Harris County Commissioners Court this week approved a package of public safety measures to support state legislation to create additional district courts, expand the county’s holistic assistance response team program and look at enlarging the public defender’s office.
The measures are aimed at ongoing efforts to reduce the ongoing backlog in the county’s criminal courts system and relieve persistent jail overcrowding. The public defender’s office, for example, currently has capacity to handle fewer than 20 percent of indigent criminal defense cases, leaving the rest to court-appointed private attorneys, who last year earned more than $60 million in fees while, in many cases, taking on caseloads that exceeded state-recommended limits, a recent Houston Chronicle investigation revealed.
The resolution in support of the Texas Legislature creating six additional courts in Harris County passed by a 4-0 vote, with County Judge Lina Hidalgo abstaining, citing fiscal concerns. Hidalgo said that while she was in favor of adding more courts she would only support the measure if it required the state to cover the cost of maintaining additional courts, which comes out to an estimated $17 million per year.
“We don’t have the money for it and somebody needs to call it like it is. I will call it like it is. We cannot afford this,” Hidalgo said, adding that the county would be in a position to cover the cost had two Republican commissioners not forced the county to adopt a lower tax rate last fall.
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Another measure passed by the court Tuesday directed county departments — including Harris County Public Health, the Office of County Administration and the Office of Management and Budget — to develop a plan to expand the county’s Holistic Assistance Response Team, or HART program, in which mental health and social work professionals respond to certain types of emergency calls instead of law enforcement officers. The fledgling program in a section of north Harris County, has responded to more than 1,900 calls since beginning operations last March, according to the county.
Handled incorrectly, police responses can turn deadly; according to a 2015 report from the Treatment Advocacy Center, a nonprofit that promotes access to mental health care, people with untreated mental illness are 17 times more likely to be shot dead by police.
Sheriff Ed Gonzalez told the court Tuesday that his deputies have found the program effective.
“Our busiest area was in north Harris County off the 1960 corridor. We did some holistic approaches out there that balance community outreach with enforcement and the procedural justice way. We were able to turn that area, during that pilot program, from the busiest area down to number three. And so it works,” Gonzalez said.
The measure approved by the commissioners would expand the HART program into Harris County Precinct 4.
On a motion by Precinct 4 Commissioner Lesley Briones, the court also requested the county work on a plan to expand the public defender’s office. The proposal approved by the court would save the county money by having up to 50 percent of indigent defense cases handled by the public defender’s office rather than the more highly paid private attorneys, Briones said. One of those attorneys earned $1 million last year, handing 399 felony cases and 207 misdemeanors.
See here, here, and here for the background. I agree with trying to get more courts, and I definitely approve of expanding the Public Defender Office; the story notes some issues with each, which you can read for yourself. I don’t know how I missed the Holistic Assistance Response Team (HART) story – okay, I do know, it was published last October 13, when I was fully encumbered with Election Brain – but it’s a great idea and seems to be catching on. It was also opposed by The Loser Alexandra Mealer (insert rude hand gesture here), so yay us for avoiding that mistake. Just, please, make sure that HART is an item in the Sheriff’s budget so that we don’t run into any further “defunding” bullshit. Anyway, kudos all around for this.