Snider sworn in as court commissioner

Attorney Jennifer K. Snider worked at the same Vancouver law firm for her entire career before she was sworn in Friday as Clark County’s newest Superior Court commissioner.

Her former law partner, Eric Johnson, of Johnson & Snider P.C., spoke fondly of the 42-year-old La Center resident at her investiture ceremony. There was standing room only at the event in Superior Court Judge Barbara Johnson’s courtroom.

“It’s like giving a daughter away at her wedding …” Eric Johnson said. “She’ll be a wonderful addition to the bench.”

He jokingly warned that the new commissioner “hates procrastination” and is concise in her communication skills.

She was appointed, out of a pool of 16 candidates, in June by the county’s 10 Superior Court judges.

“It’s an honor to be selected out of that pool,” she said Friday.

The position she fills had been vacant since September 2008, when Commissioner Daniel Stahnke became a Superior Court judge. It wasn’t filled until now because of the county’s budget shortfall.

Snider begins her commissioner duties on Monday, earning an annual salary of $133,949. She will preside largely over juvenile and family law cases, an area of the law she commonly practiced at her firm.

Snider graduated in 1996 from Gonzaga University School of Law in Spokane and joined Eric Johnson and Bill Reed in their practice later that year. She and her husband, Todd, have three children: Nathan, 14, Dana, 11, and Ty, 10.

Her firm won one of Clark County’s largest personal injury judgements in May 1999 for a Brush Prairie construction worker, Antone P. Fettig, who was injured when a wall fell on him, according The Columbian’s archives.

Paris Achen: 360-735-4551; http://twitter.com/Col_Courts; http://facebook.com/ColTrends; paris.achen@columbian.com

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