Nathan Deal Judicial Center, Atlanta. (Photo: John Disney/ALM)

A few surprises happened on the way to starting up Georgia's new statewide business court.

A pandemic. A judicial emergency. A financial crisis. Budget cuts.

Still, the court is on track to open as planned on the first business day in August, according to its judge and—at the moment—sole employee, former Jones Day partner Walt Davis. It just won't be a physical door opening. The court will be based in the expansion space on the third floor of the new Nathan Deal Judicial Center. But the work—whatever that turns out to be—will start more in the clouds, electronically speaking.

"Our e-filing system is ready to go live. Our case management system is ready to go live. We're ready technically," Davis said Thursday. "We're going to be 99% electronic, anyway."

With a continuing judicial emergency brought on by COVID-19, Davis said he would not put litigants or other courts at risk by holding in-person hearings or other gatherings.

Davis said he believes it's possible the business court could prove to be a convenient alternative to the backlog that other courts will face as a result of the pandemic and the shutdown of nonessential functions.

"I've got a clear docket. Those cases have a better path toward resolution," Davis said. "We were built for videoconferencing, built for the Zoom world."

Judge Walt Davis, Business Court for the State of Georgia. (Photo: John Disney/ALM)

Davis was the one who built it. Literally the one — although he acknowledges he found lots of help for free. State revenue declines and budget-cutting started even before the declaration of the pandemic and national health emergency in early March. Davis said he managed budget cuts by delaying the hiring of his staff.

"I'm sitting here in 4,000 square feet by myself," Davis said. "It's a big empty building." That is the 225,000-square-foot home of the Georgia Supreme Court and Court of Appeals, which opened in January.

Construction is underway on the courtroom and offices for the employees to come—legal assistants, staff attorneys and clerk. Davis said he has worked remotely some during the pandemic. Mostly he has been going to work solo. He said his days have covered "everything from putting on a hard hat and working with construction teams to sitting down and buying office supplies for my staff."

Davis stepped into a category by himself when Gov. Brian Kemp appointed him to the job just more than a year ago. The House and Senate judiciary committees confirmed him last August. He is the first judge of any state court—trial or appellate—who doesn't have to run for election. He's also the only judge appointed by a governor in recent memory not to go through the Judicial Nominating Commission vetting process. That's because his job was uniquely created.

The legislation that established the court provides for the governor to appoint a judge and a clerk for the business court, both subject to approval by the Legislature's judiciary committees. The judge is empowered to appoint staff attorneys and legal assistants for the court. But delaying those hires was a simple way to make up for the pandemic-related cuts to the court's budget, which now stands at about $1.4 million for the current fiscal year. Davis said that figure is about 11% lower than planned. He said he also trimmed his construction budget from about $1.4 million to just less than $1 million. That's inside the new $131 million building.

The business court's venue is to be Atlanta, Macon or other locations as deemed appropriate. Long before the pandemic, the court was designed for work to be done remotely through video and internet support.

The constitutional amendment question voters approved in 2018 was: "Shall the Constitution of Georgia be amended so as to create a state-wide business court, authorize superior court business court divisions, and allow for the appointment process for state-wide business court judges in order to lower costs, improve the efficiency of all courts, and promote predictability of judicial outcomes in certain complex business disputes for the benefit of all citizens of this state?"

The enabling legislation does not preclude a superior court from creating or continuing its own business court division. The new court's jurisdiction will be limited to claims greater than $500,000—except for commercial real estate, for which the floor will be $1 million. Davis started work full-time launching the court in January, leaving his job as administrative partner for the Atlanta office of Jones Day. He had been with the firm for 17 years, handling complex business litigation focused on corporate governance, fiduciary duty, securities fraud and shareholder disputes. He is a 1998 graduate of Mercer University in Macon and a 2001 graduate of Vanderbilt University Law School in Nashville. He clerked for Judge Beverly Martin in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia before he moved on to Jones Day (and before she moved on to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit).

Davis said he called on friends and colleagues for advice in designing the business court. He found support in the current staff at the appellate courts and the Administrative Office of the Courts. He recruited eight lawyers to serve on an inaugural rules commission, including big firm business litigators, smaller firm partners, a law professor and a judge. Davis said his list of thank yous covers "many people working behind the scenes, and in every branch of government."

He also took inspiration from the Delaware Court of Chancery, where he has tried cases as a business litigator. And he traveled around the state speaking to bar associations about the new court—that is, before the pandemic.

Ultimately, it will be a business litigator's choice whether to file in the new Georgia Statewide Business Court. Davis expects the first case to be stamped on the Monday the court officially opens, Aug. 3. But he doesn't know what that will be—or even if, though he wouldn't like to say it.

He diffused a question based on a line from a Carl Sandburg poem misquoted in peace activist writings of the 1960s: "Sometime they'll give a war and nobody will come."

Davis said he's thinking more about "Field of Dreams," the baseball fantasy movie from the 1980s whose star, Kevin Costner, is rewarded for turning his farm into a venue for the greatest players of all time.

Quoting the movie's theme line, the new judge said, "If you build it, they will come."