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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMinutes 01-31-2008 PUBLIC SAFETY COORDINATING COUNCIL Minutes of Meeting January 31, 2008 Convened: 3:35 p.m. Adjourned: 4:35 p.m. ***Revised*** CALL TO ORDER Commissioner Craft called the meeting to order at 3:40 p.m. in Conference Room # 3, 2300 Virginia Avenue, Fort Pierce, Florida. ROLL CALL Roll call was taken. Members Present: Commissioner Chris Craft th Chief Judge Roby, 19 Circuit th Judge Philip J. Yacucci, 19 Circuit Ken Mascara, Sheriff of SLC Major Pat Tighe, SLC Sheriff’s Office Diamond Litty, Public Defender Thomas Mark, Department of Corrections Becky Bleymen for Peggy Cioffi, CORE Program Janet Collins, SLC Bail Bond Association Members Absent: Bruce Colton, State Attorney John Romano, New Horizons of the Treasure Coast Others Present: Mark Godwin, SLC Criminal Justice Coordinator Broderick Underwood, SLC Information Technology Department Lisa Savage, SLC Pretrial Program Manager Ed Fry, SLC Clerk of Circuit Courts Jim Reeder, Palm Beach Post Tom Genung, Court Administrator Marc Traum, Court Administration Ethel Rowland, Taxpayer APPROVAL OF MINUTES: The minutes from the November 29, 2007 meeting were unanimously approved. Public Safety Coordinating Council January 31, 2008 Page 2 UPDATE by CRIMINAL JUSTICE COORDINATOR-MARK GODWIN: Mr. Godwin spoke on the Mental Health Grant, which was spurred out at the Public Safety Coordinating Council back in 2003. Major Tighe asked for a sub committee to be formed. As a result of this volunteer group, Diamond Litty also had a number of people from her staff join in and supported the Mental Health. The grant was a major amount. Diamond Litty would like to thank Katie Alonzo, Lisa Fontaine, and Laura Glanville. This is a time period where budgets are being cut. There is no money to get this kind of funding and I think we should all be proud. I just wanted to publicly thank them. th Mr. Godwin said to follow-up we are putting on the February 12 Agenda to accept the award so that all the line items will be ready to roll. We are excited about that capability. Total of grant is $688,000 over three years. It is a huge amount of funding that will help more and more individuals in the community hopefully eliminating them from returning back to the jail. Mr. Godwin says it is very exciting to see the process. When Mental Health Court started, Diamond Litty’s staff on their own time volunteered along with the Judge, Major Tighe, State Attorney. In addition to that it has also reduced the jail population and provided help to those individuals who don’t return six to eight times a year to the county jail. That same individual is now off Mental Health Court and has graduated and is not coming back. Major Tighe handed out the Audit Report on the amount of bonds that were written in the year 2007 in St. Lucie County jail. Total amount written $126,999,557.26 Cash bonds have made it easier for inmates to bond out with a credit card. It’s made an impact on the population but I don’t think it has made an impact on the bond association. 4,888 were cash bonds and a portion of that was from credit cards for a total of $5,387,392.92 Mr. Godwin handed out the jail report created by Broderick Underwood. Mark also thanked Broderick for his capabilities to be able to code in such complex information. He has built a Drug Court database, Mental Health Court database, which will be circuit wide, along with the court system data. Lisa Savage, SLC Pretrial Program Manager, gave update on the Pretrial numbers. The numbers are running about the same. We have gone up and down a little bit on the GPS cases. Had a lot of cases disposed this month. We had a couple cases come out of Drug Court, which we only had for a short period of time. We had a few DOC’s, VOP’s that were pending and they wanted them under enhanced supervision, GPS or weekly reporting. A couple of cases that their sentencing dates are several months away and supervised cases that are pending getting ready to make a plea and to be sentenced at a later date. We had a few more medical cases come through. We are doing some assessments. At First Appearance we have been working with Judge Nelson and Jodi Renc. We interview at the jail, check residency and employment. It usually takes a couple of days, sometimes up to a week, as we like to check everything out before getting back to the judge indicating yes or no on the cases. Public Safety Coordinating Council January 31, 2008 Page 3 Mr. Godwin thanked one of the Pretrial staff for keeping a suicidal defendant on the phone until proper authority arrived at the defendants home. Mr. Godwin gave update on the Drug Lab. He will be taking a trip to Bartow in Polk County to view their facility operations. Talked to the State of Florida and Dr. George Woodley has agreed to purchase up to $30,000 of chemicals for the county to test individuals. What that is going to result in is more people being able to be tested that are truly indigent with the courts of the federal poverty guidelines. Those individuals instead of going to the Health Department, being charged up to $30.00, we are looking at reducing the cost down to $20.00 for those who can afford it. I also have built in a 40% indigence ratio for those individuals that cannot afford it. That will be able to provide for those individuals of Mental Health Court who certainly cannot afford it along with those in all the court system including family and juveniles. We are also looking to enhance the program so we meet the standards of a Drug Free Workplace. We just purchased 2 breathalyzers. This unit will be located next to Pretrial office, a temporary state, until the building stst of the 1 floor is built out. It is going to be located on the 1 floor. The drug-testing machine will have the capability of when a test is done, and someone who is in Drug Court, the test will automatically be emailed into the drug database. The minute the sample is tested it will go right to the drug database. It can also be emailed to anybody who is in the system. We will be providing instant reading results. If we can meet the standard of a Drug Free Workplace we can have the County employees tested there along with any other government agencies. It will also be able to reduce cost factors to those government agencies during this time of cutbacks. Another grant, Second Chance Act, deals with reentry of inmates. Through Diamond’s efforts and the jail efforts identified the fact that reentry is a very important thing. The Second Act has already, been passed by the House. We are waiting for the next step, which is, the Senate and th then the President’s signature. We have a meeting on February 18, to discuss a redevelopment of a committee to work on this reentry task force. Mr. Godwin also thanked the Fire Department and Court Administration for donating computers, monitors and furniture for the Pretrial Department and Drug Lab. Ms. Litty stated we have all worked and done unbelievable things. You can’t ignore there is a population out there and we got to look to the future. It is a good thing we’ve had success and the population went down temporarily but the problem is not going to go away, it’s just not. We’re gonna have to look to the future. We just can’t ignore that and that’s our responsibility. Commissioner Craft - he doesn’t think anyone around this table recommended that. We are just trying to get things in check and get the system efficient as possible before we start looking at what we do need to expand as far as facilities in the future and that’s what I thought the purpose of what we’ve been doing was. Ms. Litty - I think we’ve done a real good job at it. I think we’ve tightened up, we’ve tweaked, we’ve programmed, we’ve done all of that but we cannot forget we got to look to the Public Safety Coordinating Council January 31, 2008 Page 4 future needs and we still don’t have a five-year plan. We haven’t taken that next step and we need to do that. Commissioner Craft - we are taking a field trip next month in March. We are going to have a community transit bus set up. We are going to go as a team and visit all locations so that we all have a better understanding of what the specific needs are in each location and how we are working to expand the services and the system that we need here in St. Lucie County. What can we do in Port St. Lucie? Long-term goals in Fort Pierce. We have been talking that on the Space Needs Committee for almost a year and we are spinning our wheels. The problem is the scope of what we are talking about and I said this earlier it is beyond the expertise of the people sitting around this table for what we are needing to actually implement and I hated to say it but I have to say it again, we are running into a point where we are gonna have to have a consultant who tells us and shows us what space we are going to need, where we are going to put it and that’s what we are going to work towards. Ms. Litty - that’s not what this body is tasking. That’s not the public safety. Public Safety Coordinating Council that is not our task for the statute. Our goal our duty under the law is to worry about basically the jail, the jail expansion, the jail population and that kind of thing. Commissioner Craft - the entire system affects that and that is what we are exactly talking about doing. Ms. Litty – I think it’s great that your doing that and I think you need to do that and I think its all tied into it but I’m talking about here and now today in this meeting. In this group we still haven’t dealt with what we need to be dealing with. We have patted ourselves on the back and rightly so for all the good work everyone in this room has done, but we’ve got to look to the future and we’re remiss in not complying with the law if we don’t. Commissioner Craft – I don’t think we are ignoring the law. I think we are doing exactly what we set out to do and it doesn’t necessarily mean we got plans. The number of beds we’re going to have and we are freeing beds up by having the system more efficient. We got administrative issues that we can still improve on and I think that everyone around this table is improving everyday in their field so as long as we do that, until we got it to its peak efficiency, we don’t know what space we need to add. And if I’m gonna go out and say we are gonna add 1,000 beds or 500 beds or what ever it is to a new facility I’m not gonna make that recommendation to my Board. Obviously I’ll respect the wishes of this Board as a whole of this Council if someone makes a motion they want me to take it to the Board. I’m happy to do that but I’m letting you know I don’t support that until I’ve seen something that substantiates the need for it and time overall population county population directed to jail population in my opinion and from everything I read and everything I heard from experts those who you agree with and those who you don’t agree with has said the same thing “there’s no relation to county population to jail population” as long as that’s the case I’m going to continue to recommend to my Board from my person not as a representative of this Council but I’m gonna recommend to my Board that we look to find ways of improving the system and spending money in Pretrial and spending money on the front end as oppose to the back end because if we can get them in the front end it is a lot Public Safety less expensive then Coordinating Council January 31, 2008 Page 5 spending the money on the back end. Ms. Litty – I didn’t even mention that. I didn’t even approach that topic. I just said we need a plan. I think we’ve made great strides. I think everyone in this room has worked together, done great things, but we got to look to the future. Commissioner Craft – I’m sorry when you talked about jail expansion I was assuming that, what we were talking about was beds. Ms. Litty – I don’t even think I used the words jail expansion. Commissioner Craft – I asked specifically are you speaking of jail expansion and you said yes. Ms. Litty – Well, that’s one alternative. I’m not saying that’s the only way to deal with it but we obviously are. Our population is up again and I think we need to address that. You know it was down and that was a great thing. It’s obviously a success story but we’ve got to look at that. We can’t ignore that it’s increased again. Comment from a taxpayer – The study says that 6% of the population last month have been involved in illicit drug use and as long as that continues to be the law of the land you can never have a big enough jail or enough judges or enough court space or any thing else and I think it eventually has to become part of the discussion. Commissioner Craft – I appreciate those comments. I think the issue with that is that’s a state and federal issue and that’s something that is beyond the scope of this Board. Major Pat Tighe stated we are addressing we have started a war locally on drug abuse and alcohol in the jail. Working with the Public Defenders office and DCF we started out recently eight months ago with two drug abuse cells and on any given date the population changes, 26 females, 26 males, we’ve had a great success rate. We are working with a religious community. When we commenced on this endeavor two years ago there were zero halfway houses we now have 22. We release them not only to a place to live but they continue to get the program, they get a job within 30 days. 85% of the people that come into the jail are either under the influence or have a substance abuse problem and substance abuse is linked to crime or otherwise they wouldn’t be committing the crimes so we are working on that and that is the Reentry Grant that Mark is talking about. The Second Chance Grant that we are going to apply for. We have already set up a committee. The grant hasn’t been approved yet by Congress. It has been approved by the House, and it is going to the Senate right now. There is $600,000,000 in the grant and St. Lucie County stands to get around $15,000,000 of that. When that does happen you will see the citizen rate drop dramatically because they do stay out, they do sober up, they’re getting their GED’s, they’re getting their 90 day substance abuse program while at the jail and it’s not costing them a dime. Becky Bleyman - The misdemeanor cases that are on probation are not just limited to us and that’s why I asked that we clarify the misdemeanor into which agency that VOP belongs because Public Safety Coordinating Council January 31, 2008 Page 6 DOC has misdemeanor VOP as well. Commission Craft stated on page 6 of the booking comparisons in November the bookings went up in both years between November and December. Is there a way we can find out what type of crimes they were just for those months? Obviously there is a consistent pattern that I bet if you went back it’s the same in 2005, 2006, and 2007. If we can find out what types of crimes they are maybe we could figure out a plan for the following year. Chief Judge Roby gave update on GPS Administrative order. That order was put together by representatives of the State Attorneys Office, Sheriff’s Office, Public Defender, Judges, and other members of this Council. I think Mark remembers it being a subcommittee. Quite a few members of this committee were put on that committee. That order was drafted and a copy was given to all St. Lucie County judges both County and Circuit to review and make comments before that order was signed. I received no objections from any of the judges regarding the GPS order. In fact a number of judges made some very constructive comments and those comments were changes were incorporated in the order. There were no objections the day it was signed. It was signed on January 18, 2006, distributed to Public Defenders, State Attorneys, all Clerk of Courts, all Judges in th the 19 Circuit, all local bar presidents, all County Attorneys, and variety of other folks on January 23, 2006. From January 23, 2006 to within the last 45 days no one, no one objected to the GPS Administrative Order, it being illegal or unconstitutional. Now one person has objected within the last 45 days other than that, no one has contacted me saying or claiming or alleging the GPS order was either illegal or unconstitutional or in any way violates any ones rights. So to that extent I do not anticipate changing the order other than changing a little bit of the language with regard to a portion of the statute was declared unconstitutional. That portion of the statute was replaced by the Supreme Court with a rule and that rule basically says no person charged with a dangerous crime as defined in Section 9070414A Florida Statute shall be released on non- monetary conditions, that would be GPS or other non-monetary conditions under the supervision of a Pretrial Release Service, which is what we have with our Pretrial Release Service, unless the service certifies to the court it has investigated or otherwise verified the conditions set forth in Section 9070413B Florida Statute. Now that makes sense because if we don’t have that provision in there we have possibly, judges putting people on GPS who don’t qualify for it and have no chance to review their criminal background and that creates nothing but havoc because we put people on the GPS. If you put someone on GPS on the condition of your bond the condition of your release and you haven’t reviewed their background to see if they are a safe bet sort-of- speak then you risk putting the public at a huge risk and we’re not doing that in this Circuit and the judges through out the entire state aren’t doing that as well. So I’m going to change the order to include that language in lieu of the language we talked about the portion of the Florida Statute 907041B that was declared unconstitutional but was replaced with this one. So the bottom line is we’re currently under redraft to change the order. We have made an interim change with putting in St. Lucie County in lieu of something alternative where St. Lucie County can actually go in do what they need to do if someone violates the GPS condition there is an interim order in place. The GPS program is not a constitutional right. You do not have a constitutional right to the GPS and that’s something we need to make very clear to everyone involved in the system. It’s similar to probation and probation has been stated so much to a stand point it’s a grace. For example the Supreme Court often said this court the grant of probation rest within the broad discretion of the trial judge Public Safety Coordinating Council January 31, 2008 Page 7 and in the matter of grace rather than a right because probation is a matter of grace even when statute authorize a grant of probation to those who have been found guilty of criminal violation. Trial Courts are not required to extend the privilege and I want to make it very clear that our judges are not required to grant privilege of GPS just because somebody wants it. We are doing it when it is properly recommended by the program pursuant Florida law and we are not going to violate Florida law. Now that doesn’t mean that the judge at First Appearance hearings when he or she has an opportunity to check into the criteria and the background of the certain individual can’t order GPS just because the service doesn’t recommend it at First Appearance. I think they have the right to do that but not unless or until you have that First Appearance hearing and you have that person either in front of you or on video and you had a chance to review their background should a GPS every be considered or any type of non-monetary relief ever be considered unless they meet the criteria for release. So my understanding is our program is the GPS program and Pretrial. When we first set up the program it was more of just a GPS program we’ve got it worked into more of an overall Pretrial Program which we cannot fully do unless we have people on staff 24/7 and money to fund it to do the background so we are doing the best we can with limited funds. The Supreme Court also said in a footnote “There appears to be no impediment to the executive branch of the county government to establish the minimum criteria and parameters for eligibility before accepting persons into its program for non financial custody release.” If the Supreme Court believes that the County has the right to put in a minimum criteria and I believe we put in the minimum criteria in our GPS order based on this committee decision on how we were going to handle GPS which was a huge step for this Circuit. I don’t see any reason at this point to change it and I heard it from many other sources other than one person that they think the order is illegal and unconstitutional and if there are some folks that have concerns in the public regarding that order I am absolutely willing to set up a committee and th have discussions with that of the lawyers in the 19 Circuit and none of the other folks involved in the system have complained about it. That is why we are keeping it the way it is with few modifications. Unless I hear from this committee who think we ought to change them and I haven’t been hearing that and that’s where we are with the GPS. With regards to the judges we have been certified by the Supreme Court for one more county judge and one more circuit judge for St. Lucie County. Certified does not equal funding. If anybody has anything regarding GPS order which the program is in, I think its been a tremendous success. Its got a lot more people out of jail which would otherwise be in jail and would be in jail for an extended period of time. I’m very proud of the fact that we have that order in place. It’s had a great impact and hopefully will continue to do so. With the program I think we are going to expand a little bit more and I would love to get the four counties together to all chip in to have a full time Pretrial Release Program like they do have in 10 of the other 20 Circuits. When we do our program, our First Appearances, the same way that 10 of the 20 other Circuits do throughout the entire state its principally because we don’t have the money to have a full time Pretrial Release Program and the other 10 circuits around the state they are all trying to get the money to do that but unfortunately the money is tight right now through out the entire state. NEW BUSINESS: Becky Bleyman stated we have been asked to pursue the Alcohol Monitoring Bracelets for Public Safety Coordinating Council January 31, 2008 Page 8 SCRAM. We did sign a contract on that. We’ve been training we purchased new equipment and we are up and running. We have 5 clients so far. The cost is paid for by the offender and its $159.00 for the registration and includes the first week of monitoring. The cost is $12.00 a day. They get released from jail they come into our office within twenty-four hours we register them they get an appointment set and they get the bracelet put on and they come in weekly to make their payments. If they don’t make their payments we contact them and if they don’t show up then we send a letter to the court to have the bond revoked and have them put back in jail. ADJOURNMENT: Commissioner Craft adjourned the meeting at 4:35 p.m. Submitted by, Carol Strobert THE NEXT MEETING WILL BE HELD February 28, 2008