About the Tensas Parish Clerk of Court
Tensas Parish has only a few thousand residents, and a single clerk's office in St. Joseph handles the court record, the land records, the marriage licenses, the jury pool, and the elections for the whole parish. The Census Bureau counted 4,148 people in its 2020 base and estimated 3,844 in July 2024, spread over about 603 square miles of land.
Christina "Christy" C. Lee is the Clerk of Court, and the Louisiana Clerks of Court Association (LCCA) directory dates her tenure to July 2016. The position is created by Article V, Section 28 of the Louisiana Constitution, which calls for an elected clerk of the district court in each parish with a four-year term. That same section makes the clerk an ex officio notary public and the parish recorder, the officer who keeps conveyances, mortgages, and other acts affecting land. Louisiana's Election Code adds a further role, naming the clerk the chief election officer of the parish.
The office's own history page gives a useful sense of what is on the shelves. The legislature established Tensas Parish on March 17, 1843, from the northern part of Concordia Parish. It gained part of Madison Parish in 1861 and gave up a small area to Franklin Parish in 1870. According to the clerk, the office holds original records dating to 1843, and those records have been microfilmed. The parish is bounded by the Tensas River on the west and the Mississippi River on the east, and its three towns are St. Joseph (the seat, incorporated 1901), Waterproof (incorporated 1872), and Newellton (incorporated 1904). The name honors the Tensas, or Taensa, people.
Contact information for all 64 offices is in the Louisiana Clerks of Court directory.
Court records in Tensas Parish
The clerk's site lists separate deputy clerks for civil, criminal, and traffic work. For civil filings, the Fees and Civil Costs page lists the advance deposit for filing a petition with one service at $420.00 (viewed October 2026).
The Criminal Department handles felony and misdemeanor filings, court minutes, and criminal appeals. It also runs criminal background searches, which the clerk lists at $20.00 per name. That search covers what was filed in Tensas Parish. It is not a statewide check; the Louisiana State Police describe Louisiana as a closed record state and do not release their central criminal history file to the public.
Expungement motions are filed here too. The clerk's criminal page lists a $200.00 clerk fee and says separate money orders are owed to other agencies. Under the Code of Criminal Procedure, the clerk serves the motion on the district attorney, the State Police bureau that keeps criminal histories, and the arresting agency, and the clerk collects the processing fees when the motion is filed. With some exceptions written into the statute, the total cost to obtain an expungement order cannot exceed $550. Expungement removes a record from public access; it does not destroy it.
One detail surprises people: criminal and traffic fines are not paid to the clerk. According to the clerk's site, those payments go to the Tensas Parish Sheriff's Office, at 318-766-3954.
Remote searching is available through the clerk's Record Search portal on cotthosting.com, which covers land records and civil case records. The portal lists one day (24 hours) at $25.00, one month (30 days) at $50.00, and one year (365 days) at $600.00, each with $1.00 per printed page and card service charges of $0.30 plus 3% per transaction (October 2026). New accounts need a signed form before the office approves them. The clerk's Resources page also links eClerks LA, the statewide portal run by the clerks' remote access authority.
Statewide context is in the guides to court records and criminal records in Louisiana.
Land, mortgage, and property records
Deeds, mortgages, and cancellations for Tensas Parish land are recorded in St. Joseph. The clerk's Fees and Civil Costs page carries the recording fee schedule adopted under R.S. 13:844, effective August 1, 2017. The home page describes the oldest documents as aged and fragile and says the office is working toward digital images of the microfilmed books.
For electronic filing, the clerk's Resources page lists contact information for CSC eRecording and posts an eFiling procedures document. The site does not say which e-recording vendors the office accepts, so confirm before sending a document electronically.
The parish boundary history matters for older title work. Land that was in Concordia Parish before 1843, or in Madison Parish before 1861, may have early instruments recorded in those parishes rather than here. Today's neighbors are Concordia, Catahoula, Franklin, and Madison. For a tract near one of those lines, the Concordia Parish Clerk of Court in Vidalia, the Madison Parish Clerk of Court in Tallulah, the Franklin Parish Clerk of Court, and the Catahoula Parish Clerk of Court keep their own books. Louisiana's Civil Code puts mortgages and sales of land in the records of the parish where the land is located, so the answer depends on where the tract sits, not where the owner lives.
On the east side the parish faces four Mississippi counties across the river: Warren, Claiborne, Jefferson, and Adams. Records for land on that bank are kept in Mississippi.
The statewide property records guide walks through conveyance and mortgage books in more detail.
Marriage licenses and family records
The Tensas Parish clerk issues marriage licenses, and the office's marriage page is specific about the details (viewed October 2026). The license fee is $35.00, and the office asks that no bill larger than $20 be used. A certified copy is $5.00, and all fees are non-refundable. Only one party needs to appear, but that person must bring both parties' documents and arrive no later than 4:00 p.m.
An original or certified birth certificate is required. The clerk says the requirement can be set aside only with a no-record letter from the state registrar or a judge's order. If either person was married before, the divorce or other prior-marriage documents from another parish are accepted only when that parish's clerk faxes them directly to the Tensas office.
The license must be obtained at least 24 hours before the ceremony, which matches the statewide 24-hour waiting period. A judge or an authorized justice of the peace can waive that wait for serious and meritorious reasons. The license is valid for 30 days. After the ceremony, the officiant files the certificate copies with the issuing clerk within ten days, and the clerk sends a copy on to the state registrar.
Certified copies of Tensas marriages come from this office. The Louisiana Department of Health keeps marriage records only for licenses bought in Orleans Parish. Divorce decrees work the same way: the state does not issue them, and a certified copy comes from the clerk where the divorce was granted. The marriage records guide and divorce records guide cover the statewide rules.
Courts that serve Tensas Parish
Tensas is one of three parishes in the 6th Judicial District Court, along with Madison and East Carroll. No official website for the court was found. The clerk's Resources page links the office of the Sixth Judicial District Attorney. Each parish keeps its own clerk, so a lawsuit or criminal case filed in Tallulah or Lake Providence will not appear in the St. Joseph records. The East Carroll Parish Clerk of Court and the Madison clerk hold those files.
There is no city court in Tensas Parish; the Code of Civil Procedure's list of city courts names none here. Under the Children's Code, the district court also has original juvenile jurisdiction, as district courts do outside Caddo, Orleans, Jefferson, and East Baton Rouge.
Jury service runs through the clerk, who sits on the parish jury commission. Jurors report to the courtroom on the second floor of the courthouse. The clerk's jury page lists juror pay of $25 per day plus 16 cents per mile under R.S. 13:3049, paid by the Tensas Parish Police Jury.
Decisions of the district court are appealed to the Court of Appeal, Second Circuit in Shreveport.
Visiting the Tensas Parish courthouse
The clerk's office is in the Tensas Parish Courthouse on Courthouse Square in St. Joseph, with a street address of 201 Hancock Street. The courthouse was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in March 1979. Lake Bruin State Park, on an oxbow lake left by the Mississippi River, is close to town if you are traveling some distance.
The clerk's website lists weekday hours of 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. For marriage licenses, remember the 4:00 p.m. cutoff. The site also lists holiday closings that some visitors do not expect, including Mardi Gras, Good Friday, All Saints' Day, the day after Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve, and New Year's Eve. Check the calendar before driving in around those dates.
The home page names deputy clerks for general matters, civil, criminal, and traffic, so ask for the right department when you call. If you pay the license fee in cash, the clerk asks for bills no larger than $20, and for a records request bring names, approximate dates, and any suit or instrument number you have.
Other Tensas Parish offices
The sheriff enforces the law across the parish, keeps the jail, and collects state and parish property taxes. The Louisiana Sheriffs' Association lists Robert L. "Rob" Rushing as Sheriff of Tensas Parish. No working sheriff's website could be confirmed during research. For fines, use the number the clerk publishes for the Sheriff's Office (318-766-3954). The sheriff's offices guide covers the office's duties, and the inmate search guide explains the state's LA VINE locator.
Property values are set by the parish assessor, an office the Louisiana Constitution makes elective with a four-year term. No official Tensas Parish Assessor website was verified for this page. The assessors guide explains how assessment and the homestead exemption work.
The Tensas Parish Police Jury is the parish governing body, and the clerk's jury page notes that it pays juror fees. No official police jury website was found. See the parish government guide for how police juries are organized.