After months of dysfunction, the Adams County Justice Court system appears to be doling out a bit of justice for fine-dodgers.

Thanks to Judge Charlie Vess, who kept bringing up the nearly $4 million in unpaid fines on the court’s books, something is finally being done about the hundreds and hundreds of people who owe the county taxpayers.

The matter got a bit ugly at one point when Vess and Justice Court Clerk Audrey Bailey had a few choice words over the matter, ultimately ending with county supervisors stepping in and outlining a policy on how the court system should handle the collections process.

Although the few thousand dollars collected over the last two months is merely a drop in the bucket of what is owed, that few thousand dollars is important for two reasons.

First, any penny owed to the taxpayers needs to be aggressively collected.

Second, the mere fact that the court system is now working collections vigorously almost certainly will encourage others who are fined to pay up before the law comes after them.

At the end of the day, we offer a thank you for the work done to date and an encouragement to all justice court officials to keep up the good work on behalf of Adams County taxpayers.