Lynette Feucht concluding 30 years on city court bench

The times, to borrow a phrase, they were a-changin’ when Lynette Young headed off to law school.
They still are, as Eunice City Judge Lynette Young Feucht prepares to retire from the bench after 30 years’ service.
“When I told my Daddy while I was in high school that I thought I’d like to be a lawyer, he scoffed. ‘Only screwball women are lawyers,’” she recalls him saying.
Some background -- Daddy was Judge Nilas Young, the city’s first and only judge to that point. By the time his daughter was ready for college, he had changed his mind and she went off to pursue that goal with his blessings.
Fast forward a few years -- the newly bar-admitted attorney returns with sheepskins and shingle in hands to begin a practice, at the time the only practicing female attorney in St. Landry Parish.
Encouraged to run when her father decided to retire, she wasn’t at first interested, but as she thought about it decided the worst thing that could happen would be losing the election, and at age 32 that wasn’t that big a deal, she recalls.
She became the city’s second judge, and was one of only two female City Court judges in the state.
Five six-year terms later, she still has an obvious zeal for the job and the twinkle in her eye that probably doesn’t go away unless you are in front of her in court.
“I have enjoyed every minute of it,” she said during a brief break in the stream of visitors in her City Hall office recently, including Judge-elect Terry Hoychick, who will the third city judge and the first not of the Young family.
Judge Feucht, a member of the Louisiana Judicial College, which sets policies, continuing education requirements and the like for the judicial system, says she’s not tired or weary, but wonders what else might be ahead of her.
The judge says she’ll continue her private practice, travel (she and husband Charles have Australia and the wine country of France on their short-term schedule, as well as a trip to Disneyworld with four grandchildren.)
“I’m Lolli, and he’s Pop” and they keep us busy,” she said, noting that the fifth addition is on the way.
Feucht took office just as the oil patch economy took a nose dive in the 1980’s, a circumstance that required management skills that have nothing to do with interpreting the law.
“We righted the ship, and never had to seek a nickel from other agencies,” she noted, adding she leaves her successor a debt-free operation with a bit of a surplus, though dollars “are always an issue.”
She’s also clearing as much of the docket as possible to prepare for the transition. The court’s 4,000 or so cases in an average year are about 90 percent criminal, from traffic to misdemeanor offienes to juvenile matters.
Juvenile court is a particularly worrisome facet of the court’s operation and was a recurring theme of the four candidates seeking Feucht’s post.
She notes the number of juvenile-offense cases hasn’t changed significantly over the years. “But the dynamics have changed,” she said, referring to such things as parental supervision, or lack of it; parental concern, or lack of it; and the like.
Observing City Court and developing a familiarity with the judge’s schedule, one is reminded of the Peanuts character Lucy.
Sometimes her appointments are not looking to resolve a legal matter, but instead are looking for direction in dealing with one problem or another, and the wall sign revolves -- judge, psychiatrist, counselor, accountant, politician, but most of all Eunician, through and through.