TPPF- Responds to PBT Article "Through the Looking Glass"



On February 17, 2020, the Houston Courant published a response to PBT's article entitled "Harris County- Through the Looking Glass."  The article was written by Michael Haugen who is a part of the Texas Public Policy Foundation which supports many of the changes advocated in Harris County.

In his article,  Mr. Haugen says that many of PBT's points are valid. These include:

  • Harris County’s new misdemeanor release practices all but ignore public safety.
  • Good’s point about case backlogs is well received.
  • No one wants dangerous individuals roaming the streets after having been arrested, but no one wants poverty to become an impediment on someone’s liberty, either.

In this article Mr. Haugen spends  approximately two thirds of his response conceeding that there are problems. Next, he says that the new system needs more time to see if it will work. Therafter, the final third of the article says that there is a fix for the problem and that is adoption of the bill sponsored by Senator Whitmire and Representative Murr which would require the use of a risk assessment tool throughout Texas.

Mr. Haugen ignores the fact that risk assessments have now been discredited and should not be used..

To read the entire article- CLICK HERE.

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