Committee Hearing, February 11, 2009

COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PHILADELPHIA COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC SAFETY - - - Room 400, City Hall Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Wednesday, February 11, 2009 1:15 p.m. - - - PRESENT: COUNCILWOMAN DONNA REED MILLER, CHAIR COUNCILWOMAN JANNIE BLACKWELL COUNCILMAN DARRELL L. CLARKE COUNCILMAN WILLIAM GREENLEE COUNCILMAN CURTIS JONES, JR. COUNCILWOMAN JOAN L. KRAJEWSKI RESOLUTION 080177 - Resolution authorizing the Council Committee on Public Safety to investigate the expansion of the Philadelphia Community Court in order to reduce cost, reduce overcrowding within the prison system and empower the community. - - - V A R A L L O Incorporated Litigation Support Services Eleven Penn Center 1835 Market Street, Suite 600 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103 215.561.2220 215.567.2670 2

Good afternoon, everyone. The Committee on Public Safety is now in session. Would the Clerk please read the title of the resolution.

Resolution 080177, resolution authorizing the Council Committee on Public Safety to investigate the expansion of the Philadelphia Community Court in order to reduce cost, reduce overcrowding within the prison system and empower the community.

Thank you. Let the record reflect that in attendance are Councilman Darrell Clarke to my left, Councilman Curtis Jones to my left, Councilwoman Joan Krajewski to my right, to the far right, and Councilman Bill Greenlee, also to my right. And I am Councilwoman Donna Reed Miller, Chair of this committee. This is an official City Council hearing. I'd like to begin by 3 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 thanking those that have taken an interest in Philadelphia and the problems affecting our prisons and ultimately those citizens going through the judicial system and the prisons. Resolution 080177 was introduced to examine the Philadelphia community courts in order to reduce cost, reduce overcrowding within the Prison System and empower the community. As we are all aware, our prisons are more than overcrowded; they are bursting at the seams. Our current prison facility has a capacity of 6,180 inmates, while we push over 9,000 inmates through our prisons. The overcrowding, coupled with the budgetary crisis and the proposed cuts, only exacerbates this issue greatly. We need to look at other avenues to reduce the overcrowding, cut the administrative costs and keep the inmates from returning to prison. I want to thank Councilman Jones for introducing this resolution, 4 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 and with that, Councilman Jones, you have opening remarks?

Yes, Madam Chairman. I want to thank you for having -- Chairwoman. I want to thank you for having this hearing and members of the Committee taking their time to push to the forefront of this most important public issue. As we face probably the most difficult economic times since the Great Depression, we, along with the nation, the state and our municipality, are looking at making some tough public policy decisions. Twenty-five percent of our budget is reflected in police, courts and prisons. So any serious attempt to deal with the budget deficit has to address these three key areas. So as we look at it, if I recall, the past Police Commissioner and our current Police Commissioner both have stated that we cannot arrest our way out of the crime problem within neighborhoods. 5 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 So to put in context the nature of the problem, I'm going to give you some statistics: That the cost of the court system and to imprison inmates comes to approximately $34,000 a year, which is $95 a day per person. Our current population is over 9,700 inmates. Sixty-four percent of those inmates are awaiting trial, that roughly 1,000 of those inmates are non-violent offenders and for a number of reasons, including the fact that they cannot afford bail, sit in prison. That cost per day is close to a million dollars -- to be exact, $922,000 a day to incarcerate. Non-violent offenders represent about $33 million a year to incarcerate. So out of that population, it costs us about $117 million for people that are awaiting sentencing per year. This is a costly fact of life. Now, as we look at the idea of community courts, let me say what it is not. It is not the community courts that 6 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 we have known and loved in Center City. Community courts are not a one-size-fit-all opportunity for neighborhoods, and as I found out yesterday in our trip to Red Hook, it is not a hug-a-thug program. It is a tough, hard-nosed consideration for public policy that has a win-win-win scenario. City government wins if we can reduce the per day/per year cost of incarceration. Individuals win when we can say that punishment also is accompanied by a possible opportunity for a cure of the systemic problem as to the reason you got here. The third win is the community, because through restitution and community projects, often communities actually benefit from the sentences that are imposed. Now, during the course of the day, we're going to hear from some exciting testimony, which include most of the DA candidates. The next DA is probably going to be in these Chambers 7 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 sometime today, and it's going to be important for us to kind of get a sense of where we can -- what the possibilities are as to the mindset of what type of crime and punishment system that we can have going forward. As we make these tough choices, we need to be well informed. We need to engage the community as to some ideas as to how to do this better. For purposes of discussion, which are non-gender and non-racial, we're going to call an example of Pookie. Pookie is a car thief. Pookie has the opportunity now to look at two years of incarceration, which would be about $68,000 a year. Pookie also has an opportunity to go before a community-based court system, which can, in the sentencing process, look at a holistic approach to what is wrong with the individual, if in fact he has a drug problem, if in fact he has some other issues that can be addressed by society 8 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 in a cost-effective manner, in a cost-effective manner. So if we can reduce the dependence on public dollars to solve his problem and create a better human being, at the end of the day isn't that worthwhile?

So imagine an individual, instead of going into one of our facilities, coming into a situation where during the morning they are doing a public project where they're cleaning a lot or restoring a building that had graffiti on it, and then during that course of the day, some point of the day, they work on their GED, and during the course of the day, we know where they are through electronic monitoring, so that we know they're not out repeating those same mistakes that got them there in the first place. If we can accomplish that and save the taxpayers money, it is a win-win scenario. So as we go forth, we're going to look at some examples nationwide, some 9 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 local examples and try to figure out whether or not we can, at the end of the day, take those examples, move them forward and push us to a win-win scenario. Once again, thank you, and thank you to all of those in advance who are going to testify today.

Thank you. Thank you, Councilman. Does any other Committee member have any comments? (No response.)

Great. Our first witness is Everett Gillison and -- we'll let him go.

He speaks for the Administration. (Witness approached witness table.)

Please identify yourself for the record and state your name, where you work, and make sure you pull the mike close enough so 10 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 that we can hear you. DEPUTY

Well, thank you very much. My name is Everett Gillison. I'm the Deputy Mayor for Public Safety. I obviously work for the citizens of Philadelphia in that capacity, and I thank you, Chairman Miller and also members of this committee, for the opportunity to speak to this resolution. The concept of Community Court became a reality back in 1993, as we are all aware. It opened in Midtown Manhattan. This created a new legal culture. And I want to make sure that you understand the whole idea about Community Court is a culture-changing event. So I want to highlight that one point, and maybe we'll have an opportunity to ask questions and I'll be glad to answer some questions about how community courts impact on culture. But it succeeded in answering specific questions about the role of 11 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 court in the community's daily life, such things as how does a court solve neighborhood problems, what can courts bring to the table beyond coercive power, and what roles can community residents, businesses and service providers play in improving justice. This innovative concept of community court has been implemented in a variety of locations nationwide to deal with low-level criminal offenses. These courts have implemented a new way of doing business that impose immediate, meaningful sanctions on offenders, truly engaging the community, and helps offenders address problems that are at the root of their criminal behavior. Due to the success of the Midtown Community Court, New York City expanded this concept by creating the Red Hook Community Justice Center in Brooklyn. The Red Hook Center is located in a low-income neighborhood, similar to areas here in Philadelphia that could 12 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 benefit from a community court. At Red Hook, a single judge hears local cases that ordinarily are heard here in Philadelphia three different courts, the Civil Court, the Family Court and Criminal Court. As Councilman Jones knows, yesterday I attended and went to Red Hook with him, and we saw how one judge was able to handle not only individual matters dealing with traffic, but things that dealt with also the criminal matter, housing matters, a variety of issues all at the same time. That's a very unique approach, and I thought that is something we can also seek to explore. By having a single judge handle matters traditionally heard by different decision-makers at different locations, the Justice Center offers a swift and coordinated judicial response. The judge has an array of sanctions and services available, including community restitution projects, on-site job 13 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 training, drug treatment and health counseling, all of which are vigorously monitored to ensure accountability and to encourage individual responsibility. Red Hook seeks to engage the community by implementing a number of innovative programs that engage the community in aggressive crime prevention. This is working in two ways: by solving local problems before they become court problems and by helping knit together the fabric of the neighborhood. Red Hook's goal is to strengthen families and help individuals avoid further involvement within the court system. Services are not limited to court users. And I want to emphasize that as a unique feature also. Services are not limited to court users, but are available to anyone in the community who needs help. Many of the features of the Red Hook Center just addressed have a direct impact on empowering the community. As a precursor to Red Hook, New York Midtown 14 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 Community Court was based on a model designed to address low-level crime that is part of their daily life. Many of the features of that model were also used conceptually when creating Red Hook.

The Midtown model emphasized locating the court in the community close to where the crimes are taking place; repaying the community damaged by low-level crime by requiring offenders to compensate neighborhoods through community service; using the leverage of the court to sentence offenders to complete social services that will help them address problems such as drug addiction or involvement in prostitution; bringing the court and the community closer by making the courthouse accessible, establishing a community advisory board and publishing quarterly newsletters; and using the court as a gateway to treatment and making social services available to offenders right at the courthouse. These concepts implemented in 15 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 New York are examples of how to bring about community empowerment and certainly are worthy of consideration as we explore the expanding role of Community Court here in Philadelphia. The potential for cost reduction is significant, and we acknowledge that, since the Community Court is able to deal with a wide variety of low-level offenses that may otherwise have been resolved within the judicial court system, which has significantly higher cost per case basis. Cases impacted would be comprised of a very large percentage of summary offenses and, in some cases, less serious misdemeanors. The shorter time between arrest and arraignment and the small number of jail sentences after arraignment validate the basic premise, that Community Court has the ability to effectively substitute community service and social service referrals for days in custody. An expansion of Community Court could 16 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 potentially reduce the overall prison population on any given day since many of these cases that are dealt with in the Community Court are handled in a more efficient manner and often reduce or eliminate time in custody. Reducing arrest-to-arraignment time saves on custody charges that are currently running approximately $95 per day per prisoner. During the period of February 2002 and to the end of 2008, the Philadelphia Community Court, I understand, heard 55,344 new cases. Of these cases, 10,026 were misdemeanors. 5 million over the 81 months since the beginning of Community Court. During this same period, the value of community service performed as a result of disposition of cases we understand was 17 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. million. The impacted community derived a benefit from the services performed. million in fines and court costs that actually represented previously uncollected revenue. And up-to-date values for revenue, I understand from talking with the coordinator, Mr. Babcock, will be available in the near future. An analysis of all the available statistics related to the existing Community Court here in Philadelphia could be used to extrapolate potential cost savings if the community court system were expanded. Much of the information that I am presenting here today is drawn from various publications, from my own personal experiences and also information from the Bureau of Justice Assistance. The Bureau is part of the Office of 18 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 Justice Programs with the United States Department of Justice and has available a variety of publications that offer an excellent review of how many communities throughout the United States have implemented the community court system. Before I end, I just want to say that when you end up looking at the value of Community Court and its role that it could have, it is something that is very exciting as we go forward. I am mindful that we have a huge, as this Committee knows, a huge issue with the budget as we go forward, but it doesn't cost us anything to both address and investigate what the alternatives would be.

And so I thank the Committee on Public Safety for giving me the opportunity to appear before you today offering these views on the potential benefits of expanding Community Court here in the City of Philadelphia at this time, and I'd be glad to take any questions on behalf of the 19 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 Administration.

Thank you. Thank you for your testimony. Councilman Jones.

Thank you, Madam Chairperson. First of all, thank you for bringing this issue to the forefront of the agenda. I was taken aback by our trip to Red Hook yesterday. I have never been in a courtroom environment where everybody was just happy: the defendant, the judge, the prosecutor. You know, it was amazing to me. I've been in CJC. I've been to other court environments, and it was amazing to me how that atmosphere was one that was transformational not only for the community but for the defendants and all those involved. My question is -- and I got some of this from you yesterday -- how have you rejuvenated the Criminal Justice Coordinating Committee? And I use that 20 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 to say, how do we then bring that to a specific project like community courts? DEPUTY

Yes. We are in the process -- as I explained to you yesterday, we have started -- the Mayor ran on and actually wanted to implement the Community Justice Advisory Board. The prior Community Justice Coordinating Council or Center, however you want to entitle it, there were certain pluses and minuses, and the Mayor thought that the best way for us to go forward is to join with all the other counties that are here in the state that had fully functioning Community Justice Advisory Boards. Through the Pennsylvania Commission on Crime and Delinquency, CJABs, as they are currently known, are the funding mechanism by which all money from the state is going to actually come down, and CJABs will actually be that funding mechanism for all the various programs. We began meeting as a steering 21 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 committee just to be able to put the basis forward as of August, and we will continue to meet as a steering committee as we go forward at least on a monthly basis. We are still in the process of adopting the various structures that have to be in line, but once that is accomplished, I think that you will be able to see that ideas such as this will have a place not only for the stakeholders to actually discuss what the impacts are on their individual areas, but also actually come to some conclusion as to how we proceed and go forward. Implementation, even though we talk about a criminal justice system, for those of us that have worked in this area, as I have most of my life, we understand that we are more a collection of individual entities than we are a system. We process people as we go through, but everyone has a role to play, and it is through a respectful honoring 22 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 of the individuals' roles that I have tried to push things forward, while at the same time making it clear that the one thing that we have in this city that other cities because they don't have it, but we are a city and a county. It is an opportunity, while we still have the burden of carrying all these costs, to at least be at the table talking to independent agencies about how they need to address certain problems within the system. I am mindful and, as Council does know, currently we provide $114 million to the First Judicial District for it to go forward. We provide up to $37 million to the District Attorney's Office for it to proceed. We provide somewhere on the order of $33 million for the Defender to take part, the Sheriff's Office. So all of the component parts we pay for, and, therefore, it is incumbent upon the City to have not only a voice at the table, but I think that a voice that 23 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 needs to direct where we're going so that we're all able to be respectful, honoring everyone's individual roles. But we understand that we are paying the freight, and as a result, I think that we have the opportunity today to be at the table to help work with people as we go forward. So CJAB is going to be a way for us to work forward and look at what is going to come forward and to at least give advice as to how we need to structure a systemic approach to a problem that we have going forward. So I look at CJAB as not only a beginning, but as a way of us continuing our dialogue with our partners in this area.

I'm going to yield to some of my colleagues that have some questions, but I want to come back to some of the specifics of monitoring, electronic monitoring. DEPUTY

Not a problem. 24 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177

Councilman Greenlee.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Good afternoon, Mr. Gillison. DEPUTY

Good afternoon.

In your testimony, I was interested particularly when you say at Red Hook -- and I know we have somebody testifying from there, but you say that one judge hears cases at what would normally be three different courts. How difficult would that be to do that in Philadelphia? I mean, what kind of changes -- is it something that the court could just decide on their own? I'm just trying to figure out how -- obviously here nobody does that. DEPUTY

That's very true. I mean, we do have -- and I can tell you that there has been a lot of dialogue around the models. I know that our Community Court has done an excellent 25 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 job in pulling people together. I know that having not only been around when the Community Court was instituted but having seen how it has developed, you have several partners that are the same partners that are in Red Hook. We have the Office of Behavioral Health. The same thing is available in Red Hook. We have the Defender Office with their social services office there at our Community Court. We have a lot of the same kind of partners, but what we don't have that Red Hook did have is, there was a judge there that actually took on the housing issues, took on the traffic issues, took on the support issues and took on all of those various things, including the criminal stuff. And so when you pull all those things together, that was something that while I had read about it, having to sit down and talk with the judge there and he said that that came from the Supreme Court -- that came from their Court of Appeals, which 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 is the equivalent of our Supreme Court here, and it gave me some pause to say maybe that's something we might want to see whether or not we would be able to do that. Obviously if it's something that we would be able to afford, it's something that maybe we would have an opportunity to discuss. But it took their Court of Appeals, it took their Chief Judge to actually say, This is something we're going to do on a pilot basis. They did that many years ago, and now the judge that's there, a wonderful gentleman, who basically said this was his passion. He reminded me on certain of the judges that we have here who really get excited by the fact that they can actually have an immediate impact on people's lives. He adjourned court one day when he was doing a housing matter, walked across the street, which was public housing, and said, This is wrong, fix it, and then came back to Community Court. 27 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 And the people saw that, and that's what the empowering piece about Community Court, how it really can impact a community and make it go forward.

This might sound sarcastic, but that sounds so easy for a court system. It's hard to believe. So if it was done, say, in Philadelphia, it would have to be done by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court? DEPUTY

We would have to have the cooperation of the Supreme Court in order to make that done, and work with our partners there. And I don't think you would have an issue there. I mean, obviously we're in tough times, but we're looking at creative ways of handling these issues, and we have to just investigate it to see how it would go.

Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. 28 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177

Thank you. Councilman Jones.

It was actually Councilman Clarke.

Councilman Clarke.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Good afternoon, Deputy. DEPUTY

Good afternoon.

First, I'd like to commend my colleague. He is no 16 longer a freshman, so I'm not going to call him that -- I know he keeps using that tag -- for bringing this issue up. It is much needed. I personally had the opportunity to participate in the Community Court here locally, because it was located in my Council district, and I saw the wonderful work that they were doing there, and one of the biggest 29 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 challenges was, frankly speaking, having the resources to expand it. And I think we actually -- I don't know if we did it legislatively or by order, but we actually expanded the eligible areas, the boundaries up into parts of North Philadelphia, because we clearly understood that the ability to have it in some of those neighborhoods would enhance the program. So I'm happy to see that the Councilman wants to take it in full force out to those neighborhoods, and I truly think it will make a change. A couple of questions. One I had earlier prior to your testimony, but one relating to your testimony, particularly as it related to the City's contribution to all of the various agencies that would have to participate in this. I thought to some degree I wasn't going to mention it here, but we are getting close to our budget scenario and I wanted to kind of put it out there. As it relates to the City's 30 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 contributions -- and the more I'm thinking about that, I probably shouldn't say this, but I'm out there on a limb now. As it relates to the City's contribution -- and I understand that you say it sets the basis for us being engaged in a process in trying to coordinate activities in the current and hopefully the future justice system, if in fact the Councilman is successful, because I really -- I would love to see him drive this train on the expansion -- and we needed to be in a position to have some resources diverted from the existing Criminal Justice Center as it stands today, diverted to enact something like this on a broader level, understanding that it ultimately would save money, save lives and save communities -- and you don't have to answer today, I understand, because you're not -- DEPUTY

Thank you very much. 31 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177

I didn't want to lay this on you, because I know you have very serious --

If you want to. DEPUTY

If I want to, I can.

Would that be something that the Administration would consider, if we wanted to adjust some of our funding scenarios to provide the resources to some of these alternative locations, as opposed to simply funding what most people believe to be the CJC, the District Attorney's Office and all of the other agencies that participate in our Criminal Justice Center? And I'll keep talking, so I won't leave a pause for you to answer that. The second part of my question, which is one I had prior to your testimony, over the years -- and I know a lot of the Councilmembers that have been 32 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 here for quite some time had some level of frustration in trying to access the existing community service individuals or programs, because I know that there is various both state, municipal and federal, and during the course of time, we've always tried to, when we had functions in neighborhoods or we had neighborhood clean-ups or whatever, we were always trying to get the support, because in some of the communities we have a lot of elderly individuals. We just don't, frankly speaking, have the people there to help us in some of these community initiatives, and you can never get a sense of who you would call. You end up calling a group like Self Help, which is an individual group, and say, Hey, can you send ten guys over here to help us with this community program today. But I always thought that there should be something within government to kind of coordinate those activities, and I say that more so than before, given the 33 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 fact that we're going to be, given our potential $2 billion budget deficit, we're going to be asking our citizens to do more as it relates to our communities. And not to try and get free labor, but if individuals have been mandated community service, I would think that we would maximize those opportunities to give these people a chance to give back to the community and provide support to the community, in addition to which, frankly speaking, helps supplement our inability to provide traditional City workforce to do some of these things in these neighborhoods. So I would like to see -- well, first we can get a response from you. DEPUTY

Sure. I can tell you that the -- more to your second point than the first.

That's okay. DEPUTY

That's an excellent idea. I think that that's 34 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 something that we can probably begin to bring, and I will bring that up at one of our CJAB meetings in order to sit back and be able to say to the judges and to the District Attorney and to the various components of each of those areas. When a person is ordered to do community service, there is a follow-up mechanism that already exists. So I think what you just need to have is what are those resources, where do we access them and what can they do. And I think that that's something we can probably put together, and I'll make that available and I'll give it to the Councilwoman, the Chairperson, so that we can at least give a baseline for what's available and what's out there. I know that we always have to be -- and I know in the back I don't have to say too much without my counsel, Mike Resnick, who is behind me, saying that we can't ever talk about supplanting current workers with people who are doing 35 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 community service. That would be inappropriate under any contract that we would have with our union partners, and we would not want to do that. But the opportunity to use community service for what it really truly is, it's part of the restorative justice model, and I have been -- I've been in this area for 30 years. Restorative justice is true justice. Anyone else that talks to you about the other means of what a justice system is about without talking about restorative justice never really gets the full feeling about what justice is truly about. There has to be opportunities for people who have done something wrong to pay back without necessarily always the only thing that we do is lock them up. We are coming to the point, I think, as a result of the true cost of locking people up that we are finally going to have to ask the big question, Do we have to lock someone up in order to restore to the community what it lost or 36 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 is there another way. And I agree with the Councilman when I said I've never been part of the hug-a-thug kind of mentality either. My point has always been, there are those individuals that do have to pay a price. I was a trial lawyer, and I still consider myself a trial lawyer today. There are times you just have to go to court and fight things out. That's what our system is, and I believe in it. But for the majority of the people, where we're talking about the true restorative justice, restorative justice gives the community a sense of being part of the process where they have heretofore been excluded, and that's the power that we have to really harness, of getting everyone back at the table. It's not just a victim's rights issue. It's not just a defendant's rights issue. It's not just a community right. It's everybody back at the table talking about what makes us whole as a community, and 37 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 giving people an opportunity to go forward in community service, true community service, is really what the justice system needs to be about. And so I look forward to not only providing you with the opportunities of where we currently have community service, but also where we really want to take it to the next level. Because I agree with you that we're going to have to talk about what are we going to do given the billion-dollar problem that we currently have in front of us. As to the first part, I will have to decline.

I understand. DEPUTY

Because, as you know, after our marathon meeting the other night, scenarios are in front of us. It is no secret that this issue is before us, because if the courts cut back or we cut back, there are a lot of things that we need to do we can't do. 38 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 I think it would be a mistake, but the fiscal realities that are before us are real. I keep telling people there's a lot of things -- and people who know me know that I have stood for a lot of things that need to get done. I would hate to have to take a step back and say, We can't fund these things. That may be a reality. I don't know as I sit here today. But those are some of the issues that I'll be struggling with on behalf of the Administration over the next six weeks before we come back to you with the ultimate decision that the Mayor makes on the budget address that he'll have on March the 19th. So I will decline, but obviously I will look forward to working with you as we respond to the many challenges that are in front of us.

Thank you, Deputy. DEPUTY

Thank 39 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 you.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Councilman. Deputy Mayor, I'd just like you to keep in mind that -- and I know you know it -- that this saves the City money. So I would think that we could figure out a way to get this done, particularly since it saves so much money. And I don't really know how much, and I'm reserving some of my questions for Red Hook. DEPUTY

Okay.

Are there any other questions? (No response.)

Okay. Thank you. Thank you for your testimony. DEPUTY

Thank you very much. And, again, Madam Chair, thank you very much for that, and thank you, members of the Committee, for having 40 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 me here. I appreciate the opportunity.

Great. Thank you. We will now have William Babcock, Community Court Coordinator. Philadelphia Community Court Coordinator, I'm sure. Paul Levy, President and CEO of Center City District. Is Paul here? I didn't see him. Or is anyone here representing Paul Levy?

I am, Madam Chair.

Great. James Brodick, Project Director, Red Hook Community Justice Center. (Witnesses approached witness table.)

Please identify yourself for the record and pull the mike close enough so that we can hear you.

I'm Bill Babcock, 41 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 the Center City District's Coordinator for the Philadelphia Community Court, and I want to thank Madam Chairwoman for allowing us to testify today and the entire Committee. First of all, I'd like to say that in a previous life, I served as the Special Master for the Federal Court in a jail overcrowding case, the first jail overcrowding case. I understand there's a new one now. So I'm well aware of the problems that the City has encountered in that respect. As Councilman Jones indicated, there are different types of community courts. They're adaptable to the community that they're developed in, and that's what makes them unique and special. I want to talk about today what -- well, to use Councilman Clarke's word, the wonderful work that your own Philadelphia Community Court is doing right here in your own backyard. I think it's a court that's been probably 42 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 under-publicized. If we have a simple message today, it is that after seven years of operations, the Community Court is an overwhelming success. It is effectively addressing quality-of-life crimes, which include summary offenses and non-violent misdemeanors, reducing their negative impact on Philadelphia's neighborhoods. Since 70 percent of those arrested for quality-of-life crimes suffer from drug and alcohol abuse, the Court is addressing those underlying problems by providing on-site access to a broad array of social and medical services and preventing many individuals from spiraling downward into more pernicious forms of addiction and from committing more serious crimes. Finally, through an emphasis on restorative justice, the Court is ensuring that the defendants are repaying communities for the harm that they have caused by performing community service. 43 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 Now, in the interest of time, I think I'm going to skip over the background on how the Court was created, but it is described in detail in the written testimony. The Philadelphia Community Court opened in February of '02. The initial plan was for the Court to include only the 6th and the 9th police districts, which is Center City. But in order to provide a sufficient caseload to make optimal use of the assignment of a full-time municipal court judge, the boundaries were expanded on two occasions, as a matter of fact. We now include ten police districts, which encompasses approximately square 19 miles, in which 421,000 Philadelphians 20 reside and over 500,000 people work and 21 visit each day. 22 As for our operation, one of 23 the big problems in the Criminal Justice 24 Center is failures to appear. To avoid 25 high rates of FTAs customarily found in 44 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 these types of cases, defendants arrested during hours of operation are brought to the Court for same-day adjudications. Those arrested during non-business hours are given citations or subpoenas to appear the very next business day. To address the high percentage of arrestees with substance abuse problems, four social service staff in the Department of Behavioral Health are located on site to do initial screenings, make sentencing recommendations, perform full drug and alcohol assessments, conduct drug treatment readiness and anger management classes, and place defendants in long-term treatment programs, including obtaining insurance coverage and providing casework oversight. From our opening in February of '02 through December of '08, social service staff had done over 1,700 drug and alcohol assessments, 11,300 clients had attended one of our classes, and a full 486 clients had completed long-term drug and 45 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 alcohol treatment and gotten their lives back on track. To address non-treatment needs, the Court also may order a social service assessment to determine whether the defendant may need assistance with housing, employment, literacy training, et cetera.

To the extent possible, we try to be a one-stop shopping facility. The social service staff has developed an extensive network of referrals for these services, and in the case of BEBASHI, has arranged to have staff from that organization on site once a month to meet with clients directly to address their AIDS and HIV issues. The Court also has a part-time Public Health nurse on site to provide an array of services, including emergency care, health education classes, primarily for defendants charged with prostitution, medical exams to determine ability to perform court-ordered community service, and testing and counseling for sexually 46 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 transmitted disease. For those requiring a continuation of care and don't have a primary physician, the nurse arranges for them to be seen at the Mary Howard Health Clinic. Through December of '08, the nurse had seen over 3,100 clients and assisted with their healthcare needs. The Court also includes a punishment/restitution component, which you've heard some about already from Mr. Gillison. Rather than imposing incarceration when our jails are severely overcrowded, the Court assigns community service, usually three or four days. It serves both as a punishment and restitution to the neighborhoods that have been harmed by the crime. Defendants are placed with pre-approved non-profit organizations, which supervise the assignments and report back to us as to whether a defendant has appeared and performed the work. Through December of '08, our clients have performed almost 408,000 47 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 hours of community service, and using the minimum wage as a standard, I think Mr. Gillison already reported, the value of the work performed to the neighborhoods was over $2,350,000. The Court also has been effective in collecting monetary restitution and fines and costs. Through December of '08, the Court had collected and dispensed $33,300 in restitution to individual victims. While we don't have figures yet on fines and costs through the end of '08, through June of '07 we had already collected over $1,440,000 in fines and costs. It should be noted this is money that previously had never been collected in summary offense cases prior to the establishment of Community Court, and none of that money comes back to us. When a defendant pleads guilty or no contest, the Court's sentence is suspended, and the carrot at the end of the stick for the defendant is that if he 48 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 completes the terms of the service, the District Attorney's Office withdraws the charges and no conviction appears on the individual's record, whether his name is Pookie or not. I like that. In the design and early operation of the Court, we obtained a great deal of technical assistance from the Center for Court Innovation, which I think you're going to hear from next. However, I think it is fair to say, and I think you should take some pride in the fact that after seven years, the Philadelphia Community Court has also become a model for other jurisdictions, not only in the United States but around the world. Since our opening, we have been visited by representatives from Washington, DC; California; Ireland; Germany; Malaysia; the Netherlands, and more locally the Judiciary Committee of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives and also Councilman Jones. We support the idea of creating 49 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 additional community courts in Philadelphia. When we first appeared before City Council many years ago to request funding, we presented it as a demonstration project which, if effective, could be exported to other neighborhoods. Now, this is where I'm going to do a little bit of lobbying. It is our position today that the City must first make sure that it is funding the existing Community Court, which is working successfully, before it begins planning other community courts.

The current consolidated budget for the Court is about $1,750,000. That includes contributions from the First Judicial District, the District Attorney, the Public Defender, the Police Department, Department of Behavioral Health, Philadelphia Health Management Corporation, the City for rent, utilities and operating expenses, and the Center City District contributes $515,000 to 50 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 support administrative and coordination functions. Without all of these partners, the Court simply would not work. But we want to emphasize that even before the current budget crisis, we were informed by Municipal Court that it would not be able to fund two of the personnel positions integral to operation beyond June of '09. And now, as we are all well aware, with the City asking the FJD to take additional budget cuts in FY10, the very survival of the existing Community Court is very much in jeopardy. And without a commitment from the City to continue funding, the Center City District will no longer be able to provide the $500,000 each year to administer and support the operation despite its obvious success. Now, an option to opening a new community court would be to expand the boundaries of the existing one by adding an additional police district. We have no objection. An analysis, however, 51 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 would need to be made as to how many new cases an additional district would generate and whether the Court could absorb them both in terms of courtroom and program personnel. So in conclusion, we believe that the Philadelphia Community Court actually saves the City money, reducing prison costs, reducing the cost of more serious drug addition, reducing recidivism, reducing the number of more harmful and more serious crimes. We are fully supportive of replicating or expanding the Court, but it is our position that none of these conversations make sense unless the City is prepared first to continue funding for the existing operation. So, again, I thank you for the opportunity to testify today and be happy to answer whatever questions you might have.

Thank you. We're actually going to let 52 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 Mr. Brodick go next before we have any questions. We're going to hear from everyone before we take any questions.

Okay.

Thank you. Mr. Brodick.

My name is James Brodick. I work for the Center for Court Innovation and I'm the Director at Red Hook. First of all, I want to thank the Council for allowing me to come down here and talk about lessons learned, both from New York City and specifically to Southwest Brooklyn, a neighborhood called Red Hook. And, Councilman, I thank you for coming down yesterday. You really inspired and motivated us as well to continue doing this work. The history of the Center for Court Innovation really came from the Chief Judge of New York City, Judge Kaye, who said that the court system, if it was 53 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 a business, would be out of business, that we're using 19th century solutions for 21st century problems, that courts can't just process cases and at the end of the day not think about outcomes. So we basically in Red Hook are trying to look at three outcomes that we're trying to prove each day. One is in the courtroom, that crimes matter, that people who commit crimes need to be held accountable for their actions, but at the same time, the court has a responsibility to look at the underlying reasons why people are getting arrested and to address them so they stop coming through the court system a life sentence, 30 days at a time. The court system is the last line of defense, and if the last line of defense can't make the tackle, what we're going to see is overcrowded prisons and a lot of conversations about reentry. When defendants are arrested, they don't go away forever. They come 54 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 back to the neighborhoods. So it's neighborhood residents getting arrested. And we need to think about, as a court system, not only about responsiveness to crime, but we also need to think about preventing crime in the first place. So we do that in three ways. One is through outcomes like I mentioned, and that's using things like an arrest is a point of crises and a point of opportunity. The crises is the arrest, and they need to be held accountable. The opportunity is to identify do they need job training, do they need drug rehabilitation, do they need educational classes. That is our role, to find that out and get them there. Also, the reason why the Justice Center is a multi-jurisdictional court is because of all the unintended consequences that happen in a criminal court case. Somebody who pleads guilty on a drug charge in New York City and gets out of jail that day, for many ways 55 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 that's a success. The defense attorney says, Hey, least restrictive, I got you out. Person walks out saying, I don't have -- my case is adjourned. And then about a month later, they get a letter from the New York City Housing saying that guilty plea is a violation of your lease and now you have a housing court case. Judges, attorneys, they don't think about the unintentional consequences of the small, low-level crimes. That is the reason why we in Red Hook chose the model of being multi-jurisdiction. The second responsibility we feel like the court system has is to engage community residents to be part of the process. The court system is one of the few bodies where people don't know what happens. Litigants stand in front of judges. That case ends, and if you ask them what just happened, they say, I don't know. We have to do a better job in 56 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 not only having people educated about their cases, but having people, especially low-income folks, people of color who come through the criminal justice center, to get involved. And the way we do that is, since 1995 we have a national program called AmeriCorps where we recruited community residents who live in Red Hook to serve the community by being part of the Red Hook Community Justice Center, doing community needs assessment, starting up baseball leagues, organizing National Night Out Against Crime. These are ways of getting folks involved.

And then finally why we exist is as a demonstration and a technical assistance project. Unfortunately, I can't bring everybody down to Brooklyn to come see our court, so in a second, if it's okay with the Council, we're going to show a video about the community courts. And in this work as a demonstration project, what you start to 57 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 learn is that if you're on the ground level, that community residents start to build trust in the criminal justice system, that victims are more likely to cooperate with the DA's office and give information and testify, that community residents no longer will accept drug dealing in the lobbies of their hallways, that they will actually volunteer to be part of tenant patrols, and that community service and the restitution projects and the alternatives to incarceration is getting people back on track. And the last thing I would talk about in regards to kind of cost-benefit analysis, in the 1980's Life Magazine called Red Hook one of the ten most crack-infested neighborhoods in the country. Now we have Ikea opened up their largest store in the country in Red Hook, Brooklyn. If bullets were flying in the streets and prostituting were happening right across the street from 58 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 where the store opened up, this $30 million business wouldn't be in Red Hook, Brooklyn. So not only are we talking about saving people's lives, reducing prison costs, adjudicating cases in a better way, but we also are talking about bringing jobs to a community that didn't have it before the work of the Community Justice Center. I am not naive enough to say that community courts solve all of these problems, but we played a role with police and community residents to get Red Hook where it is. So what you're going to do is, you're going to see a video right now. And please do remember that this is not an optimum court. People get arrested, come to Red Hook and that's where a case gets adjudicated. )

Thank you.

Councilman Jones.

For those 59 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 who watched this film, I had an opportunity to, along with Deputy Mayor Gillison, to actually go and sit behind the bench with the judge. You could have seen the exact same reaction from individuals that were being tried in realtime. And I'm going to ask specific questions, but one of the things I would like to put on the record was, the most amazing thing I ever saw was a young man being sentenced. His sentence was to take the GED test. He had criminal trespass, I think was the crime, and he was happy, even joyful as to the sentence to be sentenced to school, so much so that at the end of the judge's comments -- and that was the same judge -- he asked, Your Honor, can my girlfriend who came with me today get sentenced, too? It was the most amazing thing I have ever seen in my life, and with that, I want to thank you for exposing us to that, and I would encourage my colleagues 60 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 that if you ever need to get up to New York, you might want to stop by Red Hook and all those people that are here today. One question I have is, local is better in this model, that the justice system is a huge, large, complex machine, but by getting local, you're able to kind of deal with a more personal justice system and a more connective justice system. And can you explain that process a bit?

Right. Again, there's a lot of different ways of doing community courts, and some ways are having it in its main court system and improve the effectiveness and efficiency of courts. The Red Hook model was really brought to the community because of community needs, where folks realize that if we go down to the downtown courts and we get all of these services, it really wasn't going to trickle back to the neighborhoods, that people were feeling affected. 61 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 And so a lot of what we tried to do in Red Hook talks about the idea of people walking into the front door to access services voluntarily. The court, again, is responsive. People got in trouble and now we're going to come up with better ways of dealing with it. But there's also parents asking every day, I have a 15-year-old who is not doing anything. Community Justice Center, can you do something? When does a parent come to a court and ask them, Do you have a program that my kid can participate in? That's the culture that we were trying to change, and by being in the neighborhood, I like to say we're a community center that has a court. The judge wouldn't like that too much, but the court is going to give us a business. But it doesn't have to be the only way we get business. We can get folks walking in through the front door, and that's really the goals we're trying to accomplish. 62 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177

Can you, for our panel here, describe how the issues have evolved? As you tackled one problem, the evolution of how you get immediate feedback and then change the priorities of the services being delivered. That's an important aspect.

We have an active Community Advisory Board and we also have an on-site evaluator, and the Advisory Board is very much in our face saying, Red Hook Justice Center, what are you doing about blank? In 1995 when we started planning this process, it was drugs, drugs, drugs, drugs and drugs, and they were saying, How are you going to tackle that? And we said, The people who are selling drugs, the people who are committing felonies, the traditional court will handle that, but the people who are addicted, the people who are seeking -- who are demanding the drugs, we are going to get them rehabilitated. 63 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 And then we also started to try to change the norm of the neighborhood, that drug dealing is not okay in your lobby, and engaging folks in that. But we do a community-wide survey every two years, and in those surveys we've heard things now about issues are illegal dumping. I am so proud to hear illegal dumping as an issue, because that means that we have helped tackle some of the drug concerns and that people are walking into a court saying, What can you do about that. And really what we do is, we convene, just like what you're doing here today, is you're convening a body of people to talk about a problem and then using all of those resources to come up with solutions. The court, the Justice Center, doesn't solve anything. What we do is, we get people in the room who can solve things, and that's really what we've done. So that community-based survey, 64 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 having AmeriCorps members who live in the neighborhood, having an evaluator on site, that really dictates what the Justice Center is going to do.

What I'd like you to focus on is, in that evolution of what the main issue was, it went from drug dealers to then short dumping, but in the middle, there was a process by which the community gave you feedback as to the aggressive police tactics and how the residents felt about that. Could you share with the panel how you dealt with that?

Well, what's interesting about community courts is, the first critique or comment is, Are you going to put more of my neighbors in jail? And so the answer to that is, we're going to get people who are normally getting arrested, we're going to get them referred to better services. But over the course of time, the feedback that we would get is certain young people 65 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 saying, We are being identified by the police, people of color saying, We are feeling violated. Justice Center, what can you do about that? Our first thing is that the judge has communications with the local captains, the three captains that we serve, and that communication is given back to them all the time and letting them know they're on notice. But the second thing was, is that we needed to figure out how to diffuse situations. So in Red Hook, we do workshops on what to do when stopped by the police, so young people know how to get through a situation, so that warning doesn't turn into an arrest. And three years ago we started a new program called the Police-Teen Theatre Project, where we get police officers from our local precinct to work with teenagers, and they do improv comedy in local schools. The idea is, if you get cops and kids together and they start to realize the officer is just as nervous on these events that the kid 66 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 is, then we can start breaking down those barriers. We feel like that's a responsibility as well.

Just my last question is -- and I do appreciate my hometown product, and I'm going to say that for the record. One of the things when I was discussing this on our way up with Deputy Mayor Gillison, as I tried to make the difference between what Red Hook is and what our product is, and he made this crystal clear, is that you do serve as a community court, but the community happens to be Center City. And so you're more responsive to kind of that kind of priorities that are set there as opposed to where maybe in the 8th District where the priorities may be different. But you are responsive nonetheless in dealing with that as well. And hold a pin on that. But also I need to know how you are funded. How did you pull together coalitions of stakeholders to be funded?

Well, to your 67 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 first point, Councilman, originally we were supposed to be just a Center City community court modeled after Midtown Community Court, the first one in New York, which had been designed to deal with the Times Square district, which was a business community-driven project, but we expanded our boundaries in order to handle more cases, and as a result, we're actually more of a plural, communities court at this point. I mean, we go all the way down. We cover all of South Philadelphia. We cover a large portion of West Philadelphia, University City, and we're now parts -- we handle the 22nd and 23rd police districts in North Philadelphia, which goes all the way up to Temple's main campus. So like Red Hook, we have a community advisory panel and we have representatives from different community organizations from all of those ten police districts. We meet with them once every other month. And, again, as with Red Hook, we find out 68 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 what are the problems in your neighborhood that we really need to address, and we always have a police captain at the meeting from one of those districts, and there's an incredible exchange of information between the police and the court and the community as to what the problems are and what can be done to solve them, and both sides learn a lot from that process. I can't remember what the --

Stakeholders and money.

Yeah, money. Well, originally we -- I mean, the Center City District put a fair amount of money into it in the beginning. We also were very lucky to get a large grant from Pew Charitable Trust. We got a two-year $500,000 grant to fund the program part of it. So, I mean, the courts -- the Municipal Court provided a judge and court officers, and the DA provided an attorney, the PD an attorney, and the 69 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 police provided staff on site, but in order to get the program staff, we needed that foundation money. Now, where we're running into some difficulties now is that that money is gone and we're trying to replace it. The Department of Behavioral Health has been willing to fund the program staff for the most part, but as I said earlier, there are a couple of Municipal Court staff that will not be able to be funded, we've been told, after June. So it can be a problem to continue one of these operations.

In Red Hook similar because we have the Chief Judge of the state supporting the project, to have the court operations, that is picked up by the court budget. What's challenging is kind of those peripheral programs that we talk about. And the Center for Court Innovation is a not-for-profit, and that allows us to do a lot of different avenues in regards to 70 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 raising monies, everything from going after local City Council money, going to foundations, going for federal grants, things like AmeriCorps and through SAMHSA. So we have been -- we really have to try to diversify our funding sources. And the challenge is, I think we can run a court well, because these cases would have gone to the downtown court. So the personnel wouldn't have changed, but when you start talking about what Bill is mentioning, is how do you make sure you have those peripheral programs, that's where the challenge comes. One of the ways that we try to combat that -- and I believe in cities like in Philadelphia where you do have a lot of community-based organizations and service providers, one of the things that I offer service providers, I say, If I can give you a space, a phone, a computer and access to people, would you give me a staff person. And on site we've been 71 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 fortunate enough to have different agencies, for the most part, on their own dime, because we are giving them access to people that they need to serve anyway for their grand purposes. So I think there's creative ways of thinking about this, but as community courts think about cuts, once you start taking away the social service providers, once you start taking away the community service supervisors, it becomes increasingly more challenged not to turn back into the traditional court.

Councilman, if I 16 can add one more thing, locally one of the things you'll need to address up front is getting a judge. I mean, we were told if you generate enough cases, we'll provide you a Municipal Court judge, and that's one of the reasons we expanded our boundaries. But there are only, I think, Municipal Court judges, 24 and there have been a couple of times 25 over the years where we've had to go a 72 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 whole week without a judge because there just weren't enough to assign. A lot of judges take vacation in August. The last two weeks of August there's very little justice in Philadelphia. In December a lot of people, of course, want to take a week or two off at the end of December. So there have been times over the years where we've had to close down for a week, and all of those cases get rescheduled for the week after we open. So that's something that needs to be addressed head on.

Wow.

I'd like to know, how does one's case end up in Community Court? And I'm glad to hear that you did say that the Philadelphia Court has expanded, because I actually thought it was still just mainly for Center City, and I thought 55,000 plus cases was a lot of cases in Center City. So I am glad to hear you said that. But how do we get to you? If I commit or 73 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 someone commits a crime, how does that crime end up being in Community Court versus regular court?

Good question. First of all, let me back up. I should have when I started this afternoon, I wanted to apologize. Paul Levy intended to be here and I thought he might even show up by this point, but I just heard that he can't be here, and he wanted to apologize. The way cases get here, within our ten police districts, the court system has something called PARS, P-A-R-S, which is their computer system. If the police arrest somebody for a summary offense within our ten boundaries and enter that information into the PARS system, the PARS system automatically issues a court date for Community Court either for the same day or the next business day, depending on the time of day that the arrest was made. The only summary offense we don't get is underage 74 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 drinking. That goes to a separate program. For misdemeanors, there are a list of about a dozen misdemeanor cases that are programmed in PARS. They're flagged in there. So if somebody within our ten police districts is arrested on one of those, it's flagged as a Community Court case, and then the District Attorney's Charging Unit reviews it and if they find out that there's some history of a violent felony arrest or conviction, then they will veto it and it's kicked out, but otherwise, it would come to us. And when the Bail Commissioner sets bail, which would be non-cash bail in these kind of cases, he'll give them a subpoena to appear in Community Court the next business day. So it's really pretty much done automatically through the PARS system.

Okay. And I guess one of the key differences between the Philadelphia and the Red Hook 75 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 Community Court is, people see Red Hook as a community center. I mean, I was thinking that. And they come to you anyway, whether they have a criminal case or not. If someone from the community -- it sounds like if someone from the community has a problem, they might come into Red Hook's center and get service; is that correct?

Yes, that's correct. That does not happen very much with us, and I think the main reason for that is, Red Hook was very fortunate, they found, as you saw in the tape there, a separate building. It's an old Catholic school building. It's a wonderful place. I envy it a great deal. We ended up at 1401 Arch Street on the second floor where we share a building with Probation and Pretrial Services, and most people don't want to just kind of wander in there off the street and say, I need help. I would prefer that we were located in a separate kind of storefront 76 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 type of building, and maybe that can happen in the future.

So if someone did wander in and said, I want some help, can you help me out, or if a defendant brings a sister, wife, mother, whomever to court looking for some social services, what would Philadelphia Court do?

We would help them. I mean, we would refer them over to our social service staff, who would sit down with them, do a screening, find out what it is that they needed help with. If there was something we could do there on site, they would be happy to do it, and if they need to be referred to another social service agency, we certainly would help them with that. The one small group of people who do come in without having been arrested are those who have been there already on previous cases and they have developed a relationship with somebody on 77 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 the social service staff. They trust that person, and some of those clients -- and we call them clients. Some of them do come back periodically for help, and they see it as kind of a safe haven.

I know that the way that Red Hook does it, it sounds like Philadelphia is paying for -- in a sense, has a budget line for social services; is that correct?

Yes.

Versus you're giving people space, a telephone and a computer, and they have to provide the service anyway and maybe even have to do community outreach, and that makes it you don't have to pay for that?

Of the 100 people that work at the Justice Center, there's of us who work for the Center for 22 Court Innovation. The rest are part of 23 agencies that we don't pay. But the 23 of us are part of the criminal court, but -- for the most part, part of the 78 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 criminal court budget or money has been raised by private foundations that are specific to that grant.

Right. Okay. All right. Good. Well, both courts seem to be doing a pretty good job. We'll just have to figure out how to get Philadelphia some free service.

I'd love that.

All right. Thank you. Councilman Greenlee.

Thank you, Madam Chair. First of all, Mr. Brodick, congratulations on what seems to be a great program up there. You're doing a good job. And, Mr. Babcock, I certainly would agree with Councilman Jones. I think Community Court here in Philadelphia has been a great addition. I think you're doing a good job over there. Actually, the Chairwoman asked a 79 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 couple of questions I was going to ask, so you answered those already. But one other and it relates sort of what I asked Mr. Gillison earlier. Jurisdictional, it looks like Red Hook can do a little bit more right now than maybe -- forgetting the funding issue, which is easy to forget, but forgetting that for the time being. As Mr. Gillison alluded to that there's some like sort of Family Court, maybe even Traffic Court issues that are involved. So there would have to be some changes before you could go as far as, say, Red Hook does.

Correct.

Saying you had all that. Let's forget our little billion-dollar deficit for the time being. Just if you had the money.

Right.

There still would be changes. And I guess I was wondering, do you foresee, as somebody who is in the system, any 80 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 reaction or negative reaction of that within the court of -- would that be a problem in sort of sharing what is now separate? It might be hard to answer.

Do I think the FJD would have a problem with it?

Yeah, or people involved in the system.

Well, it's hard for me to speak on behalf of the FJD. I have to work with them.

Every once in a while you got to have fun and do that.

Let me just say that originally the court system did not take a leadership role in this project and had to be kind of brought kicking and screaming along. But I think that has changed. In fact, right now there's a brand new President Judge for Municipal Court, Marsha Neifield. She has already come over to visit Community Court. I've already had several conversations with 81 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 her, and I think it's been very productive. And I think with Everett Gillison's assistance -- and he's a great addition to the criminal justice picture here in Philadelphia -- I think we could accomplish something like that, yes.

Okay. Sorry. I did put you on the spot. Sorry.

No. That's fine.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Madam Chairperson, I will move real quick, because I know we have some time issues for some of the other folks testifying, but real quick comparison. You have a year-round judge that kind of is stable as opposed to one that is assigned every rotation --

Right.

-- by Philadelphia. How much does that matter in the process? 82 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177

Well, I think it makes a big difference. I would very much prefer to have the Red Hook model. I mean, Judge Calabrese, you've met him. He's a special person. And the other community courts that I've seen or other problem-solving courts, like Drug Court here in Philadelphia, having a single judge is definitely preferable. We just have not found a judge -- originally we had one judge. Judge Pugh sat at Community Court on a permanent basis. Since she was transferred, we haven't had a judge who wanted to volunteer to do that. President Judge didn't want to assign someone without them volunteering, and so we have tried to do the best we can with a rotation system.

I want to say it's ideal but not necessary, and the reason I say that, I would hate to think that everything we built is predicated on Judge Calabrese sitting on the bench, that if tomorrow he retired or got 83 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 offered to be the Chief Judge of the state, that we would fall apart. So with that being said, I think it's critical to get the right judge, and I think there's many "right" judges to get, and I think it's critical to create a culture within the criminal justice system that we are making a paradigm shift to restorative justice, to looking at these low-level offenses in a very different way, and if we give you the proper tools, we monitor these cases closely and if, whichever side of the aisle you're on, if you want to be hard, that you want to get people back in front of you quickly, or if you're more lenient, we can do that as well, but the point of the matter is, the process and the system on culture has to be there for these community courts to work. But I do believe that getting the right judge is essential, but it's not only based on the judge.

The other 84 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 comparison I would make for the record is that I've been to both courts. Aesthetics and location matter in the sense that getting into our court you go through the same gate or portal that a lot of the probation --

Right.

And it is intimidating, to say the least, to get in. Once you get in, it's welcoming. I mean, internally you've done a good job with that. How much emphasis did you place on aesthetics in your location?

The first thing is the title. There's no word "court" in our title. Nobody gets up in the morning, saying, I'm so happy to go to court today. The name Community Justice Center came out of the neighborhood. The welcoming front area where you walk through, there's a lot of natural light. The court officers, the expectation of the court officers, is to be welcoming. 85 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 The whole idea is that you treat people with respect, and that's regardless if they're defendants, clients, community residents, kids. Whoever is walking through those doors, we don't know what they're walking through for, but they need to be treated with respect, and that is kind of the culture of the entire building.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you. Thank you. I'm very happy that you came, and we'll probably be talking to you again. Correct?

Yeah. We're going to come up and take another tour with my colleagues. And I want you to take a token of Philadelphia's esteem, which is a cheesesteak, back with you.

I got it in my bag. Thank you.

I wouldn't mind 86 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 having one myself.

Well, you're a local boy.

I got to buy my own?

He was asking Geno's or Pat's.

Okay. Thank you. Thank you very much. We do have to change the agenda around just a little because of some time issues that people have, and what we will do is have Brian Grady, Dan McCaffery, Dan McElhatton, Scott Sigman, Michael Turner and Seth Williams come up next. (Witnesses approached witness table.)

Normally it's three chairs you can put at this table, and some of the rest of you can actually sit on the side. And we'll have Seth go first, because I understand he has an emergency. But everybody that I called can come on up, just have a seat 87 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 at the table when it's your turn, pull the mike up, give us any identifying information and proceed with your testimony. You can absolutely sit there. Is that your old chair? MR. McELHATTON: It's familiar, Madam Chair.

Oh, okay. Somebody is missing, though, right? We have six people. Okay. Mr. Williams, since you're first, you can proceed with your testimony. Thank you.

Good afternoon, Madam Chairperson. How are you?

Good afternoon. Fine.

Good afternoon, members of Council, Councilman Jones. I'd like to first thank you for addressing this issue. I'd like to thank my Councilman, Councilman Jones, for championing this. As you recall, I ran 88 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 for District Attorney in 2005, and then, as now, the focal point of my candidacy is community-based justice and community-based prosecution and the removal of guns, illegal guns, from our community. So I'm glad you're tackling this issue. There are many different ways -- I'm glad to have followed Deputy Mayor Gillison and Mr. Babcock. There are many different ways that we can proceed with community-based justice. We have to find what's best for the City of Philadelphia. I have prepared text and I've given them to Council, but this is a matter that I'm so passionate about, I may deviate a little bit, amen, from the prepared text. But at the onset, what we have to understand is that the criminal justice system in Philadelphia is broken. Philadelphia leads the nation in the rate of homicides caused by handguns. 89 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 Fifty-nine percent of the felonies in the City of Philadelphia are dismissed for a lack of prosecution. It's twice the national average. And the number one cause of death for African American men under 35 is homicide. So the system is broken, and it behooves everyone within the sound of my voice that collectively we must find the answer. So I'm glad that my colleagues, former colleagues, the assistant district attorneys and opponents for this race are here today to speak about this issue that is so passionate to me, because if we're going to have justice, it has to be swift. It has to be efficient. Currently in Philadelphia it is not. And one of the ways that we can create that and we can fix that is through community-based prosecution. So as you know, for ten years, I was an Assistant District Attorney. In that time, I was promoted often and was asked to create a Repeat Offenders Unit 90 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 for the District Attorney's Office and serve as its first Chief, and I chose as a model for that community-based prosecution. I saw firsthand how the same criminals were released again and again to wreak havoc on their own neighborhoods. And since early in 2005, I have strenuously advocated that the City of Philadelphia adopt a system of community-based justice, a system that is proven effective in cities across the country. Community-based prosecution is a grassroots approach to criminal justice involving citizens, law enforcement and other government agencies in problem-solving efforts to address safety, fairness and quality of life. Prosecutors are presently assigned to courtrooms. Under a system of community-based prosecution, they will be assigned to neighborhoods. The City has 24 police districts, has the ten councilmanic districts, and as you were 91 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 discussing earlier, there are different needs possibly in the 8th District from the 4th District or the 10th District. The same is true for our police districts. A day-to-day, firsthand knowledge of the community and its residents are important in distinguishing a hardened neighborhood predator from a kid in need of early intervention. The knowledge and experience of the community-based prosecutor working in a community-based court can determine when the interest of justice and safety is best served through a lengthy prison sentence or an early intervention alternative. For some first-time non-violent offenders, the cause of justice is better served through alternatives to incarceration. Young offenders once exposed to the prison environment are far more likely to become recidivists upon release, earning progressively longer 92 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 sentences.

The chances that a young non-violent offender can be turned around are greater when exposed to work camps, work release programs and begin a life skill so they will not become a repeat offender. Should I be fortunate to win this election, I will ensure that the District Attorney's Office takes full advantage of these programs, freeing the much-needed prison space for offenders who belong in prison. We have to be smart on crime and not just tough. We have to use our resources for those that are truly violent, those that cause the most harm to our society. But to those that are first-time offenders, we do not need to clog our prisons, as you heard from the Deputy Mayor, with those that just couldn't pay their bail and are facing misdemeanors and we continue the case over and over and over again because of an inefficient system, a system where the 93 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 majority of police officers receive their notices for court the night before they go to court, where the majority of victims meet the DA the first time they go to court and meet a different district attorney every time they go to court. True community prosecution allows attorneys to act as problem-solvers, engaging in proactive crime prevention and working side by side with judges, the police and the community in a renewed focus on the quality of neighborhood life. The District Attorney has the power to fix this problem, without adding personnel or raising the budget, by instituting community-based prosecution as the foundation for the entire office. As District Attorney, I will make this program a priority, and I am looking forward to working with members of City Council to implement a system of community-based justice. Together, we will set high standards, demand 94 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 accountability and develop a system of justice for the 21st century. Together, we will again make the City of Philadelphia a great place to live, work and raise our families. And, again, you heard that there are many different possibilities, and as you heard from the Deputy Mayor, there are multiple entities in our criminal justice system, from the courts, the police, the Sheriff, Probation Department and the First Judicial District, to just name a few. It will take the leader of the District Attorney's Office to work in cooperation, not as the dictator but working in cooperation with all of those separate entities so that we can have a holistic approach to justice. And, again, I'd like to reserve the majority of my time just for answering any questions that you may have. And, again, I thank you for proposing this, championing it and 95 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 beginning a discussion that I hope will be very fruitful. Philadelphia, as you know, is a very parochial city. Working to improve our communities one community at a time will be our answer.

Thank you. Thank you for your testimony. Do you have to leave? Are you under time restraints?

I'll take a few questions.

Because normally what we would do actually is just wait until everybody does their presentation and then take questions. But if you have to leave, then I have at least one question for you.

I appreciate it.

You're leaving?

Yes, ma'am.

Okay. When you talk about community-based prosecution, what exactly does that mean? 96 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 Are you comparing that to a community court in a sense, or what does it mean?

Well, there are many answers. Many jurisdictions across the country do it in many different ways. When they instituted community-based prosecution in the District of Columbia, the assistant U.S. attorneys, which are the equivalent of the DAs in the District of Columbia, the homicide prosecutors handled cases geographically. In some jurisdictions, like Portland, Oregon, the DA is working in communities for quality-of-life crimes, to prevent crimes, and working very similarly with the Red Hook program. There are police districts, 19 Madam Councilwoman, and as the District 20 Attorney -- and there are six detective 21 divisions. Many of them have different 22 issues, different problems, but most 23 importantly, crime occurs geographically. 24 There are patterns of crime based on geography. Having the district attorneys 97 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 assigned geographically, be it by division, be it by district, will help them understand those patterns of crime, will help them understand which drug gang is selling drugs where, who's trafficking the illegal guns, where the prostitution problems are, where you have this or that. I grew up in the 18th District and when your car got stolen, everybody knew the brothers that lived on the 6100 block of Catharine probably stole your car. The people downtown in the Ivory Tower wouldn't know that. By placing the district attorneys in communities, either physically or just handling the cases from those districts -- and there's lots of different ways, and we have to find the best way economically, but it comes down to justice, and having them work with those people to make them more accountable to the public. And, again, assigning those DAs geographically, the 98 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 police are assigned geographically, the Probation Department is assigned geographically. The district attorneys will be able to subpoena those police officers, cut down the amount of cases that get continued over and over that add to the escalating costs that Councilman Jones described in his introduction.

So it basically means, though, that that one prosecutor or a team of prosecutors are assigned to that geographical area, so that follows the case all the way?

Exactly. And they would handle the case vertically from start to finish, as opposed to every time a victim goes to court, there's a different district attorney, they get the case the night before, they have to repeat their story over and over and over in a way that in many cases re-victimizes our victims.

All right. Thank you. 99 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 Are there any questions?

Thank you for your testimony.

Thank you, Councilman.

Real quick. If I understood the definition and I understood the definition provided by both our local Community Court and our guest from Red Hook, generally, without being too committal, would you be committed to that concept, either one of those renditions?

Well, definitely. I believe that we have to have community-based prosecutors. The DA can do that. I will do that regardless of what the rest of the system does. But in the best scenario, we have community-based justice. We have the courtrooms where the people who receive not just sentences but restorative justice, where the victims can receive the training -- the defendants can 100 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 receive the training, excuse me, so they can have the life skills so they don't become repeat offenders. Our system is broken. We wait until people have been convicted 7 times. We wait until they kill someone 8 before we give them the resources they 9 need. We have to handle that on the 10 front end as opposed to the back end. 11

Thank you, 12 Madam Chair. 13

Thank 14 you. 15 We didn't assign anybody one, 16 two, three, four, five, so you guys have 17 to decide who goes next. 18 MR. McELHATTON: Can the oldest 19 go next? 20

Can the oldest 21 looking go next? 22

You can 23 do whatever you want to do. 24

We've decided to do 25 it alphabetically, which puts me -- 101 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177

Well, we do have them alphabetically here, but we had to go out of order because of Seth's emergency. So we can go back. Evidently you are Mr. Grady?

Correct. I'd like to say good afternoon, Madam Chairperson, members of Council. A special thanks to Councilman Jones for personally inviting me here today. I appreciate that. My name is Brian Grady. I'm here to testify on Resolution No. 080177, investigating the expansion of Philadelphia Community Court. As an attorney who has personally worked in Community Court, I'd like to say that it's a great court. It's past time that it needs to be expanded. So I'm very appreciative that the Council is looking into that. As the City's chief prosecutor, which is what I hope to be, the DA would have very significant interest in the political expansion -- I'm sorry; the 102 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 potential expansion of the Community Court. The availability of alternative sentencing for minor offenders is crucial to reducing prison population as well as costs and allowing us to stay focused on keeping violent criminals off the street, two of the most important issues in the City today, the cost and the violence out there on the streets. Community Court currently offers sentencing for low-level, non-violent offenders. Its jurisdiction is currently basically limited to Center City and the periphery around Center City. People who commit crimes in those areas may be sentenced to the Community Court and can be sent back into their own community to provide community service, which has been shown to be probably the best reducer of recidivism. As the national and local economies begin to worsen, we can expect the occurrence of petty crime to rise. Those statistics have been available for 103 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 100 years. So we are on the brink obviously of that occurring. That makes it prudent and expeditious that Philadelphia examine its current Community Court program. There are a number of benefits to expanding Community Court. First, the alternative sentencing will save the criminal justice system, and thus the City, money. Probation costs will decrease significantly because these offenders won't be put on probation. Alternative sentencing will save on the $32,000 per year it costs to imprison someone in Philadelphia. It will also save significantly. The numbers I think you will find to be staggering. If we focus on taking misdemeanants and petty offenders and en masse funneling them through not only the current Community Court but courts in the districts in the City, you only need to check out my website to see what I'm talking about about community 104 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 prosecution. I will answer that question right on. I'm not talking about putting district attorneys into the neighborhoods. You cannot do that. It's the right idea. It's the wrong way to get it done. The detective divisions in this city already have courtrooms in those divisions. We go there on a daily basis to handle preliminary offenses. When I was a district attorney, we also handled petty offenses in those courtrooms. We need to go back and handle them again in those courtrooms. So when someone is taken off the street for a petty offense, a summary or a misdemeanor offense, they will now be given the opportunity to adjudicate that offense immediately. 60 in court costs that is created by creating -- that Quarter Sessions file will not need be created. You will immediately be able to extract a fine from the offender. The money from that fine will go directly 105 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 into the City's coffers. You will also not have to spend money on the overtime for the Police Department to then attend that hearing one, two, three, four or even up to, as I have seen, times in a 7 misdemeanor municipal courtroom in the 8 City. The cost saving will be 9 staggering, and as district attorney of 10 the City, I will effectuate that process. 11 Secondly, alternative sentencing will reduce the number of inmates and, therefore, the pressure on the Prison System.

This will help prevent civil rights violations and thereby save the City in legal costs. As members of Council, you're well aware of civil rights lawsuits that are brought against the City every day, many of them frivolous. However, in a cost-crunching society, sometimes money is paid out on those suits anyway. This, by reducing the pressure on the Prison System, will reduce civil rights violations and will reduce the 106 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 amount of money the City ends up paying. We're saving money here. Third, alternative sentencing improves the chance of rehabilitation for offenders. The availability of social services so soon after the offense is committed and the opportunity to gain skill while performing community services are long-term benefits which can carry with them after you've served that sentence. We will now make the offender vested in his community. As lifelong Philadelphians, which most people here are, an example to point to is when the school system went outside of their neighborhoods. We saw a lessening of the vesting in your neighborhood. Growing up in the City, you went to the school that was in your neighborhood and you were proud of that school because it was part of your neighborhood. A number of years ago, that system ceased to exist and I think immediately we saw neighborhoods begin to 107 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 deteriorate as the children in those neighborhoods were not as vested in their neighborhood as we were as young people. I'd like to quickly mention that community service also should not be thought of as punishment. You don't want to turn people off from serving it. Serving one's community is noble and should be encouraged and loudly appreciated. By engaging more non-violent offenders in the work of the community, they will establish that stronger connection to the community. They will be less likely to re-offend. The following steps should be taken into consideration: First, the District Attorney's Office should be, as I have been promulgating, organized according to detective divisions. This will streamline your prosecutions. There will be a prosecution unit that mirrors each detective division in this city. One district attorney will not handle the case from arrest to verdict, but one 108 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 prosecution unit will, with your most senior attorneys lending guidance and mentorship to your rookie and novice attorneys so that they will have better credibility and better ability to judge a court case, a file as was called in the District Attorney's Office. The community groups or neighborhood associations in each district will be known by the prosecution division in each district. So, for example, we're in Center City. Central Detective Division, which is the former North Central and Central Detective Division, will know the prosecutors assigned to Central Prosecution Division. The community leaders, the faith-based leaders, people like the Reverend McNear, will know who is assigned to his prosecution division. They will know what programs are available immediately. Many of the programs in the City are run by and staffed by lifelong residents of this city, people in the 109 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 City who came up through our public and parochial school systems. They will know who the prosecutors are. They will have direct access to the petty non-violent offenders as they are being taken off the streets. Neighborhood associations in the districts are a good start and should be helpful in identifying areas that need cleaning, seeding, painting. We have everything from people planting trees. I was in Holmesburg last night. They have a tree-planting program up there. They need help planting those trees. We have a mural arts program in the City run by -- and I'll take a plug from my undergraduate -- Dave McShane from LaSalle University, who is out there every day making buildings beautiful, sidewalks beautiful.

He needs helping hands. He'll get them under an expansion of Community Court. Offenders caught doing graffiti can be assigned directly to these mural 110 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 arts programs. People caught dumping can clean up sidewalks and vacant lots. Vandals can tutor or read at community centers or schools. The court can partner with Fairmount Park so that offenders can effectuate the tree-planting programs that are going on in places like Holmesburg. The assistant district attorney and the judges on a case can decide whether or not the offender is qualified for Community Court. This is the only county in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania where we have clearly and distinctly taken the charging process away from the Police Department. The District Attorney of Philadelphia, their office is charged with charging offenses in this county. We need to take that responsibility back and take it seriously, so that when an offense comes to the Charging Unit, it is dealt with appropriately and efficiently. Lastly, Community Court located 111 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 here at Broad and Arch, if resources permit, that Community Court should be expanded physically into the neighborhoods, as I've previously mentioned. The City can use existing space, as it did last September for the Fugitive Safe Surrender, where thousands of non-violent offenders turned themselves in at True Gospel Tabernacle in South Philadelphia. The reported cost of that four-day event was $75,000 for the event. However, that event saved the City many times that. So the expansion of this is a wonderful idea, and I think if we're able to implement the things I've just mentioned, it will be also a successful idea. Thank you.

I want to thank you for your testimony. And I'm going to give everybody equal time, but I would like to get to the kind of Q and A. So I take that as you will support 112 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 community courts.

Oh, absolutely. We need to support it, but we need to do it right also.

Okay. Appreciate it. MR. McELHATTON: Mr. Chair, McC has conceded that McE can go next. Mr. Chair, members of Council, I respect the time that you put in and I have submitted my testimony, and I will summarize. I commit myself to going to Red Hook and trying to recruit James Brodick to come here to run our Community Court system. If you look at the video, you have to believe we can do that, and we should do that. We have a moral and legal, I believe, obligation to consider those kinds of concepts and to do it. You heard the word "respect," and the respect came from the fact that the Chief Judge of the Court of New York said, We're doing this. 113 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 You heard Mr. Babcock say, We have resistance, and, therefore, we don't have continuity in the judges. That's leadership. What you will have to have is a coordinated and consistent effort with all of the elements of the criminal justice system coming to the table, the courts, the, DA's Office, the Police Department, the Probation Department, the Sheriff's Office, the social service agencies, and that starts with the Chief Executive on the second floor and the Chief Executive in the courthouse and the Chief Executive in the DA's Office. If it doesn't start there, it's not going to work. The other part that I would just suggest that we consider is two opportunities that's presented to us now. One, with the new stimulus package, there may be an opportunity for this Administration to look for some of those funds to either secure a building or to secure some facilities or other assets to 114 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 be able to fund it. I harken back to the 1990's when President Clinton came in and the stimulus package was in place. New police officers were hired, and those hires were then designated to various other departments so that you could perform some of the specialized functions. The time is right. The window of opportunity is open now for us to explore that. It may not work, but if we don't ask, we won't get. And the second part of that is that the new President has just appointed a Director for the Office of Religion-Based and Neighborhood Programs to have the religious-based communities and the community groups become more engaged in problem-solving. And as the President has said, there is a force for good greater than government, and that force is in the non-profit and in the faith-based communities. If we don't utilize that, if we don't take the 115 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 opportunity to get them involved, we will fail absolutely and positively. And one of the ways we can do so is by using some of the resources we currently have. As I heard Mr. Brodick speak and I heard Mr. Babcock speak, I was reminded of the fact that we have a college, Community College of Philadelphia. We have a west regional campus, we have a northwest regional campus, we have a northeast campus and our main campus here. If the building on Arch Street is intimidating, then maybe we can look to some of the City's resources at our Community College as an interim step until we get to the point where there is a West Philadelphia Justice Center or a Frankford Justice Center. That's the kind of innovation we need. I think all of us agree that these kinds of community-based activities will really resonate to the benefit of the City. I'm not going to talk about 116 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 all of the issues that we'll talk about for the next 97 days, because this isn't the forum. The forum for this is to say do we support the Red Hook model and can we do it better here. I believe we can, and we should, and we must.

I take that as an affirmative. MR. McELHATTON: I believe you can interpret that as a yes.

I think we kind of drew that. MR. McELHATTON: I usually don't equivocate, but if you have trouble, yes, absolutely, Councilman.

As a former member of this body, would you please, as you know, state your name for the record. MR. McELHATTON: I'm sorry. My name is Daniel P. McElhatton, M-C-E-L-H-A-T-T-O-N.

Thank you. MR. McELHATTON: Thank you, Mr. Chair. 117 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177

That would be the other Dan. MR. McCAFFERY: I'm Dan McCaffery. Before I start, I'd like to recognize somebody who in the audience, because I think as the DA candidates speak, this particular august body can get a lot if they would actually listen to this particular woman, and that's Louise Carpino. Louise Carpino is seated directly behind me in the left row. And for those of you who don't know Ms. Carpino, she's the head of the Adult Probation and Parole Officers union in the City of Philadelphia. She is somebody who I've had extensive conversations with over the last several months, especially since I decided to seek the position of District Attorney, and I can tell you from my conversations, she's probably as well educated and well informed on this particular subject in community courts and innovative processes 118 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 in the Adult Probation and Parole Department as anybody I've ever met in my 20-some years as an attorney, and I would invite this particular body to invite Ms. Carpino up here at some point to give some testimony, give her thoughts on the expansion of community courts in Philadelphia. As I just indicated, my name is Dan McCaffery. I was about to say Madam Chair, but it looks like our Madam Chair has temporarily left the room. So Councilman Greenlee, Councilman Jones and stand-in for Councilwoman Krajewski, my name is Dan McCaffery and I am a lifelong Philadelphian, as is just about everybody else up here is as well. I sit here today not as an announced candidate for District Attorney, but I want to thank you very much for inviting me up here to testify. I will give testimony today as a veteran litigator and a former Assistant District Attorney in the City 119 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 of Philadelphia. My experience, unlike I think a lot of the other people or the other candidates up here, is as an intensive trial lawyer. Mr. Grady touched upon the detective divisions. Mr. Williams touched upon community-based prosecution. At the outset, I'll just point out something. What Mr. Williams is talking about, what he calls community-based prosecution, those of us who have been in the criminal justice system for quite some time call it something completely different. It's actually called zone-based prosecution. It's an idea that's been around for about years. And the short answer to the 18 question that everybody has on their mind 19 is, it's an excellent idea. However, 20 it's an excellent idea that only is 21 employed or only has historically been 22 employed where there's been a huge, and I 23 mean multi, multi-million-dollar influx 24 of federal dollars into the program to 25 allow the reformation of the system. 120 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 It's important to keep something in mind when we talk about the role of the District Attorney. The DA's Office and what the DA does is basically to set the priorities and the policies of the District Attorney's Office and then allocate resources to get that priority done. The DA does not operate in a vacuum. The DA is one cog in the criminal justice system, and as Mr. McElhatton just mentioned, it does take a collaborative approach. The current District Attorney in the City of Philadelphia, Lynne Abraham, has attempted zone-based prosecution for in excess of 10 or 15 years. She's even gone so far as to contact State Representative Dennis O'Brien, who actually allocated funds and resources to develop that particular model of zone-based prosecution. Zone-based prosecution, essentially what it would do is would allow the system to basically reform 121 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 itself to allow the coding and classification of all cases into certain courtrooms to be assigned to certain judges. In other words, for those of us who understand how the system works, the criminal justice system right now is based upon -- is about floors of trial 9 lawyers, trial rooms.

For instance, the 10 seventh floor would be nothing but cases 11 from West Philadelphia. They would have the same judges. They would have a team of prosecutors from West Philadelphia. However, although it's a great idea, the fact of the matter is, the system has never employed it. So if you based -- if you were the District Attorney and you said, I'm going to employ zone-based prosecution tomorrow, what you'll have at the criminal justice system is something that looks like a Chinese fire drill. You will have -- if you base it upon Mr. Williams' model of 24 police districts or what Mr. Grady just mentioned, which was six different 122 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 detective divisions, what you will have is unit prosecutors or six unit 4 prosecutors running form different floor 5 to floor, courtroom to courtroom to try 6 cases. 7 The way the DA's Office is 8 scheduled right now, it's based upon a 9 vertical-based model. The vertical-based 10 model responds to how the court system 11 codes cases. Because the court system 12 takes cases now from whether it's 13 Northeast, South, Center City, Northeast 14 Philadelphia, Northwest Philadelphia, 15 codes them and meshes them all in one 16 room, and the DAs from different trial 17 units are then assigned to that room, 18 because you have two DAs employed in the 19 City of Philadelphia assigned to each 20 individual courtroom that gets cases from 21 all over the place, unless it's a 22 specialized unit. 23 But just so we're clear, what 24 I'm here to talk about today are my opinions on the Community Court that 123 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 exists in the City of Philadelphia. For us attorneys, for us former prosecutors, the guys who understand the system understand that that has a particular -- that vernacular has a particular meaning in our courts. The community courts in Philadelphia, as I'm sure you well know, date back to the 1990's. There was a very young aggressive Municipal Court judge at the time by the name of Seamus McCaffery, who has a near and dear place in my heart, who actually was the Administrative Judge and started the City of Philadelphia's first community-based court, which at that time was called the Drug Courts. These things have been evolving over the last 10 or 15 years, and what we call them in the vernacular in our language is something along the lines of problem-solving courts. The community-based court that we have right now at Broad and Arch is an excellent example of what we call a 124 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 problem-solving court, but it's only limited to eight different police districts right now. I believe what we're here talking about is not a community-based prosecution model that Mr. Williams testified to, but the expansion of problem-solving courts. Problem-solving courts are instituted by the First Judicial District administrative judges, with the permission and under the auspices of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. The Supreme Court has to allocate funds for those courts, and those courts specifically target and identify certain problems that they can solve. The short answer to your problem is, the Red Hook model employs, is it a good idea? It's not a good idea; it's a great idea. The Drug Court in Philadelphia right now that's overseen by Judge Presenza is a national model. My brother Seamus right now and in the Pennsylvania 125 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 Supreme Court is actually trying to allocate resources to establish a veterans court, to establish a mental health court and to establish another drug court, because they understand that 60 to 70 percent of all the people who get sucked into the criminal justice system are there because of drug, alcohol or mental health problems. They're not criminals. They're engaging in criminal offenses, primarily because of the fact that they have to feed their habit or they've got a mental health problem. But the real problem becomes one of money.

As you look at models and you look at studies, studies suggest that it takes about $900 a day to put somebody into a mental health facility. It takes about $99 a day to put somebody in prison. So it's a lot easier to look the other way than it is to actually attack the root cause of the problem, which is a mental health problem, a drug problem or an alcohol problem. 126 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 But the fact of the matter is, if we take drug addicts, if we take alcoholics or we take people with mental health problems and we put them in jail with serious recidivist criminals, robbers, rapists, murderers, they may share a jail cell for about nine months, but when we put them back out on the street, if we haven't attacked the root cause of that problem, they're going to be right back in the system, and we're basically creating a cycle of criminality because of the fact that we refuse to acknowledge what the root cause of the problem is. So if I can just offer some comments or my own personal thoughts on the community-based prosecution or how the system is set up right now, community courts. The one place where we can absolutely do a good job of diverting people before they actually become career criminals is through community courts. Because when you think about what 127 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 community courts and problem-solving courts are set up for, they're set up to identify what the root cause is or problem or criminality is and address those particular problems. The one place, which is an absolute necessary component of our judicial system and the first place that we should look for increased effectiveness and the first step in the process of determining which offenders belong in a community court, is, as Mr. Grady mentioned, the District Attorney's Charging Unit. The District Attorney Charging Unit right now needs to be much more proactive in diverting non-violent offenders with addiction or mental health issues into a problem-solving environment immediately. To do this, we must develop a trusting relationship between the District Attorney's Office, the Public Defenders, private defense bar and the court. And we need to do this because we need to establish a more collaborative approach 128 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 to alternative sentencing models. While the District Attorney's Office is a strong supporter of community courts -- and my District Attorney's Office would be an absolute strong supporter of community courts -- the current Administration has taken some positive steps to divert non-violent offenders from the traditional justice system. That being said, we still have a long way to go to make the system work much better. Diversion is currently a defense attorney's initiative. In other words, far too often, the Charging Unit in the DA's Office, dealing with an overwhelming volume of cases and limited resources, currently signs off on police reports without any review. I think that's what Mr. Grady was talking about when he talked about seizing the initiative and allowing the DA's Office to actually do a better job through charging. 129 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 In my opinion, we need to beef up the pre-charging investigative process to identify individuals who need treatment and divert them from the system immediately. Most studies suggest that as many as 70 percent of all criminal defendants, as I stated before, are in the system because of drug, alcohol and mental health-related illnesses. Our short-term investment in a vastly improved pre-charging unit will pay substantial dividends in the long term by freeing up the resources of the office to focus on violent criminals, drug dealers, robbers and rapists who need to be removed from our city and targeted. Second, we need to expand the focus to include a wide range of alternative sentencing models. This is the reason I actually pointed out Ms. Carpino at the outset, because I didn't want her yelling at me later.

In my opinion, most studies, when you talk about reducing recidivism rates, come to 130 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 the conclusion that the best way to avoid future criminal activity is through an intensive probation and supervision model of both juvenile and adult offenders. And that's an important component, because the juvenile system tends to be left out. They're the forgotten red-headed step child of our system. The idea is that through intensive probation, we will keep offenders in their communities, we will keep them close to their families, while providing job training and job opportunities. If we have court-ordered inpatient treatment, community-based inpatient facilities and in-home electronic monitoring with court-ordered and supervised treatment, these are all effective ways to address the root causes of behavior that if left untreated may escalate into increasingly violent and disruptive criminal activity. Third, we must not lose sight of the essential fact that the courts function within the system for the 131 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 criminal justice. In other words, the DA is not by themselves in this effort. We need to develop a collaborative approach that I talked about earlier. Because when you talk about diversion programs and community courts, essentially what we're talking about are carrot and stick programs. It's often the threat of incarceration and separation from your loved ones that keeps offenders participating in treatment programs. And the DA's Office and the judges must exercise that threat from time to time in order for the program to succeed. If and when a defendant's drug or alcohol addiction makes him a threat to society, it's the job of the District Attorney to make sure that the protection of society at-large comes above that of the protection or the best interest of the defendant. Keep in mind, the District Attorney is the advocate on behalf of society, and in many cases, specifically, 132 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 the advocate for victims. That's our job. That's our role in the system. We're not social workers, even though there should be a social service component to what we do. As I said before, my years as an Assistant District Attorney were not spent in an administrative capacity. I wasn't a bureaucrat. I never was. I never wanted to be. My years were spent in a courtroom. I was a prosecutor assigned to the Habitual Offenders Unit, which employs the model that Mr. Grady was talking about. I was a DA in the Major Trials Unit, and I was a specially assigned DA assigned to the most violent criminals in the City of Philadelphia. In many cases, the people that I prosecuted were violent offenders for whom there was simply no hope and no 22 alternative except to isolate them from society. This was an expensive and overburdened process, and it, more often than not, failed to provide the justice 133 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 and closure that victims, families and communities deserve. The end result is that we end up warehousing an entire generation of our neighbors and our community, only to set them loose at the expiration of their prison sentence upon unsuspecting neighborhoods. These parolees have very little prospect and, more often than not, no hope of turning their lives around because we have failed to address why they're committing the criminal behavior that they basically were convicted of. It is precisely because of that experience and my experience as a veteran trial lawyer and a prosecutor that I strongly support expanding our community courts and problem-solving courts. And I further want to empower the problem-solving courts and the community to work together to identify and solve these problems and turn non-violent offenders into productive members of our society as opposed to recidivist violent 134 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES.

080177 criminals, because unless we fail to address those root causes of criminal behavior, we're in for the same thing we've been doing for 250 years in this country, which is basically repeating the cycle of violence and repeating the cycle of recidivist behavior, and we're basically losing a generation of our neighbors that could be better point off -- in a situation to be pointed -- these people could be better utilized and diverted through the Community Court application into productive members of our society. So the short answer to your question, Councilman, that I know is coming is, I vehemently support Community Court expansion. Any questions?

Thank you.

Thank you for your testimony.

May I proceed? Madam Chairman Reed Miller, 135 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 Vice-Chairman Krajewski and other esteemed members of this committee, thank you for requesting my presence as well as my perspective on the expansion of Philadelphia Community Court. I applaud this committee for investigating the potential expansion of Philadelphia Community Court through Resolution No. 10 080177 in an effort --

Excuse me.

-- to both reduce costs, reduce prison overcrowding --

Excuse me. Please identify yourself for the record.

I'm sorry. I should know better. I've been in court enough. Michael L. Turner. -- (continued) in an effort to reduce costs, reduce prison overcrowding and reduce recidivism and ultimately to empower the community. As I said a moment ago, my name is Michael Turner. 136 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 I'm a lifelong Philadelphian. I have years of litigation experience. I've served as an Assistant District Attorney from 1981 to '86 and thereafter I've been a civil trial attorney. I've tried more than 200 jury trials to verdict, including successfully prosecuting some of the worst violent criminals here in Philadelphia. I'm a declared candidate for District Attorney of Philadelphia. As you all know, the Philadelphia Community Court was established by combining criminal justice and social service agencies under one roof in order to facilitate a comprehensive response to quality-of-life crimes. Rather than emphasizing jail time for low-level, non-violent offenses, Philadelphia's Community Court emphasizes community service sentences and behavioral treatment programs. One of Community Court's aims is to address a defendant's underlying social or medical service needs, thereby reducing the 137 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 potential for recidivism. As we know, Community Court has jurisdiction over many quality-of-life offenses. Those quality-of-life offenses include retail theft, prosecution, vandalism, minor drug possession and theft from auto. Under this model, defendants receive an expedited hearing date that's no later than the next business day after a particular defendant's arrest. Social service staff, which is on site, provide professional screenings that are given to the judge prior to sentencing. I think it's important that non-violent offenders are adjudicated in such a manner when possible for two reasons. One, it's a better way to meet out justice, and, two, Philadelphia, as the system currently stands, lacks the capacity to warehouse non-violent offenders and, by doing so, we risk their institutionalization. According to a recent report by 138 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 Leon King, the Philadelphia Prison System has a capacity for nearly 6,200 inmates, but the number of those who are actually incarcerated exceeds 9,000. By expanding Philadelphia's Community Court, alternative sentencing and reducing the number of offenders who violate their probation or parole, we can actually cut down on the number of people who are inmates in our corrections facilities and keep our communities safe at the same time. In essence, a reduction in recidivism -- and I repeat -- a reduction in recidivism should be the goal of any community court. Strategies for this were recently set forth in a PEW Center on the States report, entitled "Putting Public Safety First: 13 Strategies for Successful Supervision and Reentry," and that came out this past December, December of 2008, and I just want to run through some of these strategies real quickly. 139 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 Strategy is defining success as recidivism reduction and measuring performance. According to this particular article, what they said was probation and parole agencies should adopt risk reduction and behavior-change strategies and measure performance against the standard of recidivism reduction, substance abuse, employment, victim restitution and other reintegration activities. The second strategy that they stressed was tailoring the supervision -- tailoring the conditions of supervision, and what the article indicated was that conditions of probation and parole need to be both realistic, relevant and research-based, the three R's as they called it. No. 3, resources should be focused on higher-risk offenders. And that might be counterintuitive, but research has shown that interventions that are actually directed towards 140 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES.

080177 offenders with a moderate to high risk of committing new crimes result in better outcomes for the offenders and the community. If you focus on those who present the greatest risk, the limited treatment and supervision resources -- and we're here talking about limited resources -- the limited treatment and supervision resources can be utilized where they're going to provide the most benefit to the public at-large and public safety. No. 4, the article talked about front-loading supervision resources. Research has shown that the time period that immediately follows an individual's release from incarceration is a high risk time for those offenders, and what needs to be done is that resources have to be concentrated in those first few days and weeks of supervision following release. You get a better bang for your buck that way. No. 5, implementing earned 141 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 discharge. Probationers who are lower-risk probationers can earn their way off of supervision if they get -- if they're told what specific goals and guidelines are that they have to meet ahead of time. The sixth strategy that the article suggested was supervising offenders in their communities, and the article said that if probation and parole officers actually supervised the offenders where they live, relationships can be fostered with those people in the areas where they live who know them best, and if you can organize these caseloads by neighborhood, you, again, can better allocate scarce resources. No. 7 was engage partners to expand intervention capacity. The article said that supervision agencies have to partner with other entities, like community health providers, substance abuse treatment providers, mental health providers and the like, and to the extent 142 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 that you can have a greater coordination among these entities, that helps to keep offenders crime and drug free. The next was assess criminal risk and need factors. Instruments to assess whether an offender is a low, medium or at high risk for re-offending have to be used to determine how much supervision those offenders need to get and the type of services that those offenders need to be offered. No. 9 was balance surveillance and treatment in case plans. Again, the research that they did in connection with this article as well as other research shows that combining surveillance and treatment is a more effective way to reduce recidivism than simply just monitoring an offender or trying to control them. So that's something that needs to be done, too. No. 10 was involve offenders in the supervision process. You want the offenders to have a stake in the outcome 143 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 and you want them to be able to talk about what they need. Offenders, according to the article, should be active participants in developing their own supervision plan. As active participants, they'll feel an increased sense of motivation and accountability, and that will result in better outcomes as well as greater public safety. No. 11 was engage informal social controls. You need to look at the offenders' support networks, their families, their friends, their employers. They all should be utilized to promote positive behavior change. No. 12 was use incentives and rewards. If you utilize positive reinforcement, incentives and rewards, that can also enhance offender motivation. If you utilize incentives and rewards for progress, along with sanctions as well as violations, then probation and parole officers can support positive behavior change and reduce 144 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 recidivism. And the last suggestion was to respond to violations with swift and certain sanctions. Offenders need to know that if they don't do what they're supposed to do, there are going to be punishments and they're going to happen quickly.

Here in Philadelphia there are several programs that currently are in existence that utilize these strategies that I just talked about in an attempt to both reduce the recidivism rate as well as to alleviate prison overcrowding. These programs include the Mayor's Office for the Reentry of Ex-Offenders, MORE; the Work Release Program and Forensic Intensive Recovery, FIR; and that's from the Inmate Services report which came out in spring of 2008. It's my suggestion that these programs be expanded and that more programs need to be identified and instituted along these lines, such as the 145 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 Supervision to Aid Reentry, STAR program, that's currently being utilized in Federal Court. The STAR program began in the fall of 2007 under the supervision of Magistrate Timothy Rice in Federal Court, and I can talk to you a little bit about that later if you have questions. Another alternative adjudication model that this committee should review and strengthen is Truancy Court, a partnership between Family Court and the School District of Philadelphia. According to DHS, you have more than 12,000 students who are actually truant on any given day. I think we all know that truancy is one of the leading indicators of potential criminal behavior for youth who are at risk, and DHS generally defines a student as truant if he or she has eight or more unexcused absences. Although Truancy Court has one major shortcoming, it only meets one week per month, it actually includes home visits, family development planning and 146 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 the PATCH Process, which is a community-based model of family support service delivery that Philadelphia's Community Court should emulate as well. So to conclude -- and I know Councilman Jones is going to ask me this, too -- I strongly urge City Council to pass this resolution and to expand the scope of Philadelphia's Community Court. This expansion should be viewed as an opportunity for both rehabilitation and increased public safety over time. And as District Attorney, what I will do is create a Community Court Task Force that will include representatives from the DA's Office, the Defender's Office, the judiciary, social service agencies, elected officials, community groups, clergy, law enforcement and the prisons, all with the task of creating standards for what crimes should be adjudicated in Philadelphia Community Court and to identify what the best practices are in terms of alternative sentencing. 147 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 This is an issue that for too long has flown under the radar in criminal justice, and I thank you as a committee and Councilman Jones for bringing it to the forefront and allowing me to make my comments and offer you my perspectives. Thanks.

Thank you. Thank you. Are there any questions? No, we're not doing questions yet. Mr. McElhatton. MR. McELHATTON: I have already made my remarks, Madam Chair.

Madam Chair, he's already spoken. MR. McELHATTON: I'll repeat them if you wish.

I have to catch up. So everybody has had a chance to speak?

Yes, ma'am.

All 148 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 right. Great. So the floor is now open for questions. Any questions?

Yes. First of all, thank you guys for your patience. I know your schedules are busy. If you are announced candidates, you're going to be campaigning, and if you're not, you're probably making money so that you can have some campaign funds. So we appreciate you taking the time for this important matter. A part of this was for us to learn from you and get a kind of sense of where you were. My opening statement said that during the course of these hearings, that probably the next district attorney was going to walk through the door, and I stand by that. So I stand by that. But a couple of things that jumped out at me that maybe you could give me some help with. In the research 149 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 of this resolution, we took a look at from the arrest point to the disposition point as to where we might have -- and I think you might have mentioned it with the Charging Unit -- where we might have a quick resolution to move a case to Community Court, and wanted to get some kind of sense from you if we're on the right path with that. And we want to keep the answers really short. I know you're campaigning, but we're trying to save the trees from the stenographer. So help us out with that, because you know this process.

As quickly as you can say it, you're right, charging. MR. McELHATTON: Charging.

We all agree?

Charging. That's the first step. That's the first contact, and that's the place where if you're going to have a diversion, the diversion needs to be made. 150 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177

You probably in your course of campaigning will never be this close together again, but share the mikes, please. MR. McCAFFERY: Just one point. The DA's Charging Unit responds, just so I can explain the process so you have an understanding, when somebody gets arrested by a Philadelphia police officer. It's assigned to a detective, and that detective then provides what's called an Affidavit of Probable Cause, faxes it over to the DA's Charging Unit. Some person in the DA's Office looks at it, stamps "approved" on it, sends it back, approves the charges, and the charges generate a complaint. What happens is, the DA's Office -- and this is what I'm trying to point out. The DA's Office Charging Unit charges people. They can do a better pre-investigative job. But realistically what you're talking about coding these things, you're talking about the First 151 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 Judicial District. You're talking about court administration. Because the way that the community courts work is that the Community Court, the way it's set up now is, that summaries go to Community Court and that's it. They're all specific summaries. They all go directly from the court administration to Broad and Arch. Same thing with the Community Court as far as the drugs are concerned. Judge Presenza presides over the Community Court for the Drug Court. First offense, misdemeanors only, drug cases possession go directly into that court, and then it's a defense attorney's initiative whether or not they're going to take a look at it and say, We're going to opt out of this trying to try the case or we're going to go through the program. That's the way it is right now. The DA's Charging Unit just responds to the actual facts that are on a fact sheet, and they actually approve the charges, but the court administrator with the DA's Office 152 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 has to work together. And to be blunt, part of the biggest problem you're going to run into is that if you're a defense attorney in the City of Philadelphia and you're charging somebody from $1,500 or $2,500 to do a misdemeanor trial, if you see a flaw in the facts, you're going to kick that case out of Community Court, regardless of whether or not it's in your client's best interest, and you're going to try to fight that case. So the DA's Charging Unit can do the job of charging and diverting, working within the court system, but really what has to happen is, it has to be a holistic, collaborative approach between the DA's Office, the defense bar and the court system.

If I can clarify on that a little bit, though. I think it's time to stop -- I think one of the things that I think needs to happen here is, we need to stop passing the buck back to the First Judicial District, back to the 153 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 bench. The District Attorney's Office does not have to charge the misdemeanor to send it to the FJD. The District Attorney's Office, whoever is sitting in that Charging Unit, can make that a summary offense, which does not generate a complaint, does not generate a case file for the District Attorney's Office. So when a fact pattern comes in from a detective and it can just as easily be a summary criminal mischief instead of a public intoxication, it can be an open container, it makes it a summary offense. It is completely within the control of the District Attorney's Office at that point to take that case and take responsibility for that case, not simply code it as a misdemeanor, kick it into the FJD and start down this path that never ends. The District Attorney's Office needs to step up to the plate and say, These are summary offenses. They immediately go to Community Court. There's no involvement of the FJD at that 154 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 point, and you're immediately saving costs.

What are the guidelines, though, for a summary? Would someone that maybe has an open container more than once or twice then be moved up?

It's based on the crimes code. It could depend on the number of prior offenses. For example, retail theft can be a summary offense if it's a first offense under a certain amount. However, the District Attorney's Office can also determine that even if it's not your first offense, the District Attorney's Office can still say, We're still making it a summary offense. It's within the discretion of the Charging Unit. They are not exercising that discretion. That discretion needs to be exercised, particularly in the atmosphere in which we're living in the City now.

So who or what needs to be in place to help them 155 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 exercise this discretion?

One of two things. One of those things is either to give the power back to an actual assistant district attorney, which they don't do the charging anymore. There are now clerks without law degrees who do that charging. Or simply tell the clerks who are doing it that you'll stand behind their decision and train them as to when a fact pattern comes in, that that fact pattern calls for common sense and it should be charged as it's written, as a summary. They're over there now. They're frankly scared to death to not charge everything they can think of, including the kitchen sink. That's the atmosphere. The atmosphere needs to be changed. We need to tell them, I trust you. If I don't trust you, I'm not going to hire you. If I hired you, I trust your judgment. You need to do that. We can 156 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 then streamline these cases into Community Court. You will save thousands upon thousands of Municipal Court cases. Sixty-five thousand arrests per year. There's only 400 of them are homicides. Only 1,700 of them are shootings. Less than a thousand of them are rapes. We're talking 50,000 misdemeanor arrests. Take that 50,000 and multiply it by the amount of overtime we're spending, multiply it by the amount of court costs per file, multiply it by the two to five court listings. You can funnel those cases into Community Court. Those are people that will free up probation officers' times and parole officers' times so they can intensely supervise violent offenders who have been re-acclimated into the community.

So at this point, the clerks, though, are taking -- are charging people based on what the police are saying?

The police will 157 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 send you a fact sheet. They will send you a sheet that says this is what happened. It's called a PARS report. The clerk will read that and, as a law school fact pattern, will come up with as many charges as they can come up with based on that fact pattern, instead of looking at it and charging it as a reasonable human being.

All right. Thank you. Councilman Jones.

Just real quick -- and emphasis on quick, because we have other people ready to testify -- the level of offense that you would as DA be comfortable with remanding to Community Court?

Misdemeanor. MR. McCAFFERY: Misdemeanor.

Misdemeanor. MR. McELHATTON: Misdemeanor, but I'd be very careful about gun cases. I think you should carve out some 158 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177 exception for weapons.

Well, 06 and 08 are felonies. 08 is a felony. 06 is the misdemeanor that carries with it. MR. McCAFFERY: It depends upon the facts and circumstances of the case, but primarily if you're going to draw the bright line rule, it's misdemeanors.

Gentlemen.

Thank you. Thank you for coming.

Thanks for having us.

Okay. Everybody that's left. Let me just call your names. We have Leon King, Beverly Muldrow, Donna Siminski, LeeRoy Jordan, and I believe Walli Smith left. (Witnesses approached witness table.)

Just so I know who is here. I know Leon King is here. LeeRoy Jordan?

Jordan. 159 2/11/09 - PUBLIC SAFETY - RES. 080177