Coram seeks Register of Deeds Office
By From staff reports
Published in News on April 2, 2012 1:46 PM
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Constance Corum
Democrat Constance Coram is trying for the second time to unseat incumbent Lois Mooring in the race for Wayne County Register of Deeds.
Beaten 2-to-1 four years ago, Mrs. Coram said she learned much from her first venture into politics and says she hopes to win the job in May.
Both candidates are Democrats and there is no Republican running for the position.
Mrs. Coram is a former employee of the Register of Deeds Office and said her experience will help her "take the office to a new level."
"Customer service has always been a primary focus of mine and what better place for it," she said at a campaign fundraiser last week. "Every important piece of documentation you will ever need comes through the Register of Deeds office."
Mrs. Coram, a Wayne County native who has worked as a legal assistant for both the Ohio Bar Association and the New York Attorney General's Office, said if elected she would like to see more modernization of record-keeping in the office, which keeps files of births, deaths, wills, deeds and other legal transactions.
She said that even after she stopped working for the office in 2007 that people continued to call her and ask questions about how to navigate the records.
"I know the ins and outs of the register's office," she said.
More people than ever are using the office to do research into their family history and she said she would like to see the office better prepared to help those people trying to trace their genealogy. Volunteers interested in helping people track their family trees also could be a big help in the office, she said, adding that she would work to get those people interested in genealogy to give their time.
She also would work to make the office's webpage more user friendly and investigate ways to link the information from the office with that of other offices to give people easier access.
Mrs. Coram said she has looked into how other counties have integrated their register of deeds information with other county and state offices to make it easier for residents to look up information. She would like to see that happen in Wayne County as well, she said.
A graduate of East High School in Buffalo, N.Y., she attended Erie Community College and the Bryan and Stratton Business Institute as well as Wayne Community College.
"I am well qualified, determined, committed and ready to make some positive changes in the Register of Deeds Office," she said.
Mrs. Coram currently serves as vice chairman of the city of Goldsboro's Appearance Commission and has been a member of the Parent's Association for School Street School.
Mrs. Coram said she would work to upgrade the electronic record-keeping system in the register of deeds office to make record-searching faster.
She said some forms that people have to fill out when they come to the office at the courthouse can be put online to speed up the process "so you're ready when you come to the office."
She mentioned working with the Postal Service to make it easier for people to obtain passports, which would be especially helpful in a county filled with residents who are in the military or are former military.
Mrs. Coram also said she would work to improve disaster planning for the office to safeguard the records kept there.
"I'd like to develop a disaster plan for the office," she said, "with each employee prepared to safeguard those documents. We hold the history of the county in that office."