With collections of fines due in Warren County Justice Court on pace to slide for the fifth straight year, officials said a work program is a last resort to drum up timely payments.

The county took in $169,518 through April and is on pace to collect about $290,000 for fiscal 2012, County Administrator John Smith said. If that prediction holds, it’ll be down about $7,000 from last year and more than 15 percent less than five years ago.

Ideas during that time to spur more people found guilty of misdemeanors and traffic offenses to pony up fees have ranged from jail time to aggressive phone calls from debt collectors. The next step, officials said, is to send the offenders to the Road Department to pick up litter and earn money to credit their fee balance in court.

A formal policy is being drawn up this week to implement such a program at a judge’s discretion and could be presented to the Board of Supervisors on Monday, board attorney Marcie Southerland said.

The likeliest scenario for defendants to don a yellow or orange vest alongside a county road and chip away at their fines at $7.25 an hour, the federal minimum wage, is when a defendant owes significant amounts, Northern District Justice Court Judge Eddie Woods said. Woods and the court’s southern and central district judges, Jeff Crevitt and James Jefferson Jr., broached the topic with county supervisors Monday, who appeared ready to start the program.

“Undoubtedly, there are some people who cannot pay a fine,” Woods said. “I hear ‘I forgot’ a lot. I always say, ‘Well, let me see if I can refresh your memory.’ But, sometimes, after one phone call, then suddenly they have $100 to come up with the fine.”

A work program would mimic similar arrangements in other localities. In November 2009, a community service program was put into place in the City of Vicksburg to work off fines where people pick up litter or clean buildings. Such a program in justice court, which handles cases outside the city, essentially would be run by the Road Department manager, since the sheriff’s oversight is necessary only for programs involving state inmates.

Payment plans have been mildly effective at best as collections have decreased, the judges said. Misdemeanor fines paid to county coffers make up the final bits of the total amount paid by defendants, after constables and assessments to the state.

In February 2009, the county hired Receivable Solutions Specialists, a Natchez collections agency, to round up past due fines from two years’ worth of cases in justice court and old garbage fees. By March 2010, the county had cut ties with the company after its efforts showed a 4 percent collection rate from more than $662,000 in outstanding misdemeanor fines and traffic offenses.