Bar mails merit retention survey.

Supreme Court Justice Raoul G. Cantero III and Justice Kenneth B. Bell lead the list of 24 appellate judges who will be on the merit retention ballot this fall.

It will be the first time either justice has appeared on the merit retention ballot. Justice Cantero joined the court in the fall of 2002, Justice Bell in early 2003.

Voters will be asked whether the justices and the DCA judges should be retained for six-year terms.

The Florida Bar will poll the membership about the judges and justices standing for merit retention this year, as it has in the past, to assist the public with the merit retention process. (Biographical information on the jurists can be found at www.flabar.org.) Ballots are scheduled to be mailed August 27.

They must be returned to the Bar post-marked no later than September 17. The results will be published in the News.

Since voters approved merit selection and retention for the appellate judiciary in 1976, no judge or justice has lost a merit retention election.

DCA judges on the merit retention ballot...