The Office of Administrative Hearings has added a new satellite office in Onslow County to better handle cases in Eastern North Carolina. The expansion was funded by the state budget. Chief Administrative Law Judge Donald van der Vaart gave an update last week to a legislative oversight committee. He said most of his office’s administrative law judges are based in Raleigh, and they have to travel and set up venues to hear cases outside the capital. The new Jacksonville office has its own administrative law judge, Samuel Morris, a former clerk to Supreme Court Justice Paul Newby. So far, he’s handled 35 cases there. “This is going to make it very much easier to hold hearings in that part of the state,” van der Vaart told lawmakers. |