Problem with the press

Ran across a KXXV story on the Sheriff budget fiasco.

http://www.kxxv.com/global/story.asp?s=17269809

 

From the story:
The McLennan Co. Commissioners Court approved a $285,000 budget amendment today..

Wrong, it was a $385,000 budget amendment.
(Click image to enlarge)

However, after already blowing through their $1 million budget for the fiscal year, the sheriff's office expects they will need even more money very soon.

Randy and Larry did not only blow through their budget, the bill received was actually $1.3 million spent in the first 5 months of the budget year. They got a bill for $385,000 more than they had in the budget.

Unfortunately for the county, the CEC nor the sheriff's office has any idea when the downtown jail will be ready to pass the Texas Commission on Jail Standards inspection.

So the old jail has been vacant since June 2010. I think it is reasonable to expect something more than “don’t have any idea” when they have had almost two years.

"I think [Reyna's] doing a great job," said McLennan Co. Commissioner Kelly Snell. "At the same time we have a downtown jail and I don't think that would've been much of an issue had the downtown jail been open. We could've accepted the inmates."

 

Snell took office in 2009. What has he been doing to address the downtown jail since he voted to transfer the inmates out in June 2010?

For a temporary budget relief the commissioners say they plan to work with county judges to hold certain classifications of inmates for 24 hours, as opposed to 72 hours.

It should be noted the District Attorney told Commissioners he was aggressively pursuing cases because when he was in private practice, people awaiting trial would commit new crimes while out on bond. One, he noted, managed to amass a list of 9 new crimes while awaiting trial. After the District Attorney explained that, they want to get people out of jail faster.  (Link to story with audio)

Tax Payer money and plenty of it

Reviewing the agenda for next Tuesday, I ran across an interesting budget amendment request.

At first glance, this request for $385,020.00 purports be due to an increase in the number of county prisoners housed elsewhere due to overcrowding. All taxpayers should be shocked that a one million dollar budget could be missed by more than 30%.

It gets worse

McLennan County documents are cryptic at best. It appears from the second page of the agenda item, the money was spent as of 3-13-2012. Expenses incurred were $385,020.00 over budget as of a WEEK before the Commissioners’ Court is scheduled to address the issue.

Another question

Of possibly greater concern is the fact that the above ledger does not reflect any expenditures for October or November. The county fiscal year begins October 1.

And the big question

If the total for the first half of the fiscal year is $1.38M, what are they going to do for the remainder of the year? Note the invoice dates above only reflect through 3/13/2012.

The rub

Looking at the documents above, is there any doubt who is paying for the new jail? The above figures are tax payer funds.

Is anybody in there?

In a Waco Trib article. 

The county’s newly appointed criminal associate judge said he may not take the position after the commissioners court set his salary at a lower rate than he anticipated.

I have a smiley face sticker for anyone who can explain why we have 10 candidates for county commissioner and three more not running for office and not one could come up with what seems a really simple solution.

There are 8 justice of the peace courts. Two district courts and two county court at law courts. Any of the presiding judges could do the arraignments of prisoners at the jail.

So we have 12 “magistrates” on the taxpayer tit already. It seems simple. If you think it necessary to fund this position, $200,000.00 seems reasonable for an associate judge budget. All you have to do is add up all the budgets of the 12 existing courts, determine what percentage the extra $120K would be and give the existing courts the option.  The 12 courts can fill the duties and have the currently funded $80K distributed equitably among them or have their budgets cut to offset the needed funds.

This is what RESPONSIBLE taxpayers do when the have an unexpected expense or want to buy something not in the budget. The economy is screwed because people borrowed the money to finance things they had no ability to pay for.  This is the course the court has pursued in the past.  The court suffers no such disability since there is plenty of money.

 

The county budget is on line. Pretty simple to find the information. The commissioners should probably reduce the budget of the “budget director” by 10 percent just because he did not offer this solution. The key to public office is not to be a rocket scientist (can I get a hell yea) but to hire the best possible people to work for you.

The whole associate judge deal has back room deal all over it. The opinion by the District Attorney that the former magistrate was in violation of the Texas Constitution was drafted in August 2011. Prior to the budget approval by the court and the District Judges / County Court at Law Judges didn’t appear to have any problem with ignoring the Texas Constitution.

They did WHAT?

On 12-27-2011, the Commissioners’ Court voted to hire a new associate judge. The court did not know what he was going to be paid or much about what his job responsibilities would be. How does that sound for a plan?

 

McLennan County officials made the case to State Rep. Doc Anderson that due to overcrowding, they needed a way to expedite the processing of people charged with crimes. The justification is murky at best. Some say the justices of the peace who were responsible would not do their job. No particular evidence to support this was ever offered but the JP’s did not raise a fuss because they were going to be paid the same with a significant reduction in their responsibilities.
The part you will not see mentioned is most arraignments take place via video conferencing. Think Skype.  When the jail magistrate was first appointed, video arraignment was not reliable or very evolved. Not the case today. Taxpayers currently pay for 8 magistrate courts in McLennan County.

One advantage of having an appointed judge is that the person does not answer to the voters. An additional level of disconnect is of benefit because the associate judge is appointed by the four criminal judges but the position is funded by the Commissioners’ Court. The judges can say he is a county employee and the commissioner’s  can said they have no control because they don’t appoint him. Why is that important? We offer that no magistrate could do what the appointed one did and have any hope of being re-elected. Another interesting thing about this is that while a brief reference to the matter was posted in the agenda, no documentation was available before court.  In fact, Senior Court Judge Strother emphasized that failure to take the action would have dire consequences. This story by the Legendary http://downdirtyword.blogspot.com/2011/08/criminal-judges-ponder-mclennan-jail.html shows this was a well known issue more than three months ago.

<Appendix>

Quick Study of PR Bonds - Multiple Sex Offenders Freed  - There is little chance a magistrate could be re-elected with a record like this one.

Climate of Terror, Frustration Evident In Robinson -  Much the same for this report.

Waco City Attorney Stonewalls Public Information Requests – In this story details are found about a man who is compelled to beat on his wife after being released on a PR bond.

Alleged Child Rapist Has New Lawyer - Jurors To Pass Sentence – Release of child predators on PR bond might pose a disability to election.

Lady Justice absent from McLennan County – A review of the performance of the last magistrate appointed by Judge Strother.

The Sheriff's Office has no such reports.

It is interesting that McLennan County Commissioners’ Court, this year, approved a $12,000.00 a year increase for the Sheriff.  There is a contract requiring the Sheriff to make twice monthly inspections of the Jack Harwell facility. The curious thing is there is no record of any inspections. If the Court required the Sheriff to file reports, this would not have been a surprise.

Immigration agency pulls inmates from Jack Harwell jail www.wacotrib.com

The federal immigration agency has stopped sending inmates to the Jack Harwell Detention Center and moved all existing detainees out of the facility, citing concerns about housing conditions and inmate medical care.

From the above article:
Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokeswoman Nina Pruneda:

“We’re no longer using it, and from what I understand we have no intentions of using it in the future,”

In addition, some county officials said they were not informed there were complaints about care at the jail.

County Judge Jim Lewis said he talked with officials from CEC about ICE’s decision and said he has a meeting scheduled with CEC in the coming weeks to discuss the matter further.
Lewis said he had “only heard rumors” that ICE raised complaints about inmates’ medical treatment.

Commissioner Lester Gibson, the court’s liaison for jails, said while he noticed the ICE population slowly dropped to zero at the Harwell facility, he was not given a reason for the change.

Commissioner Kelly Snell learned about the lack of ICE inmates at Harwell from Gibson. He too said he would have wanted CEC to inform the entire court about the issue, but said in general he finds it difficult to get information directly from CEC officials.

Commissioner Ben Perry said he asked the sheriff’s office about the decline in ICE inmates, and officials there speculated that ICE simply was moving the detainees to a cheaper facility.

Commissioner Ben Perry said he asked the sheriff’s office about the decline in ICE inmates, and officials there speculated that ICE simply was moving the detainees to a cheaper facility.

Sent: Monday, August 15, 2011 11:47 PM
To: 'Lynne Lockwood'
Cc: randy.plemons@co.mclennan.tx.us
Subject: Request

I am requesting access to and making application for the following information:

This is a public information act request for any reports filed by the Sheriff in relation to this clause of the agreement.

Randy,

Please consider this a request of the Sheriff for documents not in the possession of the County Judge but maintained which are responsive to this request. This request is intended to include requests for additional information which resulted from the on-site inspections, and requested remediation or related correspondence. Please consider this as redundant for reports filed with the Commissioners’ Court.

Thank you,
R.S. Gates

_________________

From: Lynne Lockwood
Sent: Thursday, August 18, 2011 11:34 AM
To: R.S. Gates
Subject: RE: Request

Scott – Your below open records request has been received and reviewed.  Based on our best attempt to interpret your request with relation to a clause of an agreement relating to monitoring of the detention facility by the Sheriff, the County Judge’s Office has no responsive information. No such reports were identified.  L2

___________________
From: Randy Plemons
Sent: Thursday, August 18, 2011 3:56 PM
To: R.S. Gates
Cc: 'Lynne Lockwood'
Subject: RE: Request

The Sheriff's Office has no such reports.

The director of maintenance of building recently told the court a local vendor refused to work for CEC because they could not get paid. Dr. Wells, the jail Dr., told the court he was unable to resolve an expensive medication issue for taxpayers because the new warden had problems to deal with.
More coverage from The Legendary: http://downdirtyword.blogspot.com/2011/11/mclennan-court-continues-housekeeping.html

But this is supposed to be a surprise to the court…..

Magistrate makes application for golden parachute

It’s a good job if you can get it.

Britton was hired sometime in 2007. The compensation sought appears to date back some 4 years. That is quite a nest egg.

We ran across this document as a result of a public information act request. Commissioners will vote today on whether or not to grant the golden parachute to the magistrate.

It is interesting that no documentation was included to indicate how much tax dollars are involved. The item is buried in the consent agenda which is normally approved with one vote approving several items. 

The departure of the magistrate is another issue. There was documentation from the District Attorney’s office indicating the employment of said magistrate was in violation of the Texas Constitution.

Will the Commissioner’s approve yet another sweet deal? Court begins at 9:00 a.m.

An example the double standard in local political reporting of elections?

On December 2nd 2011 the Waco Tribune-Herald published an article titled Tax Assessor candidate pulls endorsement from website. In the article by political writer Michael Shapiro, the paper pulled out the stops and blasted the former city manager of the city of Lacy-Lakeview. Shapiro points out the candidate was not aware of the allegations against the manager until the Trib pointed it out.

Here is the part I think most people missed. The city manager was never charged with a crime. In the article, like the original coverage of the purchasing irregularities, there was innuendo tying the questionable purchases to the city manager. The city council voted by majority vote not to pursue a criminal investigation related to the purchases. They kind of acted in the capacity of a grand jury.

Now contrast that with the recent endorsement announcement by the local Sheriff’s Officers Association. The association endorsed Randy Plemons. Mr. Shapiro's article pointed out that Sheriff Larry Lynch endorsed Plemons.

The Texas Ethics Commission fined Sheriff Lynch a few years ago. So the Trib will crucify someone who was not only never convicted of a crime but, like the former city manager, was not even charged with a crime, and at the same time promote an endorsement by someone who was found to have violated the law.

Remember that the Trib did not cover the news of Lynch’s violation of the law. Only KWTX-TV covered it. The common story was that the only way laws were broken was by committing clerical errors. If you review the document linked from KWTX you will see the violations took place in three different years and happened after Lynch had been in office for 6 years. It was neither a one time omission or a rookie mistake.