At the State, Circuit and District judges conference, St. Clair County Presiding Circuit Judge Phil Seay was elected president of the Alabama Circuit Judges Association.

He previously served as the vice president of the association, president of the Alabama Juvenile Judges Association and president of the Alabama Drug Court Association.

“I’ve always been involved in the circuit Judges Association, and I was asked to consider becoming an officer and I did, and then the natural progression is to the presidency,” said Seay.

Seay said he is looking forward to the challenge.

Seay served on the board of directors for 10 years. Has also served on the education committee and has been a speaker at some of the association events.

He has served 12 years as a circuit judge and seven as a district judge.

He is currently the presiding judge of the 30th judicial circuit, meaning he oversees drug court, veteran’s court, civil and criminal juries, manages the juries and civil cases with the amount in controversy is more than $25,000.

Currently he has four capital murder cases pending.

As the president of the association, he will work with the association makes statutory appointments each year for judicial positions. He said he will also form policies.

“We help form policy, any policies that need to be executed for the judiciary. We follow legislation that would affect judges such as legislation that occasionally is aimed at reducing the discretion a judge may have. We certainly pay close attention to those type of legislative issues,” said Seay.

He said he is most looking forward to forming judgeships because the state of Alabama is severely lacking in judges.