Hester wrote.

The team also recommended the office staff use re-key verification software. "This procedure ensures that index rules are consistently followed and removes some of the limitations of sight verification," they said.

Manuals such as "Minimum Standards for Indexing," the N.C. Association of Registers of Deeds' "Internal Procedures Manual" and the "N.C. Guidebook for Registers of Deeds" were all listed as reference materials that can be used by the staff when determining the proper parties to index. Contacting other registers of deeds was also given as a suggestion.

"We recommend filling the vacant position as soon as possible so that more staff time can be devoted to the verification process," the team wrote under personnel and staff training.

A staff training session scheduled for May 20 and 21 in Asheville will be utilized by his employees, Hamilton said, but the recommendation that his office close for lunch "cannot be done. We'd be the only office in the building to do that."

In the concluding statement, the team wrote, "We agree that confidence in the integrity of the records is extremely important, not just for the Bar, but for the citizens of Jackson County."

The team's report will be an agenda item during the next regular commission meeting Tuesday, May 13, Chairman Buchanan said. With Hamilton, commissioners plan to go over the document "recommendation by recommendation and address what needs to be addressed."

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