This story was produced by the Berks County bureau of Spotlight PA, an independent, nonpartisan newsroom. Sign up for Good Day, Berks, a daily dose of essential local stories at spotlightpa.org/newsletters/gooddayberks.
READING — Berks County’s online civil court records system has been broken for more than a month, meaning the public can’t remotely access documents related to divorces, liens, and more.
Spotlight PA identified the issue June 16 when attempting to search court records, and was unable to find any public notice or release informing people that the site was nonfunctional.
County officials told the news outlet a new system is coming Aug. 3.
Berks County Prothonotary Jonathan Del Collo said he doesn’t know why the current site crashed, but IT knows it’s inaccessible. Attorneys have electronic filing access necessary for day-to-day administration, Del Collo said.
Del Collo is replacing the server-based online system, originally developed by the county IT department more than a decade ago, with a new cloud-based platform from an outside vendor. The vendor, Paperless Solutions, operates prothonotary systems in other Pennsylvania counties.
The change won’t cost the office extra money, Del Collo said, as revenue from the e-filings that was previously meant to go to upkeep will go toward operator payments.
Members of the public looking to access the civil court dockets can do so at the prothonotary’s office in downtown Reading.
Berks County Chief Operating Officer Kevin Barnhardt told Spotlight PA that the county became aware of the issue June 8. He said that the county would benefit from the new system by having “less infrastructure, development time.”
Del Collo started looking for a new case management system around 2021 when the current system “was beginning to fail,” he said. He decided on Paperless Solutions in 2024 and signed the contract in September 2025, which he believes lasts five years.
The new site was meant to go live on April 1, then July 1, but Del Collo said the county IT department was not ready to transfer data. None of the delays have been the fault of the new vendor, he said.
Barnhardt said in an email that the delays can stem from data conversion, user requests, and new reports.
“Most software implementations have fluid go-live dates,” Barnhardt said.
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