>> BALDWIN COUNTY SUPERIOR COURT
Mitch Longino officially retired as Baldwin County Superior Court Clerk at the end of 2023, and he was honored with a reception in late December.
Approximately 30 friends and colleagues showed up at the courthouse to wish Longino well in his retirement, and he expressed his appreciation to all who had helped him over the years.
“I’m gone but I hope not forgotten,” he said in his closing remarks. “I’ll be around if anybody needs anything.”
Longino has said he does expect to find some endeavor to occupy his time in the future, but he is not prepared to say what that might be.
“I haven’t thought that far in advance. My wife and I are going to take a little trip to Maine and after that take a few weeks off,” he said. “Think about what I want to do, maybe find something part-time.”
Longino started in the office in 1994 in the old courthouse across Wilkinson Street, working there two years until the existing courthouse opened in 1996. He was appointed to chief deputy clerk before former long-time Clerk Rosemary Fordham Phillips announced her retirement and appointed him clerk in 2016. He was elected to the position that year and re-elected in 2020.
He said he will miss his job. “I’ve always been a public servant,” he said. “That’s what I always wanted to do. Rosemary gave me the opportunity to get into this. I walked in the door, fell in love with it, and wanted to do it ever since.”
Longino appointed Wanda Paul as chief deputy clerk in mid-2023 and named her interim clerk when he announced his retirement. She was sworn in as the new clerk earlier in December.
“She was there when I started,” he recalled. “She had been there since she was 18 years old.”
Paul was chief deputy clerk when she left to take a job with a software company that worked with Georgia court offices.
“She came back full circle and started working at the assessor’s office, I was talking to her and told her ‘if you ever want to come home, you’re welcome’. She agreed and came back to the office.
“I feel so good, pleased and excited that she’s taking over for me because I know she’s going to do a wonderful job.”
Longino was only 24 when he went to work in the clerk’s office.
“I’ve never had another adult job but this. I had some other part-time jobs, but this is the first fulltime job I had, and I have been here ever since.”
Might this be his only full-time job ever?
“More than likely,” Longino replied with a laugh. “I don’t know; that’s something my wife and I have to talk about.
I guess,” he added with a smile, “it depends on how much she wants me around the house.”