814.65.Fees of the municipal court.

Municipal courts run on their own separate cost schedule under s. 814.65, apart from the circuit court fees in s. 814.61. Subsection (1) sets a court-cost fee of not less than $15 nor more than $48 on each separate matter, whatever the outcome — default of appearance, a guilty or no-contest plea, issuance of a warrant or summons, or a fully contested trial — except for a financial responsibility violation under s. 344.62 (2) or a violation of an ordinance conforming to s. 343.51 (1m) (b) or 347.48 (2m). Each month, the municipal treasurer pays $5 of every fee collected to the secretary of administration and keeps the rest for the municipality.

Witness and interpreter fees in municipal court aren’t set separately; (2) points to s. 814.67 for those. And (3) draws a clear line on attorney fees: a municipal court may not impose or collect them at all.

Taxation of costs is narrow. Under (4) (a), no fee or cost is taxable to a party in municipal court unless it’s directly chargeable to the municipality as a disbursement, such as the cost of serving process. When municipal personnel handle that service themselves, (4) (b) makes the cost — set under ss. 814.70 and 814.71, and subject to any higher fee a governing body has adopted under s. 814.705 — taxable regardless of whether the municipality separately reimburses the employee or agency who served it. Subsection (4m) then adds a blood-draw cost rule that mirrors s. 814.63 (3m)’s circuit court version: if a defendant is convicted of an OWI-related local ordinance violation and law enforcement paid or was charged for withdrawing the defendant’s blood, the municipal court must impose and collect that cost (actual or reasonably expected) and disburse it to the agency, except a court can’t charge for a free alternative test under s. 343.305 (4).

Finally, (5) sets the appeal fee: an appellant from municipal court pays the fee prescribed in s. 814.61 (8), with costs governed by s. 814.08.