Harris County officials on Thursday said they fear new state legislation and gaps in the county’s budget could hinder their strides to significantly reduce the population of the Harris County Jail — which has dipped about 14% since January.
They’re crediting the use of emergency court dockets for a dwindling jail population this year. The approach is called emerging issues dockets — a retooled version of post-COVID era emergency dockets, which were used to address an inflated court case backlog.
Though the first iteration of the fast-tracked case schedules were funded through the federal American Rescue Plan Act, emerging issues dockets were moved into the county’s general fund this fiscal year.
Tonya Mills, Harris County’s managing director of justice innovation, touted faster case dispositions during a quarterly update on the jail’s population during Thursday’s commissioners court meeting. She said the county identified a large swath of defendants who had been in jail long enough that their cases should’ve been adjudicated, and officials implemented a stronger focus on getting specific low-level felony charges into the emergency dockets. The results, she said, showed a significantly boosted case disposition compared to the same time frame last year — about a 179% increase in cases disposed from the makeshift dockets.
“We have managed to have this steady chip at the [average daily population] and it’s by way of we’re moving cases faster and moving more cases,” Mills said. “The progress over the last 12 months with all the justice stakeholders has been pretty significant and it’s showing in the numbers.”
Harris County leaders last month ended a contract to outsource jail inmates to a private facility in Mississippi, shaving millions of dollars off the county's outsourcing costs. On Thursday, commissioners unanimously passed a motion for the county to provide an estimation and updates on the Harris County Sheriff’s Office’s efforts to end jail outsourcing contracts by the court’s Feb. 26 meeting.
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Though cases are getting disposed quicker, the county will still need to hire more detention officers to meet a state-mandated ratio of one officer for every 48 inmates in order to bring more than 1,000 outsourced jail inmates back to Harris County. On Thursday, Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo said it’s still unclear where they might find money in the budget to hire more detention officers after commissioners passed a budget with a multi-million-dollar deficit this year.
"The chief was saying we need additional incentives for detention officers,” Hidalgo said. “Well we have no money. We already had to cut programs, so that's my concern. This sort of tape and glue budgeting, hoping for the best."
In the Thursday presentation, Mills said that new legislation passed by Texas lawmakers this year, including Senate Bill 9 and Proposition 3, could also have the potential to exacerbate the jail population by preventing more defendants from getting out on bail.
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The population of the jail could grow by more than 1,900 inmates by the end of 2026 if defendants accused of certain crimes outlined in the legislation were denied bail, according to the jail presentation. It’s unlikely though, Mills said, that prosecutors will feel empowered to request that most defendants be denied bail.
Diversion programs
In continued efforts to alleviate jail overcrowding, Harris County District Attorney Sean Teare and other county officials have this year touted diversion programs aimed at steering low-level offenders away from incarceration.
Though the programs are not a new effort — and were once an acclaimed effort of Kim Ogg’s stint as district attorney –Teare said that hundreds of inmates had been diverted to mental health programs during intake in the first few months of his term.
The diversion program began in 2018, gaining the quick endorsements of Ogg, the county judge and sheriff. In a 2021 promotional video about the program, law enforcement officials said officers use their crisis intervention training to determine whether someone has an underlying mental health condition, and if it plays any role in the criminal offense.
This year, county officials say the diversion programs have played a key role in addressing the jail’s average daily population.
“Diversion was intended originally back in the day to be what we call deflection today,” Mills said. “But the intent with diversion was that law enforcement would have some place to take someone in the community, if it’s a sobering center or a mental health diversion program where they would avoid contact with the criminal legal system altogether.”
That proved to be difficult for many jurisdictions because of a lack of resources in the community — so law enforcement opted to help connect inmates with diversion programs after they were arrested and booked, she said.
“It’s post-arrest diversion now,” Mills said. “That still counts as an intake, and when you can divert someone rather than them staying in custody until their case is adjudicated, it helps by keeping the average length of stay reasonable.”
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