Travis County Commissioners Court
October 4, 2005
Item 39
Let's go to 39. Consider and take appropriate action on county compliance with senate big 1863 regarding collection services.
>> I think all of you received my memo dated September 29th in regard to senate bill 1863 in which it was passed during the last legislature that requires Travis County to develop and implement a program to improve the collection of criminal court fines and fees by April the first. We're scheduled to be -- implement that plan that's in compliance with that new senate bill 1863. Deanna travis and myself have met almost weekly with the office of court administration looking at the model plan that the office of court administration has out in a draft form, and what p.b.o. Would propose is that the attached draft with any type of corrections that you would like to make be sent from the Commissioners court to the selected elected and appointed officials that are involved in criminal fines and fee collections indicating, setting out the -- kind of the general overview of the requirements of the statute. And that p.b.o. In consultation with the auditor's office would send out a questionnaire shortly after the court sends out this memo to all those elected and appointed officials with the checklist that is -- is directly off of the office of court administration's outline that lays out the requirements for counties to comply with the new statute. There are a number of things that are still being drafted by the state comptroller's office. The state comptroller will be the enforcement arm. We've been notified the state comptroller received 34 f.t.e.s, new f.t.e.s to enforce this statute. So our intention would be to work hand in hand with the office of court administration and the comptroller's office. Once we receive these questionnaires that the office of court administration has requested, laid out as a standard, once we receive those back from the elected and appointed officials, we would see how many holes that we have in our collection, our current collection activities and we would be meeting with those elected and appointed officials to see with the office of court administration what we would need to do in order to form a plan that would be in compliance with the state statute.
>> are you guys going to get together I値l call it a time line for implementation because when we send out these letters say hello, we got another group gig that we need help on, we need to be really strict about okay, we're going to need this information back within three weeks. Within thee weeks we're going to have a huge meeting. Just to give them a sense this is one of those projects that cannot drag out and will get an extension. We've got to have it. And I知 going down the checklist here and there's quite a few things that we're already doing, so I think it's really going to be more of a focus on the whole. Currently we have the omni issue, clearly we issue and serve warrants. Clearly, you know, we try and collect money, but, again, I think it's more of do we have strict payment terms and the closely monitoring for compliance. Yeah, and certainly judge goodwin in precinct 3 is doing an innovative pilot program that could give us further direction about something that we might want to do on the j.p.s and working with richard, constable, about trying to exhaust in-house collection efforts. But I think it's going to be real important to come up with a time line that says this is when we expect to get things done and kind of a sense of when people's time is going to be needed. And we move on. But this can't be something like the e-government -- it's not an ongoing thing, it's a specific thing and we need to move on.
>> and our time line on this first piece, we would hope that the court would be able to make whatever changes you might want to have to the draft, we would like to get that out tomorrow if possible, and we would like to get our questionnaire out to these elected and appointed officials by the end of the week. Giving them about 10 days to reply. And then we would immediately go into reviewing the holes and calling a meeting. The area that has the greatest resource potential are our justice of the peace's office. And we would propose that we very quickly after we've reviewed this questionnaire call a meeting of the justice of the peaces, travis, deanna, myself and maybe a representative from the auditor's office and go over these holes that we've identified and identify those areas that are in compliance which I would assume that in j.p. 3 with the pilot we're very close to meeting some of those requirements. But we will know more witness they complete that questionnaire.
>> where is the questionnaire?
>> where is it? The questionnaire --
>> that's not the model collection program components document, is it?
>> leroy has a draft copy in his hand. The office of court administration put out a checklist which was based on those components, and what we've done is take that knowing -- I guess add more specific information knowing how the operations of Travis County are to provide I guess some -- the same information but in greater detail.
>> okay. When do we get to see the questionnaire?
>> I can give you a copyright now. Or right -- I値l make some copies and hand them out to you.
>> all right. Here's what I recommend. I recommend on the page 1 of your draft letter, second line on the bottom, implementation of the program, by Wednesday, October 11th at 5:00 p.m. Now, the court voted last week or week before that this -- somewhere in our name ought to be this is the state mandated criminal court fines and fees compliance committee. And for two weeks we've been saying that we are deficient in collection efforts and for two years we listened to a variety of departments give excuses why. So if there is not a greater commitment to comply with this law, we simply won't do it. But it seems to me that for us to comply, we have to make changes to various documents. And those designees are to be able to speak for their departments. There must be procedural changes, right? Various notices to the internal staff as well as the public. So if we're serious about collection, part of the money if not all of it on the day of sentencing, that's a massive public education effort that there have to be documents to say at the time of plea, your full fine and fee are due in full. But the law says we can try to work out some circumstances to -- well, a payment plan basically. But what about training? And the other thing would be, and this sort is my recommends recollection from the meetings I went to, there are computer modifications required. So the question is what are they, and joe harlow really needs to be brought into it. Seems to me there is no way to get around one big meeting, but based on the big meetings that I attended in the past where we talked about collection of fines and fees, you really need to break it down into subcommittees.
>> right.
>> like having the j.p.s work together, putting their program in place makes sense, and to the extent there are like departments, getting them together and getting this done. At that first meeting, though, if when this goes out, I think it ought to go out with a copy the pertinent statutory provisions and I知 thinking the ones that really matter can be put on one page.
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>> [one moment, please, for change in captioners]
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>> if you prefer for us to meet with everybody initially, that's fine. I値l be glad to do that.
>> the two designees. I don't know can the (indiscernible) and criminal court judges may appoint one person. That's 15 or 20 people represented by one. But that is a one person who can make the call for them. It's the community service that the law allows too. I anticipate based on fines and fees that we have failed to collect historically, a lot of these defendants will not be able to pay within short time frame. So the question is do we have real community service available. And I would think that Travis County would come up with a community service program that we chip away at. Do you see what I知 saying.
>> judge, if I remember going back to the days that I was at the constable's office, there were a lot of folks who were not able to pay within 60 days. And so you kind of felt like you were putting them in jail for debt. We don't have debtor's prison any more, do we?
>> we're not supposed to.
>> that's not where I want to go. But we need to consider that community service.
>> we ought to be able to put together a list of community service programs that not only benefit community government, but also the Travis County citizens. I assume there's a definition for that also.
>> well, the survey does that, the community service option and when are they used.
>> and the good thing we have discovered from judge good win's pilot going on in 3 is that very few folks did trigger the thing, saying I had no money, you will have to throw me in jail for me to serve my time. That was the myth of what going on. It was one of those things of hi, you need to pay up. We really need it. You can't walk into the h.e.b. Grocery store and say get back to me with my bill. It doesn't get that way. We need to reinstitute a point of service payment, period, and people will pay it if they know they have to do it.
>> there are some folks who can't.
>> and I know judge diaz has been good about putting them on an extended plan on how much is the leeway in terms of how much are the payment plans because there are folks that she has put on appropriately to do it over a six-month time period. We need to find out there are more leeway here to say that you will be given the time to dispose of your obligation as opposed to more of what going on and trying to get the obligation. We need to change the attitude that it's a do.
>> there's a whole lot of guidance in the law. And what is not there we have to decide ourselves. Part of the job would be for us to decide just that.
>> there's going to be a procedures manual coming up and the next couple of weeks. As soon as we have it, we will send it out. It's supposed to be very detailed, start to finish, job titles, how you set up the operation physically, all sorts of stuff. Plus the controller is having a training on this. I think it's next week. And the staff are going to that. It's just for state staff. We're not invited to that training. The statute really doesn't have that much more information than what we have already and the details are being ironed out in the state level as we speak. So we hope to have more information in two weeks as far as the -- how much leeway the model program will give us.
>> that's assuming that the model program will set forth the minimum and that we can creatively build on it. That's why I move approval of the staff recommendation with the recommendations made by the Commissioners court today as incorporated as best staff can do it. And you need to act on this early tomorrow morning, right?
>> right.
>> discussion? That means the court doesn't need to see it again. We need to see action more than the document. All in favor? That passes by unanimous vote. Thank you very much.
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Last Modified:
Wednesday, October 5, 2005 8:54 AM