One of the main differences between Houston and Harris County is that the city can generally do what it wants to do while the county had to get a law passed to do the same thing. When the city of Houston began enforcing stricter regulations on topless clubs and massage parlors, officials saw complaints against [...]
Posts Tagged ‘Harris County Sheriff’
Report recommends against privatizing the Harris County jail
Very good news. Privatizing the Harris County jail would be risky and may not result in savings, according to an internal county memo recommending that Commissioners Court keep the state’s largest lockup in Sheriff Adrian Garcia’s hands. The confidential Feb. 11 memo, obtained by the Houston Chronicle, comes after more than a year of study [...]
Murder by numbers continued
There are two ways to look at this. Houston averaged slightly more than four murders a week during 2012, unofficial figures indicate, inching up from 2011 when the total dropped to the lowest point since 1966. In unincorporated Harris County, an early total suggests a three-year decline in murders may continue. Houston police reported 216 [...]
Jail privatization update
Grits, from about two weeks ago: In a conference call last week with investors (see the transcript), Corrections Corporation of America said it expects to find out by next spring whether they will receive a contract to operate the Harris County Jail. Said President and CEO David Hininger: The final update I wanted to give [...]
What I’ll be looking for tonight
Just a reminder that I’ll be on KPFT tonight starting at 7 PM to talk about the elections. Here’s a preview of the things I’ll be looking for: 1. SD10 – Sen. Wendy Davis vs Mark Shelton: Easily the most important race on the ballot in Texas. Davis has been a progressive champion and a [...]
Strip club cash in the Sheriff’s race
The waning days of a campaign always have the greatest potential for hijinx. A $25,000 political contribution from the owner of a strip club being sued by Harris County lawyers found its way, via the Harris County Deputies Organization, into the campaign coffers of the man challenging Sheriff Adrian Garcia in November, according to campaign [...]
All the interviews for 2012
As we begin early voting for the November election, here are all the interviews I conducted for candidates who are on the ballot as well as for the referenda. These include interviews that were done for the primary as well as the ones done after the primary. I hope you found them useful. Senate: Paul [...]
30 Day finance reports, Harris County candidates
Here’s a look at the 30 day campaign finance reports for Harris County candidates. All reports can be found by going to the Harris County Clerk campaign finance reports page. Candidate Office Raised Spent Loans Cash ========================================================== Garcia Sheriff 192,670 120,957 0 388,197 Guthrie Sheriff 158,700 48,633 171,000 98,152 Alessi Sheriff 1,019 2,007 700 1,719 [...]
Endorsement watch: The other easy call
The Chron makes a ringing endorsement of Sheriff Adrian Garcia for re-election. In the 2008 elections, Adrian Garcia received more votes than any other candidate in Harris County. His record in office merits a similar outcome in 2012. With Garcia as sheriff, a $56 million budget overrun has become a $3 million surplus, overcrowded jails [...]
The Sheriff’s Crisis Intervention team
It’s a really good idea. Crisis intervention teams, tagged to respond to calls involving mentally disturbed subjects, reflect a new wave of law enforcement thinking pioneered by the Memphis, Tenn., Police Department in the 1980s. Such efforts have received renewed attention after a Houston police officer last week fatally shot a mentally ill double-amputee who [...]
Fall interview season begins tomorrow
I know that we just finished the primary runoffs, but we’re also now more than halfway through August, so it’s time to start doing interviews with candidates for the fall. I’ll be up candid, I don’t know exactly how many interviews I plan to do. For the most part, I don’t anticipate re-interviewing candidates that [...]
July campaign finance reports for Harris County candidates
You know the drill by now. Office Candidate Raised Spent Cash Loans ============================================================ Sheriff A Garcia 47,025 41,900 357,818 0 Sheriff L Guthrie 70,176 75,646 33,075 157,000 Sheriff C Pittman 11,309 11,566 5,217 24,000 DA M Anderson 73,888 60,980 33,371 0 DA L Oliver 0 150 0 0 County Atty V Ryan 56,571 33,047 145,606 [...]
Democratic results, Harris County
The good: – Lane Lewis won a full term as HCDP Chair by a 55-45 margin. If you heard a whizzing noise this evening, it was the bullet we all dodged in this race. – Sheriff Adrian Garcia easily won renomination with over 70% of the vote. – State Reps. Garnet Coleman and Borris Miles [...]
Recap of all my interviews so far this cycle
To say the least, there was a lot of uncertainty at the beginning of the year when I was planning out my interview schedule for the primary election. There were no maps for the State House, State Senate, and Congress. We didn’t know if the primary would take place in April, May, June, or later, [...]
30 day financial reports, Harris County offices
Candidates for county offices who are in contested primaries are also required to submit 30 day campaign finance reports. I’ve been going through the County Clerk’s campaign finance reports page to collect what’s there; ones for Democratic races are on the 2012 Primary page. Since I whined so piteously last time about how sucky the [...]
Endorsement watch: Sheriffs
The Chron endorses Sheriff Adrian Garcia for renomination. When the incumbent took over four years ago, he faced a particularly daunting job. The sheriff’s office had been plagued by a series of controversies ranging from federal investigation of prisoner deaths in Harris County jails to legal battles about unjustified arrests. Newly elected Sheriff Adrian Garcia [...]
The Sheriff’s office is hiring
Good. Harris County Sheriff Adrian Garcia says by balancing his department’s $392 million budget, he’ll be able to transfer 100 deputies from jail duties to crime-fighting jobs in the next year while hiring hundreds of new civilian jailers. During a news conference Monday, Garcia said when he took office in January 2009 the department was [...]
Interview with Sheriff Adrian Garcia
Harris County Sheriff Adrian Garcia was elected in 2008 with the highest vote total of any candidate on the ballot. He inherited an office that was tainted by the scandals of his long-term predecessor, a jail system that was overcrowded, understaffed, unsafe, unsanitary, and under the spotlight of federal and state inspectors, a hiring freeze [...]
More on disciplining deputies
Here’s another long Chron story about disciplinary statistics for Harris County Sheriff’s deputies. Reading through it, I felt like there was some context missing. A Houston Chronicle review of disciplinary records indicates that from 2008 through 2010, more than 200 jail employees were disciplined for various offenses, some serious and others minor. Last year, the [...]
January finance reports: Harris County
January is a very busy month for campaign finance reports, since they are due for all levels of government. I’ve been busy updating the 2012 Primary Election pages for Harris County and elsewhere in Texas with reports as I can find them. Here’s an overview of some races of interest in Harris County. I’ll have [...]
A better way for law enforcement to deal with the mentally ill
Good. Three Harris County Sheriff’s deputies will have new partners riding shotgun soon, if county officials approve a pilot program pairing them with mental health workers to deal with mentally disturbed suspects. Sheriff Adrian Garcia said he wants to treat the mentally ill, not jail them. “This will help keep those in crisis from becoming [...]
Harris County braces for state budget cuts
More joy to look forward to. Proposed state budget cuts could cost Harris County government nearly $50 million a year, according to a legislative analyst’s rough estimates, rolling back or eliminating state allowances for dozens of programs that include mental health services, auto theft prevention, alternatives to jail and a school for juvenile offenders. The [...]
Ankle monitors
Also on the Commissioners Court agenda this week, Harris County will take another small step towards reducing its jail population by experimenting with ankle monitors for low-risk inmates. Commissioners Court granted Sheriff Adrian Garcia permission Tuesday to do a trial run on 10 to 20 inmates who work outside the jail under armed guard. If [...]
On county jails and treating mental illness
There’s really only one thing that needs to be said about this op-ed, which was co-written by Harris County Sheriff Adrian Garcia and HPD Chief Charles McClelland. Texas ranks 49th in the nation in per capita spending on mental health services. Only 25 percent of children and 18 percent of adults with severe mental illness [...]
Loren Jackson signs on with Sheriff’s office
Great news. District Clerk Loren Jackson, who was defeated by Republican Chris Daniel last month, will likely stay in county government when his term expires on Dec. 31. Sheriff Adrian Garcia proposes hiring him as his chief of information technology. Jackson is not named on the Commissioners Court agenda, but he is “the special assistant” [...]
Grits on the CCSI
Scott Henson got the same information I did about the HPD “Chronic Consumer Stabilization Initiative” pilot program, and as always his take is worth reading. In that post, he pointed to this Malcolm Gladwell article that puts this initiative into a larger context, and which is also well worth your time. Also, he got a [...]
New “booking center” proposed
As we know, Sheriff Garcia has been trying to rework the jail bond referendum that failed in 2007 into something that can be passed. On Tuesday, Commissioners Court will have a look at the new proposal, which calls for a 1200-inmate “booking center” that’s being touted as a gateway into and out of the jail [...]
Not everybody isn’t hiring, Part Deux
Bad economic times are good times for Texas prisons to fill their vacancies. Texas has just 1,262 correctional officer jobs now open, compared with more than 3,700 openings just over a year ago. Officials say more people have become guards because of pay incentives and the struggling economy. “It’s the economy. No doubt about it,” [...]
Garcia talks recruitment again
New Sheriff Adrian Garcia echoes a theme he sounded at his swearing-in about hiring more deputies to increase patrols. Garcia promised to put more “boots on the ground” in his inaugural address Sunday, saying about 800 deputies now patrol an area that would be the seventh-largest U.S. city. The county’s new top lawman declined to [...]
Sheriff Garcia asks for more recruits
Yes, Sheriff Adrian Garcia. Not Sheriff-elect any more, as he’s been officially sworn in now, and a new era is underway. Harris County needs more “boots on the ground” to arrest criminals, prevent crime and help residents of its far-flung neighborhoods feel safer, newly elected Sheriff Adrian Garcia said Sunday. In an inaugural address to [...]