Travis County Commissioners Court
March 1, 2005
Item 14
Item number 14 is to consider and take appropriate action on recommendations from the taskforce on fines and fees. We have been provided backup that outlines the issues and the recommendations. Mr. Nellis?
>> I'm with the taskforce on the fines and fees. We had a complete discussion I think on January 27th with the court in a work session involving the status report of the process that the taskforce has been going through. At that work session the court asked us to bring back several items for the action during a voting session, those being to propose a private project as outlined in the backup. The number two issue would be whether or not the court would like for the tax assessor collector to continue collecting the taxes of the county courts at law through the implementation of the facts system or if the other alternative would be to transfer that responsibility immediately to cscd. The third issue to bring back involved the consideration of developing a pilot program to collect fines and fees owed to Travis County by individuals sentenced to a state jail facility. Since that work session the auditor's office did draft a pilot project that I shared with all the members of the taskforce, and I did receive a response that I included in the backup from the district clerk's office, of which I have had an opportunity to discuss with michelle and basically go over a couple of the issues that she raised there. Number one had to do with the pilot and the entry of the data of entering data by personnel that are not the responsibility of the district clerk. And essentially the accountability for that information. In discussing that with michelle -- dwroj if ma -- I don't know if michelle is here. That essentially they had indicated that they were interested in having district clerk personnel involved in that pilot project and that the bigger issue had to do with if in fact we moved forward with the reassignment of the responsibility of the entering of that data on a long-term basis, the responsibility of the district clerk's office for reporting information is input by other than district clerk personnel. I would think that the long-term issue on that would be an issue that we would readdress before we would bring back any action to Commissioners court based upon the review of the district clerk's input, the current under facts, and then in the event that the committee, the taskforce made a recommendation to proceed with the pilot program in the court administration office. And if that pilot program proved that we had incomplete percentage -- and really when we talked previously about an error rate, a lot of it is incomplete percentage of those case files. And if in fact we were able to meet the objective, the objective of the pilot program, the review of the district clerk's office has to do with whether or not we can ask the district judges to reduce the amount of time that the fines and fees on the district level are collectible to 90 days as we do in the county courts. And you heard the testimony at the work session, we believe the taskforce believes, that if in fact we're able to get the accuracy and completeness and timeliness that those assessments of fines and fees, the district judges, I will go to the district judges and ask them on behalf of the taskforce and the Commissioners court to reduce the time that we collect and there by increase the amount of fines and fees at the district level that we collect. So that's the issue. And I think that I had a very good conversation with michelle and I believe that we can work through the details and the issues that we raised and the district clerk's office raised if in fact the court authorizes us to proceed with the evaluation of the district clerk's under facts and proceeding with the pilots if the results of that review show that. And that's essentially in the option of the tax assessor collector's office continuing to collect the county court at law fines and fees. The stipulation on that is that we are in property tax collecting season right now, and the tax assessor I believe is here, but I know that she is interested in those four positions being permanent for collecting whatever we do with them in the future. She wants to fill the positions that she has held back in the property tax collecting area, the tax assessor collector's office, so that you can proceed with filling those on a permanent basis and not having to do temporary collecting in that area. And I believe that that's a fair request from the tax assessor collector's office. I would direct one other point to the statistics that the tax assessor collector's office has provided us, the taskforce, and it does show that those fines and fees on the county court at law level that were assessed in the year of 2003, calendar year 2003, the tax assessor collector's collectors have collected 91% of those fines and fees. I have not seen a statistic from the office of court administration at the state that shows an urban county that has collected 91%. I've seen high 80's. I also would like to say that the tax assessor collector has the highest property tax collection rate in the state of Texas. So you can see the account six months to one year, they're at 70.9%. This isn't saying that cscd is not doing a tremendous job of collecting our district level fines and fees, because they are, and the issue that donna brought forward, donna ferris with cscd about the dilution when you have a base that includes accounts not being collected from the 60's and 50's, of course you're going to have a lower percentage because your denominator is bigger when you do the calculation. There was a sense on the taskforce that in this period between now and the implementation -- fully implemented facts system in the county clerk's office that we should not change in mid stream, that we ought to minimize the number of variables that were going forward with at this time. The taskforce would come back to you after the fully implemented facts system in the county clerk's criminal division, and we would recommend we go in and review, as we're doing in the district clerk now, the county clerk's collection -- assessment under facts and make a recommendation to you. I've laid out from the taskforce response and I did show you the background on those. We are asking the court to give us authorization to proceed with the pilot assessment project that's drafted. We are recommending have the tax office continue to keep the county court fines and fees until the facts system is implemented and the criminal division of the county clerk's office. This recommendation requires the four f.t.e.'s in the project be made permanent collector positions. And number three, we would ask permission for the taskforce to proceed to develop a pilot project to collect fines and fees owed by individuals serving time in the state jail facilities.
>> so until we're given alternative recommendations, you read a. The taskforce recommends a over b?
>> that's correct. The majority of the people responding to the department's on the taskforce responding to that question referred to leave the collections with the tax office so that a recommendation from the chair representing the majority of the participants recommends it stay with the tax office.
>> now, cscd will have other fines and fees to collect for -- you're just talking about part of them.
>> we're just talking about the piece of it that the tax assessor collector is addressing now, which are those fines and fees that have been assessed since January 1 of 2003 from the county court at laws.
>> we do have the tax assessor here along with several of other top managers. Any comments or you y'all supportive of the recommendation? They are saying yes for the record. Right? That's why I move approval.
>> second.
>> of 1, 2-a and 3, right?
>> that's correct.
>> recommended by the chair of the taskforce.
>> that's correct.
>> the taskforce that was appointed for 90 days and now is in the third year or fourth?
>> [ laughter ]
>> I believe we're finishing our second year.
>> you're doing a good job.
>> judge?
>> yes.
>> I'm approving of this, given that this is what the taskforce is recommending. I'm always a little nervous whenever you use words like pilot program and turning temporaries into full-time. So we are going into this knowing that if we do make a change for whatever reason, that all of a sudden we're not trying to justify trying to keep these four folks as permanent. That's the only thing that I want to make sure of. I think we're doing the right step here. Obviously the numbers -- the proof of the numbers that nelda and her group are collecting, and I applaud that, but I do want to -- and the pilot program would be until what, full implementation of facts?
>> right. Facts is scheduled currently according to the schedule, currently in the county clerk's office for August of '05. It's conceivable that the implementation of that could exceed through the end of the calendar year. We implemented in the district clerk's criminal division in November, and now we're looking at it in the latter part of February or first part of March, so we would expect there to be a 90 to 120-day period there where they got all the kinks out, so we would go in and do a pilot in there. So that's a period of time that the importance just on those positions, the tax office is held -- the permanent positions behind these vacant and have been backfilling with temperature with temporary staff much this is not the time to have temporary people filling in at the tax office. And I think that we need to salute the efforts of the tax office for stepping to the plate in January of 2003, but we do need to give her the support that those are permanent positions. And if in fact the court changes course in the future, that those people -- they wouldn't be looking for jobs for those people. That we do have permanent positions, and through the budget process perhaps we could reassign some.
>> anything from the district clerk? All in favor of the motion? Show Commissioners Gomez and dougherty and yours truly voting in favor. And Commissioner Davis, a unanimous court. Thank you very much.
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Last Modified:
Wednesday, March 2, 2005 10:31 AM