Archive: Opinions

I have long abhorred state mandates, especially the unfunded kind.  I understand that each level of government wants to have some influence on its sphere of jurisdiction, but the farther away from local a government gets, the more clueless it is about how local communities work.  Albany is especially fond of dictating what localities must do.  Many of the mandates require reports and data, which, I suppose is fine.  But when Albany mandates that a local community must do something, it rarely attaches funding to do it.  And unfunded mandates mean higher property taxes, which I am definitely opposed to.

Tuesday I had the pleasure and pain of interviewing Tompkins County Sheriff Derek Osborne and Undersheriff Jenn Olin about a new unfunded mandate that Albany will begin imposing in January.  The pleasure was in talking to two fine public servants.  The pain came from the frightening thing they told me.  In a nutshell, Albany is mandating that cash bail be eliminated for almost all misdemeanors and even some felonies, and that law enforcement officers and prosecutors will have a maximum of 15 days to gather the proof needed to arrest somebody.  Instead of being arrested most offenders will be issued appearance tickets, effectively releasing them into their own custody.  And the police will have to chase them down to get them to appear in court if they don't show up themselves.  These 'reforms' are clearly weighted toward protecting the rights of the accused at the expense of the victims, law enforcement, district attorneys... and taxpayers.


"This legislation goes much too far, NY State Senator Pam Helming (Lansing's Senate representative) said in a letter that arrived in my email box literally one minute after I finished writing this editorial (I am editing it now, obviously, to include her statement, and the whole letter is on this week's Opinions Page). A dealer who gets caught selling drugs on school grounds will be back for his next round of sales by the time the end of the day school bell rings. A repeat DWI offender who kills someone while driving drunk and is charged with aggravated vehicular homicide, will be free to drive himself home after his arrest. A pedophile who promotes or possesses an obscene sexual performance by a child will be free to go. And the list goes on. Under these new laws, a vast majority of offenders will no longer qualify for bail. The State Legislature has literally given criminals a get out of jail free card."

Even State Attorney General Letitia James, who has been characterized as one of the most progressive attorney generals New York, one of the most liberal states, has had, has warned that the new measures will put a burden on her office, and that millions of additional dollars will be needed to comply.  The Attorney General's caseload is smaller than most county district attorneys', which means more expense for counties that get their tax money from property tax.

Essentially the bill forces people on fixed incomes to pay for the privilege of having less effective police protection.  If the state payed for this, the money would come from residents who can afford to pay because they are currently employed.  But forcing the mandate on the counties and cities and villages that have police forces means people on fixed incomes, whose lives are already stressful enough, will have to pay more to feel less safe.  And it won't just be a feeling, because they will actually be less safe.

Sheriff Osborne told me he wants to wait and see how it goes for the first year before deciding on whether he needs to ask for more manpower.  But he and Undersheriff Olin were clearly shaken by the new regulations and the obvious conclusion that more people are going to get away with more criminal activity, and the public will have good reason to feel much less safe.  Especially crime victims, who, until the end of this year, can at least take a little solace in the fact that their attackers or robbers are in jail where they can't cause further harm.

Some might say that law enforcement would naturally resist reforms that mean changes to their routines and that erode their power to enforce the law.  My take was that our Sheriff's office is concerned with practical matters and the impacts they will have on the Tompkins County community, none of which has to do with their routines or power, except that they worried about how to reasonably staff the mandated activities while continuing to protect 492 square miles with only three to five officers on road patrol at any given time.  And worried that legitimate criminals will get away with more crime.

Rensselaer County DA Mary Pat Donnelly succinctly criticized Albany lawmakers, saying "In attempting to level the playing field, we are playing roulette with public safety."

Another piece of this that I find disturbing was something Undersheriff Olin told me about how the jail population will be impacted.  She mentioned that the majority of inmates will be serious and violent crime offenders, which poses a threat to the officers who manage the jail.

Tompkins County already has a smaller jail population, down from between 80 to 90 inmates to 50 today.  The Sheriff credits Tompkins County's 'Alternatives to Incarcerations' programs, which seems to effectively accomplish a good part of what next years criminal justice reforms aim to do, but without endangering the public. I have noticed that unfunded mandates imposed on our school district address the worst case scenarios, while punishing districts like Lansing that do a lot right.  In those cases it saddles the district with more paperwork, or imposes testing on kids that may be helpful in poorly producing schools, but takes time away from actual education in schools like Lansing that have good academic success.

All well and good.  It costs more, and our school taxes go up.  But it is not life threatening.  The 'reforms' very well could be, as law enforcement officials and district attorneys seem to be universally predicting that more crimes will result, more criminals will not be arrested, more witness intimidation will be encouraged, and more tax money, most of it property tax money, will be needed to make up for the sparse resources relatively limited police and sheriff offices have.

I think most people want the criminal justice system to be fair, especially when innocent people are accused of crimes.  you want the system to be able to strain out the innocent so they can focus on punishing the guilty.  These 'reforms' clearly have that in mind, but when you are dealing with people who threaten the safety and well being of society, some prudence is needed.  It would be better to err on the side of safety.  After all, if someone is falsely arrested they do get their day in court to prove their innocence.  And yes, the courts get backed up and an accused innocent person's life can be seriously impacted, not to mention the financial ruin that can follow needing a defense attorney.

So there is a fine line that needs to be navigated between individual rights and public safety.  These new criminal justice mandates appear to cross that line to the detriment of pretty much everybody that laws are supposed to protect.  Law enforcement exists to serve and protect.  These mandates will make it much harder for them to protect.  That scares me.

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