Sunset Hills is looking for a new judge after longtime municipal court Judge Laird Hetlage submitted his resignation to the city in December.

Mayor Pat Fribis announced at the Dec. 11 Board of Aldermen meeting that Hetlage, who has been the city’s municipal court judge since 1995, submitted his resignation and that the city had begun the search to replace him.

Hetlage will remain the municipal court judge until the city finds a replacement.

Hetlage plans to continue his private law practice.

At the same meeting, the board also voted to raise the municipal judge’s salary, along with the city prosecutor’s salary, by 6 percent to $1,400 monthly.

The city prosecutor is City Attorney Robert E. Jones.

Former Ward 1 Alderman Frank Hardy criticized the pay raise, pointing out that in the budget the city passed earlier in the same meeting, the city’s other employees had only received an average 3-percent raise.