When Berks County voters elected Eric J. Taylor to a county judgeship in a hard\u2011fought race last year, they may have triggered a ripple effect that could eliminate the magisterial district court he previously led.<\/p>\n
Taylor had served as district judge for Magisterial District 23\u20112\u201102 \u2014 covering West Reading and Wyomissing \u2014 since 2018. He resigned at the end of December, weeks after winning the general election, to assume his new role on the county bench.<\/p>\n
The district judge seat has remained vacant, with a senior judge handling criminal and civil cases in the West Reading courtroom.<\/p>\n
The vacancy has opened the door for a potential restructuring.<\/p>\n
In a May 7 notice, District Court Administrator Brendan L. Harker outlined a proposal to eliminate District 23\u20112\u201102 as part of a redistricting plan. Although magisterial district boundaries are typically reviewed after each decennial census, the notice said \u201ccircumstances can arise that prompt a review out of the normal sequence,\u201d and the recent vacancy created an opportunity to rebalance caseloads.<\/p>\n
The county\u2019s last redistricting, completed in 2022, did not eliminate any offices. Under the new proposal \u2014 which requires approval from the Pennsylvania Supreme Court \u2014 two of the county\u2019s 17 districts would be realigned.<\/p>\n
District 23\u20112\u201101, which covers Reading\u2019s 1st, 4th, 5th and 18th wards, would absorb West Reading. Judge Priscilla Campos, nearing the end of a six\u2011year term, presides over that district.<\/p>\n
District 23\u20112\u201104, representing Cumru Township and the boroughs of Kenhorst, Mohnton and Shillington, would absorb Wyomissing. Judge David Yoch has held that seat since 2014.<\/p>\n
Caseload data provided by Special Courts Administration shows the impact.<\/p>\n
Campos\u2019 district averaged 2,157 filings annually from 2022 through 2025 \u2014 well below the 17\u2011district average of 4,390. Adding West Reading would raise her caseload to about 5,500 filings a year, making it the fifth\u2011busiest district.<\/p>\n
Yoch\u2019s district would climb from the 11th\u2011busiest to the third\u2011busiest, with an estimated 6,100 annual filings after adding Wyomissing.<\/p>\n
Campos, in a recent interview, said she welcomes the possibility of serving West Reading if she wins a second term and plans to knock on doors there ahead of the election to introduce herself to borough residents and ask for their vote.<\/p>\n
She emphasized that she had no role in shaping the proposal but believes the vacancy makes this an appropriate moment for consolidation. She said it\u2019s her understanding that no staff positions would be cut.<\/p>\n
Yoch, whose courtroom is in the Berks County South campus building in Mohnton, declined to comment.<\/p>\n
The proposed realignment is posted on the Court Administration <\/a>section of the county website. Public comments may be submitted to Specialcourtsadmin@berkspa.gov<\/a>.<\/p>\n Berks President Judge M. Theresa Johnson plans to forward the proposal to the state Supreme Court next week.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When Berks County voters elected Eric J. Taylor to a county judgeship in a hard\u2011fought race last year,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":211471,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[349,46,6512,182,139,28,736,128,130,129,706,707,133],"class_list":["post-211470","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-reading","tag-berks-county","tag-courts","tag-cumru-township","tag-local-news","tag-news","tag-pennsylvania","tag-reading","tag-reading-city","tag-reading-city-headlines","tag-reading-city-news","tag-top-stories-reg","tag-west-reading","tag-wyomissing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/211470","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=211470"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/211470\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/211471"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=211470"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=211470"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=211470"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}