February 9, 2024 • 20 mins
A new report produced for the American Bar Association claims poor and low-income Floridians charged with misdemeanors are getting "nickel and dimed" with fees and fines. We speak with Sarah Couture, Florida director of the Fines and Fees Justice Center.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Gordon Bird here with Beyond the News. The Public Defense Group of the American
Bar Association has come out with areport on how Florida treats low income or
indigent defendants facing low level charges.Basically, it accuses the court circuits of
nickel and diming them to death.Sarahkatur is the Florida State director and senior
(00:23):
Research strategist of the Fines and FeesJustice Center, which is addressing the issue
nationwide, and she's going to helpus understand some of the issues that are
raised in this report. Sarah Cutur, thank you very much for joining us
on Beyond the News. Thank youfor having me. Well, there's a
lot to break down in this andone of the areas this study covered was
(00:45):
that it looked specifically at a coupleof judicial circuits, the one including Miami
Dade County and the one including LeonCounty and described some of the problems there.
Are there any meaningful differences from circuitto circuit or are the issues that
are faced with the low level chargesmisdemeanors with defendants who are indigent or low
(01:10):
income are they fairly uniform statewide?I would say that the issues that defendants
face is uniform statewide. There aredifferences among those two counties being their makeup.
You know, Leon is going tobe more considered more rural than Miami
(01:30):
Dade obviously is going to be moreurban. They have more courts, they
have more judges. In Miami Dade, you have different, you know,
different policies in place that are putin place by chief judges that can impact
how finds these impact defendants, Differentpolicies in place by clerks of court that
(01:53):
can also impact defindants when it comesto finds in fees. So while general
issues are going to be the same, there are going to be some difference
is because of just location and who'sin charge. But the overall Florida Statute
(02:13):
is uniform in that fees are mandatoryand the amounts are mandatory. For the
most part, there's very little discretionthat judges have when it comes to those
fees, and the fines are goingto have a range that judges are going
(02:34):
to have to land in on that. So that's what I'm kind of saying,
answering your question in two different ways, because in some ways it's the
same and in other ways it's different. But basically, judges don't have very
much leeway as far as adjusting thefines that are paid and adjusting the fees
that are paid or the court coststhat are paid, is what you're saying.
(02:55):
Correct, Correct, They currently donot they do under the limited circumstance
of felonies, and when it comesto restoring voting rights, which they were
given that in SB seventy sixty sixa few years ago after Amendment four was
passed, so they have the abilityto do that under that small caveat right
(03:22):
now, we are currently working onlegislation with Representative Rizzo and many It's HB
one one one where it would givejudges that discretion to waive or reduce fines
and fees after the fact is whenit currently does it, so they would
(03:45):
still be imposed because everything's currently mandatory, but after the fact, the judges,
on their own motion, or ifan individual or their lawyer petitioned the
court, they could come back andlook at it and do an ability to
pay assessment. Now, pulling backand looking at the bigger issue, the
American Bar Association has been targeting andlooking at these fines and fees nationwide over
(04:12):
the years, and the sense youget from the report is that if you
get arrested on a misdemeanor charge,basically the meter is running. You're getting
assessed with from the very beginning withfines and fees that, among other things,
pay for the operation of the courtsystem, and even you're paying for
the public defender, which by definitionis intended for people who can't afford to
(04:32):
pay. So is this a situationwhere the courts need this money to operate?
Is it a question of these feesreplacing tax dollars. So one of
the things that makes Florida unique comparedto any of the other states that we're
working in is the clerks of court. So their budgets are based off of
(04:54):
these fees, costs, and surcharges, and that's in the Florida Constitution.
So that complicates things, and that'sin section fourteen of Article five of the
Florida Constitution. So they would havethey don't get in. The clerks of
court don't get an appropriation in thebudget process. So right now we have
(05:16):
the Florida legislators in session and we'veheard different things about their budget proposals going
on. The clerks do not receivean appropriation for their budget. The courts
do the courts receive an appropriation,but the clerks of court do not.
Their budget is based off of revenueestimates by the Revenue Estimating Conference about what
(05:39):
finds and fees they're going to bringin and collect, and so it's an
estimate and it gets it gets changedthey meet the Revenue Estimated Conference meets quarterly,
so it gets adjusted up or down. And so to replace that revenue,
the clerk's funding source would have tobe changed. They would have to
(05:59):
be put back into the budget atminimum, right, But this is in
the Florida Constitution and that's hard tochange. You're in a situation then,
where the clerks of court are arebasically the whole situation drives them to seek
more revenue or that they are completelydependent on revenue. And the Clerk of
(06:24):
Court is of course an elected office, so this is an issue. I
would think that would factor into theirraces, although I've never heard it brought
up in a Clerk of court's race, right, And to be fair,
like they don't like this either.It's not a it's not a sustainable if
you're looking at it from a businessperspective. Also, it's not a sustainable
(06:47):
budget. You know, for anyone, regardless if it's the clerks of the
court or if it's a completely differententity, this budget model is not sustainable
and it's you know, twenty twentyreally highlighted that right for them because when
Florida was shut down for a coupleof weeks, it was you saw less
(07:11):
civil traffic tickets and so a lotof that revenue stopped coming in because there
weren't civil traffic tickets being written.And that's their biggest source of their budget
is where they're collecting the most moneyis civil traffic fines and fees, which
is like you're speeding to certain levels, right, you're low level speeding,
(07:33):
you're you know, you didn't weara seatbelt ticket. Think, those are
civil traffic in nature, and soit really highlighted they had to make cuts,
a lot of them across the statehad to make cuts, or they
had to get some of them wentto their county commissions and got loans.
(07:53):
But you know, so yes,it's not something that a lot of people
know about unless you're involved in thiswork. The report from the ABA had
several recommendations, although interestingly, Idon't think that they touched on the idea
of making a constitutional change with regardto the way that the clerks of courts
are funded. They recommend not jailingpeople for failure to pay, not suspending
(08:18):
driver licenses, not issuing warrants forfailure to pay, making it easier for
it to convert fines to community service, eliminating the fee for the public defenders,
and making the third party fees moretransparent. And this report, by
the way, it was commissioned bythe ABA, but it is not necessarily
ABA endorsed. Just wanted to getthat out there. So do those recommendations,
(08:39):
if those were all implemented, wouldthose go a long way toward relieving
the problems with this particular system.Yes, it would be a step in
the right direction. But to clarify, Florida does not We do not jail
people solely for failure to pay.What happens is some one will fail to
(09:01):
pay, a judge will set ahearing for whatever reason. People don't attend
that hearing so that they get afailure to appear, and then the warrant
gets issued for that failure to appear. But that hearing was set for to
find out why they you know,why they stop paying, and people you
know, don't show up to thosehearings for a number of reasons. You
(09:22):
know, they may not have beenable to get there because if their driver's
license is suspended for failure to pay, transportation is a challenge, especially to
get to you know, the exampleof Miami date they have eleven different courthouses.
Granted they have, you know,the best public transit situation in the
state, but public transportation in thestate is not great, especially in these
(09:46):
rural areas. So they may nothave been able to get there. They
may have been afraid to attend thehearing thinking that if they did, they
would get arrested for not paying.Right. So there's all different things.
But thankfully Florida does not We donot run debtors prisons. We stopped doing
that. There are other states thatstill participate in that, but Florida does
(10:09):
not, so that is good.But yeah, driver's license suspension is something
that for failure to pay is somethingthat we have tried to eliminate in Florida
since twenty twenty we started. Congressmannow Congressman Byron Donalds ran the first bill
(10:30):
that f FJC worked on, butprior to that, there had been a
bill for years that former Senator JeffBrandis and current Senator Darryl Russan worked on
together, but it just always getskilled in the legislature. The clerks have
(10:50):
testified that they think it is theonly tool in their toolbox that compels people
to pay them and if that werethe case, people's licenses wouldn't stay suspended
for as long as they do.We have a we have. As of
November twenty twenty two, there wereseven hundred and sixteen, three hundred and
(11:13):
eighty three people whose licenses were suspendedstatewide for failure to pay, not for
dangerous driving, but for failure topay. One of the issues that was
brought up as well in the reportis making it easier to convert fines to
community service. Now, as Iunderstand, it is possible to convert a
fine to community service in Florida ifa judge will will consent to that,
(11:35):
but there are problems in the mechanism. I guess there's a problem in implementing
that. Is that correct? Yeah, there is. And one of the
issues with there's a couple issues withconversion to community service. Most community service
is going to be during business hourswhen folks, you know, might otherwise
(11:58):
be working to you know, needto make money to survive, to pay
their bills, and so it's achallenge in that respect. It's a challenge
in finding you know, a placewhere you can continually do that. And
also the rate that they convert thehourly rate that you're getting for the community
(12:24):
service to you know, ultimately payoff. And so you know, our
view is that judges should have theability to waive or reduce these and that
community community service is still a burdenon folks. In other words, they're
getting the fees converted to community service, but they're using an hourly rate that's
(12:46):
probably very close to minimum wager orI don't know, perhaps below it.
I don't know, right right,yeah, and I'm not and that can
that's something that can vary. Thatcan vary between judges. I used to
work for the courts actually in Florida, and that can vary between judges.
(13:07):
Something else that the report calls foris making third party fees more transparent.
And again, if people who havenot had contact with the criminal justice system
in these cases may not be awarethat you are actually these individuals are actually
getting charged for by third parties asa part of say financing or adopting a
(13:31):
payment plan for their fines and fees. Yes, and also diversion programs is
a really big example. So ifyou get charged with a misdemeanor and you
know, you're offered a diversion programwhich you can do that, and if
(13:54):
you successfully complete that, then youwouldn't that charge could you know, be
removed from your record, so itwas like you were never charged, right,
And so a lot of the timesthese diversion programs are now being run
by private entities and they cost afee. So it becomes a situation where
(14:16):
you have this two tiered system ofjustice of like, well, if you
can afford to participate in the diversionprogram, then you don't have to go
through the criminal justice court system,assuming you complete that program successfully. And
if you can afford that program,then you have to go through the system
and ultimately you might have a record. Now, it has been mentioned you
(14:41):
have had success in changing some lawsin other states, and there have been
attempts to change laws in Florida,but it doesn't seem that the legislation has
gone very far. And wondering thiswhen state legislatures and politicians take up the
issue is the discussion getting bought upin the sort of soft on crime talk
(15:03):
in backlash over prosecutors and sentences andissues like that. Is anyone saying that
it's soft on crime to give thesemisdemeanor defendants a break on fines and fees.
No, I haven't specifically heard thewords soft on crime. What we
have heard is, you know,well, they shouldn't have ever committed the
(15:26):
crime, right, whether that's amisdemeanor or if it's a traffic related and
you know, it's kind of like, so you've never made a mistake in
your life, right, These feesjust become they can snowball, and it
(15:46):
just keeps people in the system,is what ultimately happens. People have a
hard time getting out of it.And so if you can do an ability
to pay and you can set somebody'sfines and fees on something they're able to
pay, then they're going to payit. You know, judges do have
(16:07):
tools to deal with folks who arewillfully not paying, who can't afford and
they're willfully not and there's a differencethere. Right, most people want to
pay. I get contact forms allthe time of you know, I want
to pay, but I can't affordthis amount per month. I can afford
this, but I can't afford morethan this, And so meeting people where
(16:33):
they're at, we actually have theopinion that the clerk's revenue will increase,
which is backed by some data outof Texas and Tennessee and California that's not
in this report, but we knowabout it of FJC that shows when like
in Texas in twenty seventeen, theygave judges the ability to do these ability
(17:00):
to pay determinations, and the fiscalyear after their revenues that stayed local and
their arrest that they sent to thestate, both of those incased by around
seven, seven and eight percent,respectively, give or take. So to
sum it up, basically that ifthey are able to work out, if
(17:21):
they are willing to work out paymentplans with these individuals who have outstanding fines
and fees, they're likely to collectmore because those other fines and fees were
simply going uncollected because they couldn't affordto pay them. Correct, the check
is not in the mail currently,The check is not currently in the mail
because they can't afford it, andso the money is uncollectable. So looking
(17:45):
at it again from a business perspective, I'd rather have fifty dollars a month
than zero dollars a month if I'min this situation with my budget that the
clerks have been put in, andso yeah, it's it would it would
help people. And I will saythere have been we have made some progress
(18:06):
when it does come to payment plans. So in twenty twenty one a bill
was passed. It was actually inthe Clerk of Courts Priority Bill that year,
where it mandated a uniform payment planform to be created to be US
statewide because we found that they weresixty seven different forms being used with all
(18:30):
these different provisions. So that waspassed. And then in twenty twenty two
they passed legislation again through the Clerk'sPriority Bill, that sets a monthly payment
based on somebody income. It's twopercent of somebody's net income, divide by
twelve or twenty five dollars, whicheverthose two amounts ends up being greater.
(18:55):
But we also know that there aresome folks who are unlimited income that even
twenty dollars is too much for them. And there are clerks that we know
of that do work with folks likethat. And they will set it below,
but they're not They're not the rule, they're the exception. I would
say we've covered a lot of ground, and there's a lot of ground still
(19:17):
to be covered as far as theseissues go to some to kind of wrap
up here, if you would liketo give out some contact information about your
organization for people who would like tofind out more about this issue. Yes,
Our website is Fines and Fees Justicecenterdot org and if you go there,
you can click on state offices andthen you'll find Florida. But you'll
(19:41):
also find a wealth of information ina heading we have called clearing House,
which when our co director started theorganization, was one of the one of
the things they wanted us to beable to do. So the Clearinghouse is
like the Google of fines and feesinformations. You can go there and you
can find legislation, you can findmodel policy, you can find reports,
(20:06):
you can find law reviews, alldifferent kinds of things in the Clearinghouse,
and there's also a contact us formif you want to reach out to me
specifically. Sir Cautura, Florida StateDirector of the Fines and Fees Justice Center.
Thank you very much for joining uson beyond the news. Thank you
for having me
Gordon Bird here with Beyond the News. The Public Defense Group of the American
Bar Association has come out with areport on how Florida treats low income or
indigent defendants facing low level charges.Basically, it accuses the court circuits of
nickel and diming them to death.Sarahkatur is the Florida State director and senior
(00:23):
Research strategist of the Fines and FeesJustice Center, which is addressing the issue
nationwide, and she's going to helpus understand some of the issues that are
raised in this report. Sarah Cutur, thank you very much for joining us
on Beyond the News. Thank youfor having me. Well, there's a
lot to break down in this andone of the areas this study covered was
(00:45):
that it looked specifically at a coupleof judicial circuits, the one including Miami
Dade County and the one including LeonCounty and described some of the problems there.
Are there any meaningful differences from circuitto circuit or are the issues that
are faced with the low level chargesmisdemeanors with defendants who are indigent or low
(01:10):
income are they fairly uniform statewide?I would say that the issues that defendants
face is uniform statewide. There aredifferences among those two counties being their makeup.
You know, Leon is going tobe more considered more rural than Miami
(01:30):
Dade obviously is going to be moreurban. They have more courts, they
have more judges. In Miami Dade, you have different, you know,
different policies in place that are putin place by chief judges that can impact
how finds these impact defendants, Differentpolicies in place by clerks of court that
(01:53):
can also impact defindants when it comesto finds in fees. So while general
issues are going to be the same, there are going to be some difference
is because of just location and who'sin charge. But the overall Florida Statute
(02:13):
is uniform in that fees are mandatoryand the amounts are mandatory. For the
most part, there's very little discretionthat judges have when it comes to those
fees, and the fines are goingto have a range that judges are going
(02:34):
to have to land in on that. So that's what I'm kind of saying,
answering your question in two different ways, because in some ways it's the
same and in other ways it's different. But basically, judges don't have very
much leeway as far as adjusting thefines that are paid and adjusting the fees
that are paid or the court coststhat are paid, is what you're saying.
(02:55):
Correct, Correct, They currently donot they do under the limited circumstance
of felonies, and when it comesto restoring voting rights, which they were
given that in SB seventy sixty sixa few years ago after Amendment four was
passed, so they have the abilityto do that under that small caveat right
(03:22):
now, we are currently working onlegislation with Representative Rizzo and many It's HB
one one one where it would givejudges that discretion to waive or reduce fines
and fees after the fact is whenit currently does it, so they would
(03:45):
still be imposed because everything's currently mandatory, but after the fact, the judges,
on their own motion, or ifan individual or their lawyer petitioned the
court, they could come back andlook at it and do an ability to
pay assessment. Now, pulling backand looking at the bigger issue, the
American Bar Association has been targeting andlooking at these fines and fees nationwide over
(04:12):
the years, and the sense youget from the report is that if you
get arrested on a misdemeanor charge,basically the meter is running. You're getting
assessed with from the very beginning withfines and fees that, among other things,
pay for the operation of the courtsystem, and even you're paying for
the public defender, which by definitionis intended for people who can't afford to
(04:32):
pay. So is this a situationwhere the courts need this money to operate?
Is it a question of these feesreplacing tax dollars. So one of
the things that makes Florida unique comparedto any of the other states that we're
working in is the clerks of court. So their budgets are based off of
(04:54):
these fees, costs, and surcharges, and that's in the Florida Constitution.
So that complicates things, and that'sin section fourteen of Article five of the
Florida Constitution. So they would havethey don't get in. The clerks of
court don't get an appropriation in thebudget process. So right now we have
(05:16):
the Florida legislators in session and we'veheard different things about their budget proposals going
on. The clerks do not receivean appropriation for their budget. The courts
do the courts receive an appropriation,but the clerks of court do not.
Their budget is based off of revenueestimates by the Revenue Estimating Conference about what
(05:39):
finds and fees they're going to bringin and collect, and so it's an
estimate and it gets it gets changedthey meet the Revenue Estimated Conference meets quarterly,
so it gets adjusted up or down. And so to replace that revenue,
the clerk's funding source would have tobe changed. They would have to
(05:59):
be put back into the budget atminimum, right, But this is in
the Florida Constitution and that's hard tochange. You're in a situation then,
where the clerks of court are arebasically the whole situation drives them to seek
more revenue or that they are completelydependent on revenue. And the Clerk of
(06:24):
Court is of course an elected office, so this is an issue. I
would think that would factor into theirraces, although I've never heard it brought
up in a Clerk of court's race, right, And to be fair,
like they don't like this either.It's not a it's not a sustainable if
you're looking at it from a businessperspective. Also, it's not a sustainable
(06:47):
budget. You know, for anyone, regardless if it's the clerks of the
court or if it's a completely differententity, this budget model is not sustainable
and it's you know, twenty twentyreally highlighted that right for them because when
Florida was shut down for a coupleof weeks, it was you saw less
(07:11):
civil traffic tickets and so a lotof that revenue stopped coming in because there
weren't civil traffic tickets being written.And that's their biggest source of their budget
is where they're collecting the most moneyis civil traffic fines and fees, which
is like you're speeding to certain levels, right, you're low level speeding,
(07:33):
you're you know, you didn't weara seatbelt ticket. Think, those are
civil traffic in nature, and soit really highlighted they had to make cuts,
a lot of them across the statehad to make cuts, or they
had to get some of them wentto their county commissions and got loans.
(07:53):
But you know, so yes,it's not something that a lot of people
know about unless you're involved in thiswork. The report from the ABA had
several recommendations, although interestingly, Idon't think that they touched on the idea
of making a constitutional change with regardto the way that the clerks of courts
are funded. They recommend not jailingpeople for failure to pay, not suspending
(08:18):
driver licenses, not issuing warrants forfailure to pay, making it easier for
it to convert fines to community service, eliminating the fee for the public defenders,
and making the third party fees moretransparent. And this report, by
the way, it was commissioned bythe ABA, but it is not necessarily
ABA endorsed. Just wanted to getthat out there. So do those recommendations,
(08:39):
if those were all implemented, wouldthose go a long way toward relieving
the problems with this particular system.Yes, it would be a step in
the right direction. But to clarify, Florida does not We do not jail
people solely for failure to pay.What happens is some one will fail to
(09:01):
pay, a judge will set ahearing for whatever reason. People don't attend
that hearing so that they get afailure to appear, and then the warrant
gets issued for that failure to appear. But that hearing was set for to
find out why they you know,why they stop paying, and people you
know, don't show up to thosehearings for a number of reasons. You
(09:22):
know, they may not have beenable to get there because if their driver's
license is suspended for failure to pay, transportation is a challenge, especially to
get to you know, the exampleof Miami date they have eleven different courthouses.
Granted they have, you know,the best public transit situation in the
state, but public transportation in thestate is not great, especially in these
(09:46):
rural areas. So they may nothave been able to get there. They
may have been afraid to attend thehearing thinking that if they did, they
would get arrested for not paying.Right. So there's all different things.
But thankfully Florida does not We donot run debtors prisons. We stopped doing
that. There are other states thatstill participate in that, but Florida does
(10:09):
not, so that is good.But yeah, driver's license suspension is something
that for failure to pay is somethingthat we have tried to eliminate in Florida
since twenty twenty we started. Congressmannow Congressman Byron Donalds ran the first bill
(10:30):
that f FJC worked on, butprior to that, there had been a
bill for years that former Senator JeffBrandis and current Senator Darryl Russan worked on
together, but it just always getskilled in the legislature. The clerks have
(10:50):
testified that they think it is theonly tool in their toolbox that compels people
to pay them and if that werethe case, people's licenses wouldn't stay suspended
for as long as they do.We have a we have. As of
November twenty twenty two, there wereseven hundred and sixteen, three hundred and
(11:13):
eighty three people whose licenses were suspendedstatewide for failure to pay, not for
dangerous driving, but for failure topay. One of the issues that was
brought up as well in the reportis making it easier to convert fines to
community service. Now, as Iunderstand, it is possible to convert a
fine to community service in Florida ifa judge will will consent to that,
(11:35):
but there are problems in the mechanism. I guess there's a problem in implementing
that. Is that correct? Yeah, there is. And one of the
issues with there's a couple issues withconversion to community service. Most community service
is going to be during business hourswhen folks, you know, might otherwise
(11:58):
be working to you know, needto make money to survive, to pay
their bills, and so it's achallenge in that respect. It's a challenge
in finding you know, a placewhere you can continually do that. And
also the rate that they convert thehourly rate that you're getting for the community
(12:24):
service to you know, ultimately payoff. And so you know, our
view is that judges should have theability to waive or reduce these and that
community community service is still a burdenon folks. In other words, they're
getting the fees converted to community service, but they're using an hourly rate that's
(12:46):
probably very close to minimum wager orI don't know, perhaps below it.
I don't know, right right,yeah, and I'm not and that can
that's something that can vary. Thatcan vary between judges. I used to
work for the courts actually in Florida, and that can vary between judges.
(13:07):
Something else that the report calls foris making third party fees more transparent.
And again, if people who havenot had contact with the criminal justice system
in these cases may not be awarethat you are actually these individuals are actually
getting charged for by third parties asa part of say financing or adopting a
(13:31):
payment plan for their fines and fees. Yes, and also diversion programs is
a really big example. So ifyou get charged with a misdemeanor and you
know, you're offered a diversion programwhich you can do that, and if
(13:54):
you successfully complete that, then youwouldn't that charge could you know, be
removed from your record, so itwas like you were never charged, right,
And so a lot of the timesthese diversion programs are now being run
by private entities and they cost afee. So it becomes a situation where
(14:16):
you have this two tiered system ofjustice of like, well, if you
can afford to participate in the diversionprogram, then you don't have to go
through the criminal justice court system,assuming you complete that program successfully. And
if you can afford that program,then you have to go through the system
and ultimately you might have a record. Now, it has been mentioned you
(14:41):
have had success in changing some lawsin other states, and there have been
attempts to change laws in Florida,but it doesn't seem that the legislation has
gone very far. And wondering thiswhen state legislatures and politicians take up the
issue is the discussion getting bought upin the sort of soft on crime talk
(15:03):
in backlash over prosecutors and sentences andissues like that. Is anyone saying that
it's soft on crime to give thesemisdemeanor defendants a break on fines and fees.
No, I haven't specifically heard thewords soft on crime. What we
have heard is, you know,well, they shouldn't have ever committed the
(15:26):
crime, right, whether that's amisdemeanor or if it's a traffic related and
you know, it's kind of like, so you've never made a mistake in
your life, right, These feesjust become they can snowball, and it
(15:46):
just keeps people in the system,is what ultimately happens. People have a
hard time getting out of it.And so if you can do an ability
to pay and you can set somebody'sfines and fees on something they're able to
pay, then they're going to payit. You know, judges do have
(16:07):
tools to deal with folks who arewillfully not paying, who can't afford and
they're willfully not and there's a differencethere. Right, most people want to
pay. I get contact forms allthe time of you know, I want
to pay, but I can't affordthis amount per month. I can afford
this, but I can't afford morethan this, And so meeting people where
(16:33):
they're at, we actually have theopinion that the clerk's revenue will increase,
which is backed by some data outof Texas and Tennessee and California that's not
in this report, but we knowabout it of FJC that shows when like
in Texas in twenty seventeen, theygave judges the ability to do these ability
(17:00):
to pay determinations, and the fiscalyear after their revenues that stayed local and
their arrest that they sent to thestate, both of those incased by around
seven, seven and eight percent,respectively, give or take. So to
sum it up, basically that ifthey are able to work out, if
(17:21):
they are willing to work out paymentplans with these individuals who have outstanding fines
and fees, they're likely to collectmore because those other fines and fees were
simply going uncollected because they couldn't affordto pay them. Correct, the check
is not in the mail currently,The check is not currently in the mail
because they can't afford it, andso the money is uncollectable. So looking
(17:45):
at it again from a business perspective, I'd rather have fifty dollars a month
than zero dollars a month if I'min this situation with my budget that the
clerks have been put in, andso yeah, it's it would it would
help people. And I will saythere have been we have made some progress
(18:06):
when it does come to payment plans. So in twenty twenty one a bill
was passed. It was actually inthe Clerk of Courts Priority Bill that year,
where it mandated a uniform payment planform to be created to be US
statewide because we found that they weresixty seven different forms being used with all
(18:30):
these different provisions. So that waspassed. And then in twenty twenty two
they passed legislation again through the Clerk'sPriority Bill, that sets a monthly payment
based on somebody income. It's twopercent of somebody's net income, divide by
twelve or twenty five dollars, whicheverthose two amounts ends up being greater.
(18:55):
But we also know that there aresome folks who are unlimited income that even
twenty dollars is too much for them. And there are clerks that we know
of that do work with folks likethat. And they will set it below,
but they're not They're not the rule, they're the exception. I would
say we've covered a lot of ground, and there's a lot of ground still
(19:17):
to be covered as far as theseissues go to some to kind of wrap
up here, if you would liketo give out some contact information about your
organization for people who would like tofind out more about this issue. Yes,
Our website is Fines and Fees Justicecenterdot org and if you go there,
you can click on state offices andthen you'll find Florida. But you'll
(19:41):
also find a wealth of information ina heading we have called clearing House,
which when our co director started theorganization, was one of the one of
the things they wanted us to beable to do. So the Clearinghouse is
like the Google of fines and feesinformations. You can go there and you
can find legislation, you can findmodel policy, you can find reports,
(20:06):
you can find law reviews, alldifferent kinds of things in the Clearinghouse,
and there's also a contact us formif you want to reach out to me
specifically. Sir Cautura, Florida StateDirector of the Fines and Fees Justice Center.
Thank you very much for joining uson beyond the news. Thank you
for having me
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