2027 Proposed Budget Hearings - Day 7.

But as I'm understanding, and I can let Judge Davolid talk more about that because she's on the state's budgetary committee, there is no provision that I'm seeing for them to fund us past June 30. Who has the authority to increase, like, the filing fees and stuff at civil court? The clerk. Okay. All right. So my part is to talk about the impact on criminal district court. So just to take you all back several years, is that criminal district court has endured severe cuts over the past decade with past administrations and with respect to the budget. So criminal district court has already sort of streamlined the way that we operate in terms of the employees that are employed by criminal district court, in terms of the services that are provided by the court, in terms of salaries. We vacated a number of different positions in order to try to save money so that we could operate. But in many past administrations, the court has been forced to reduce its cash on hand by using cash on hand in order to supplement the reductions in the already existing deficits for criminal district court. At the time prior to this year, criminal court was previously funded through various sources, including first the state legislature, which would then funnel money to the Supreme Court, then also through the city council through these budget hearings in the mayor's office, and then also with various grants. Well, initially a few years ago, the grants, many of the grants expired or were terminated based on the current administration and its priorities in terms of funding programs. So those grants, those programs that were grant funded were then absorbed by criminal court in its operations personnel and operations funding. And then we see the cuts that we saw with the city over various administrations, and then now we have the cuts through the state legislature. So we've endured cuts from all of our funding sources over years and years. What that means is that last year, the budget that we sought overall We had a more than $3 million deficit. We used cash on hand, as Judge Lombard said, to cover that more than $3 million deficit. So we have absolutely no funds, no cash on hand to cover the $4.2 million deficit that we're currently facing. What that means is that statutorily mandated items that the court is required to adhere to from a constitutional purpose, that we will not be able to adhere to those requirements. That means more lawsuits. That means overcrowding in the jails, which will then cost the city an extreme amount of money to house people in custody, and then also to transport people to other facilities. We've looked at potential furloughs, but because the salaries of our staff, they're already below average, which causes us issues with retaining good, qualified people, a furlough, even a day or two, will not assist us in any real cost savings. And so we're looking at potential impacts to our budget in terms of our jury commission. And as you know, our jury commission, that's the department in criminal district court that oversees all of our jury trials, that summons potential jurors for voir dire. They summon potential jurors for all of our jury trials, as well as for grand juries and for special grand juries. And so this is a department that's ongoing. It's already staffed at the lowest amount of staff members that we can withstand. Trials are mandated by the Constitution, and so any impingement upon that would subject the court and the city and maybe even the state to potential legal liability. We look at pretrial services program that was mandated by the city of New Orleans in 2015 that actually started in 2017. Pretrial services runs what we call a criminal history. They monitor defendants who are on bond for safe release. They monitor defendants who are on electronic monitoring. They also monitor defendants that have guns and weapons charges. And so they are statutorily mandated because of new statutes, as well as the existing statutes that look at conditions for release. There is now a new statute that requires each court or law enforcement to run a background check to see if someone has any existing or pending cases that might affect their bonds. We also have domestic violence, stalking, and sex-related offenses. There is a statutory mandate that those offenders be monitored through some type of domestic court monitoring program. And so, again, not offering that particular program, which is statutorily mandated, will cause us or subject us to, again, more legal liability. The Sanity Commission is also required through the Code of Criminal Procedure, wherein doctors are appointed, as you all know, to determine the mental competency and or sanity and or dangerousness of a person in criminal district court. Again, that's mandated by state law. If we do not provide at least two psychiatrists or at least one psychiatrist and a psychologist to conduct the evaluations and then provide testimony and reports to the court, that, again, is another area where the court and the city would be exposed to legal liability. We are required to provide indigent transcripts to those people who are deemed indigent. And as you all know, probably over 75% of the people who are court-involved are indigent. Court costs. Orleans Parish is the only court parish that has been sued. And there is a federal consent judgment that requires our court only to conduct, basically, a financial assessment of someone to determine whether or not they are able to pay court costs, fines, or fees. If they're deemed indigent, then we have to waive those court costs, fines, and fees. So our court is not allowed to collect court costs, fines, and fees from those who are indigent, even though previously that involved allowing people to pay on a monthly basis. All other courts, including federal court, and all of the state courts currently still collect court costs, fines, and fees.

And so we've exhausted all avenues over the past decade in terms of court reductions in the budget, in terms of reductions in grants, and the funding that we've received. And at this point, operating with a $6.1 million budget versus a $10 plus million budget would put us in a huge deficit, where we would only be recouping about 60% of our budget. That would render our court inoperable, basically, for 2027, or at least the second half of 2027. Thank you. And I just briefly want to go through the goals of the court for next year. That should be on the presentation. That should be on the presentation. The goals for the criminal district court. I can't get through it. All right. All right. So obviously, the goal is, well, primary goal is operational continuity. We want to continue what we are doing today. We want to make sure that the city of New Orleans' access to justice remains as prescribed by the code, and that we can continue to provide the level of service we have been doing. As we have just stated, it does not seem like we would be able to do that on the current proposed budget. Our next goal is fiscal stability, which again, under the current circumstances, will not be attainable. Obviously, we still have our commitment to public safety and community confidence. We are going to do the best we can with what we have to maintain that, but we just don't see how we do that by the end of the second half of 2027. We do want to maintain our sustained interagency collaboration, which includes collaborating with the city, the partners, the LEAD program, the Sheriff's Office, and all of our community partners that are providing services to the defendants and the victims, the Family Justice Center, and all of our partners that provide services to our court. That we plan to continue as long as we can operate normally. And then the last thing is sustained data integrity and information sharing. As you know, we got a new computer system at the end of last year, and we have been maintaining our records through that system, and we want to continue to maintain our data integrity and information sharing. We are trying to be as transparent as we can with the general public. OK, I have some questions, and I know Councilmember McCarran also has her button pushed. So I get where you're saying you expended about $3.5 million in cash on hand to fill the gap last year, and you're saying there is no cash on hand this year. OK, for the three sections that were eliminated, do you have a total cost savings for those three sections? Or Brandi, can you calculate that? It was about $1.1 million, but that's not in this. I mean, we took that out before we gave you the cost. So you backed that out of the budget, and you're using that cost savings to do what with? Have you identified the programs that you're going to fund with that $1.1 million, like the sanity, the domestic violence? We don't have it. The $1.1 million came out and left us still with a $4.2 million deficit. So the deficit would have been higher if that remained. Yeah, yeah, I got it. All right, I'm looking at just some high-ticket items that you have in your budget, and I just want to go over them quickly. Capital expenditures at 460, what is that? Rob, do you know? That's the build-out. That's good. That includes the domestic build-out, and those are funds that we are requesting again. It was $350,000 that we had initially in there, and we just never have been funded for that, and so we would put it in our request again. So that's a request. It's not anything that you're in the middle of? Correct. That's correct. We talked about technology, 196. That's just for ongoing technology? Yes. For the new technology? Correct. Ended in transcripts, I get. Law books and legal subscriptions, that's your Westlaw. Yeah, you need to have that. Professional and contractual services, 387,500. That includes the CPA services that are being provided, and it also includes attorney fees that we are paying for ongoing cases that we have. For ongoing litigation. Exactly. Yes. Mm-hmm. And the audit fees. And the audit fees as well. OK. 43 for domestic violence. Yes, that includes the, that partly includes the salaries for those individuals that work in that department. So that's the salaries and benefits. So their pay is included there in that line. That's domestic violence. That's personnel and non-personnel expenditures. And that's the same for sanity? Sanity is contractual services. So those are the amount that's budgeted, or the fees that we would pay the psychiatrist and those others that perform services. So it's strictly professional services there. All right, so if I'm just looking at this one page, I know we've been trying to get the domestic violence area up and running for a minute. We theoretically could back out that 460 for now, and pause on it. On the capital expenditures? Yeah. Yes. OK. And I'm not going to say all of it, because we do need some for maintenance of the building. So we still had about $110,000 there for expenditures for the building. OK, can you send us something that separates that out? Yes. So the domestic violence portion is $350,000. Right. All right. Just looking at the, I see the organization, the second page with the adult learning center, the administration has basically zeroed all of this out, right? That's a pass through. OK. We only retain us probably 3% of those funds. We have a MOU with the outside agency to provide those services. Got it. And we did not zero those out. That total is. not the same, but that's not zeroed out for that. I can get you the total that's in the budget. Okay. I'm looking at the budget book. If there's a different number, please get it to us. Just to remind you, Council Member Harris, that is for the Youth Empowerment Project and for Delgado, that's the HiSET program where clients can get their, basically their GEDs.

And currently it's being funded at 323,150 for fiscal year 2026, but that's a reduction from the year before where we were about 461,000. In 2026, we incurred a 30% reduction. So the amount that we are currently being funded for the New Orleans Adult Learning Center is 323,150. Our request is to go back. We are trying to reestablish what we were cut because they're having difficulty performing those services as well because it's a pass-through that's being performed by an outside agency and they have expenses as well. So right now, the amount that you funded for fiscal year 2026 is 323,150. Okay. So one of the things that I think I'm going to ask all of the agencies that are before us today and tomorrow is how do we get the jail population down and your role in getting that jail population down? I know that there's been progress with the DA, the public defender, and the sheriff on trying to minimize the jail population by doing various tactics. Is there any idea or thought of how we can speed up reduction in the jail population? And your role in it? So we've already, I think, criminal district court has basically, I think, been leading in jail population reduction through the programs that I've talked about. So pretrial services, domestic violence monitoring court, all those programs that allow us to do these public safety assessments and then allow us to have case managers that monitor those who are placed on, electronic monitoring, who post bond, et cetera. Without these programs, then more people do stay in custody and without the number of types of monitoring and supervision, then more people do stay in custody. So a lot of the initiatives that we've taken, it's been since 2013, when the city partnered with the, it was the Arnold Foundation and MacArthur Foundation are when some of the reductions continue to take place. But without the programs that the court has, I don't see any way that we can ensure any continued reductions. Okay. But that is why these services are crucial, specifically the Sanity Commission, because that allows them to get in there, evaluate them right after first appearance. And if in fact they need to be more extensive service, that allows them to get us, get those defendants out of the jail, either to UMC or transferred to ELMS. So they're not in our particular system, but we do have two things coming down the pipes that's going to impact the jail population even more and probably increase the cost to the Sheriff's office. One, of course, is the reduction of the three judges. So we're gonna have the same amount of cases with three less people to move them, which is obviously gonna result in some higher incarceration times. The second is a law that the legislature passed this year. It's 3.1.2.1. That law requires that if someone is on probation, I mean, on bond for a certain list of crimes, that if they're rearrested on a new felony, they have to go through a hearing before they can be readmitted to bond. So that's requiring a lot of transferring around the court system, because if they come to me on a new felony, I have to hold them under that statute, send it to the judge that has their other bond. But the bigger issue is when they're out of parish, we still have to hold them, and at some point, transfer them to the judge that has the original bond. So we're holding people extra time, both for those hearings and to transfer them to other jurisdictions. Okay, let me just ask one last question, then I'll turn it over to my colleagues. So last year, you plugged the hole with about three million dollars, and you were able to sustain yourself. You're asking for another, what, four million dollars this budget season? You're not gonna get four million dollars. I mean, that's just the reality. What is the minimum amount that you need to continue these programs and continue to function? We would have to make another assessment, because the request that we were asking for would be to fully fund us where we were, because we did incur that 30% reduction last year. And I just want to also just highlight on that same page that we were on, jury commission was funded by 300, City of New Orleans funded us at 315,000. We were receiving 450,000 from the Supreme Court that will be eliminated. So jury commission alone cannot function off $315,000. So we would have to go back and really do another assessment of the budget to answer, I don't think we can answer that question right off to say. And that's fine, look, you guys know me. You've known me for years. We're friends. I just, I'm a straight shooter. Like, you're not gonna get four million dollars. You're not gonna get that amount. So if you can whittle down and say exactly the amount that you need to function at least for this year until we can get our feet back underneath us, I think that would be helpful to all of us so that we can make an informed decision. Okay? All right, Matthew Willard followed by Council Member Morrell. Did you have a question? You got mine, thank you. All right. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you all for coming down today and presenting the budget. Just a couple follow-up questions for clarity. Did you assign like a dollar value in which you would not expend with the elimination of those three judgeships and staff? 1.1 million. 1.1? Okay. It looks like on the personnel side in the budget the request from you guys was about $800,000 less than it was last year. And I'm assuming some of that, most of that is from the elimination of those positions. But then I noticed that the request that criminal court is making from the city for next year's budget is about 2 million higher than the city's provided in the last five years. It looks like 2025 was the highest at around 7.2 million. Is that due to the loss of state funds, grants rolling out and whatnot? So what's going on with the Supreme Court funding? Because it, you know, you guys were getting Supreme Court funding but now you're not getting it.

Is that, was that part of the change with the legislation earlier this year? Or is this just a decision? No, that is just the primary change. So the Supreme Court does not have its own independent source of funding. The Supreme Court received funds from the legislature. So when we would fund you guys in the legislature it would be routed through the Supreme Court essentially? Okay. And they were funding us at a value of around 4. Well, they said 7 in some of the hearings but it was really about 4.2, 4.5. So they funded that half for the beginning of the year but they're not funding the second half. So that's where that 2 million comes from. Okay. And so that means that, you know, if we're thinking about the future for 2028 we have no funding. Correct. Okay. Yeah, I mean, and I'm sure we'll get there but I think that the clerk is gonna have to really look at increasing those fines and fees in civil court to balance out, you know, the operations and salaries in criminal court but that'll be a separate discussion like- And we are waiting for an accounting. Sorry to interrupt. We are waiting on the clerk to kind of provide us with a clear accounting of what is going out before the courts get paid. That's the meeting we've been trying to schedule and we're hoping to reschedule it very soon. Okay. Yeah, that's very, I mean, that's very timely if you ask me. So I guess keep us in the loop there. So it looks like the adopted budget was 6.2 million for 26 but your projected actuals are about 9.9. Is that basically you guys depleting your reserve, your reserves? Correct. Yes. So rolling into next year that'll be essentially zeroed out? Correct. All right. And my last question is, so in the template spreadsheet, tab three showed that you guys had a fund balance of about 5 million as of the end of June. Any idea what it's, where it stands today? Template three? It was, it included restricted funding and general fund. I think your general fund was around 2.1 million. Oh, Jesus. Give me one second. Okay, so the funds that the balances that are on this page, some of these funds are not. We don't have access to it. We are legally. Yeah, some of it is restricted. Exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, so those funds that are there, that's part of the 3.2 million that's gonna take us through December 31st. Gotcha. Yes. Okay. All right. Thank you all for coming down. Keep me in the loop on the conversations with the clerk. Thank you all for having us. Council Member Morrell has a question. Oh, I'm sorry. Thank you. Following up with Council Member Warren, I think I'll be a little bit more robust. The legislature's goal in consolidating the clerk's office, as they stated repeatedly, was to make us like everybody else, correct? That's what we all heard. That was the argument. And as you know, in every other parish in the state of Louisiana, the clerk's office collects funds on the civil side to fund the criminal side. And so right now what we have, the disconnect is when we had two standalone courts, and I'm gonna put on my Professor J.P. hat for a second, dating back to the days of John Elario and first term Edwin Edwards. This is like the 1970s before I was born. When the courts were standalone, there was a specific appropriation, an HB1, that came to criminal district court to meet the obligation that existed because we had two clerks, and constitutionally, criminal court cannot charge filing fees. So you are functionally underfunded. You are functionally unable to fund yourselves. And over the course of years, the legislature tried repeatedly, whether it be through fines and fees to those people who are incarcerated, whether it be through every way they could possibly think to give revenue streams to criminal court, but none of them. stuck because they were all unconstitutional. So part of the legislature's kind of like dance over getting rid of the clerk of criminal court was that they would no longer have to give you any money. And in fact, the chair of appropriations, Representative McFarland, said now that you're like everybody else, they cut your funding, which is basically what was flowing to you through the Supreme Court. Correct? McFarland so far? That's right. Here's the problem the legislature created and their ridiculous rush to eliminate the clerk of criminal court. They did not put a mandate on the Orleans Parish clerk to fund criminal court. So basically the clerk of Orleans Parish has all the responsibilities to fund court but no obligation to do so. Is that about where we're at today? That's where we're at. Okay. Now I say all this because one, I know that our CAO is in conversations with the legislature right now to address this issue. I believe they're going to have to go back into that legislation and specifically put language in saying you have the responsibility as the clerk of Orleans Parish to fund all of court. Because I know I say this every year and I know you're tired of hearing it but it's rich dad poor dad. Civil court is sitting on surpluses while you guys are cutting essential programs. When we are looking at this historic drop in crime in the city of New Orleans, the programs you offer are part of the essential cogs that make this machine operate. And while the clerk is sitting on surpluses and not meeting with you to figure out how to address this issue, this is a problem the legislature created because it empowered a singular clerk with no obligation to fund half of the court system. Now I say that with the caveat, when it comes to your capital expenditures, every parish, every city has the responsibility to take care of your building. So when it comes to your jury room having black mold or whatever, that's on us. When it comes to that making sure the building, the roof doesn't leak, to make sure that everything operates physically in the building, every parish, every city bears the responsibility for your capital costs.

But when it comes to your programming, when it comes to your employees, when it comes to your day-to-day operations, that is the responsibility of the clerk. And if you want to be the clerk of Orleans Parish, you have to do your job by funding all of the courts, not just the court where your office is. And so I heard you say you're trying to get that meeting set up. We are in the middle of a budget crisis trying to figure out how to rob Peter to pay Paul and fund all aspects of the city of New Orleans. Everybody needs to show up and show what they're going to put down to make sure criminal court can function. And I would certainly encourage the clerk to show up and say where they're going to dip into in her extensive large surplus to help you get through this year until we can get the legislature to correct their mistake. But as the budget chair said, we do not have enough money to pay for everything. And what we're talking about today is not the money we historically give you. It's talking about how we make up the state money the state will no longer give you. And I think that's an important caveat. When it comes to our commitment to funding and subsidizing criminal court, we're meeting it. We just can't afford to meet the additional obligation the state has put on the city by not putting that obligation on the clerk of Orleans Parish. So just for clarity, because you said that civil court is sitting on a surplus. Now that I'm on the consolidated JEF, that was what I thought all this time too. Civil court itself is not sitting on the surplus. The clerk's office is sitting on the surplus. The only mandate from the legislature right now is that the clerk put in 60% of the filing fees into the JEF, which has now become the consolidated JEF. They do not address surpluses in this bill. They do not address, they don't even clarify whether it's really gross or net in this bill. So what we're getting right now, or what's going into that fund right now is 60% of the net of the clerk's office. So that's after all the expenses of the clerk's office is taken out. That is a very important distinction because unlike other parishes, our clerk of civil court has infinitely more control over the money that the judges generate through filing fees more than any other clerk in the state of Louisiana. If you look at other parishes, the money that comes in through the clerk is regulated by the equivalent of the JEF, or whatever the judge's en banc. It is very unusual that the clerk of court sits on such a significant pot of surplus money in their budget. That is not normal and that is a relic of the clerk of civil court. I think that what needs to happen at the legislative level is they need to go back into their consolidated clerk bill and make that clerk like every other clerk, where all of the money comes in. When it comes to their amount of money they have for their courthouse, that's separate. But the clerk should not be sitting on surpluses on operations any year. No other clerk does that. The money comes in, it goes out. The fact that a clerk is sitting on an operational surplus is just money. It's just money and when you look at the fact that the newly consolidated courts have a need that will directly impact operations, it makes the idea that there could be an operational surplus completely ridiculous. Because if anything, what should happen in a reasonable place is that you take your operational surplus, you make the courts function, then you go back to the judges en banc and you raise the civil court fees to cover the operations of the consolidated judicial system. That is what should have happened and the fact that it hasn't happened yet really draws concern to me because it shows a lack of urgency. If you have the operational resources to make sure both courts can operate at efficient levels, this should have happened already. And I really call upon my legislative colleagues and I will work with the council and the members of the delegation to correct this issue going forward but it's very disappointing right now that in the midst of the city having a deficit, the clerk has not stepped up with their surplus to solve this problem. Thank you, Madam Chair. Council Member Willard. Just to follow up on that, so the 60 percent that goes into the JEF, is that split between criminal and civil? It is. Wow, all right, thanks. Well, before it was split, I mean, so that's what I was saying, before it just went to civil and the amount that's been going to civil is keeping their head above water. Do you know how much it is? It depends because it's based on filing fees so it can alternate monthly but from what I got from civil court, on any given month sometimes they have a deficit, sometimes they have a surplus, and at the end of last year I think they finished with a surplus of a couple hundred thousand, maybe two hundred, two hundred fifty thousand. But if some months they have a deficit, wouldn't it just make sense to increase the the filing fee so you never, I mean... The civil judges don't make that decision. Got it. Thank you, Judge. All right, thank you all. Anybody, any other questions? No, that's it. Thank you. Thank you all for your time and attention. And we're looking forward to the revised budget. Thank you. Next is the district attorney's office. Let's see. Okay. Throw a piece of paper at me if you have a question. Mr. DA, whenever you're ready. Okay, I'm always ready. Let's jump in. It's good to be back with you all. This feels like coming home, although I've come home, back to a home that has run out of money, which makes it a lot harder. I was in a group of people last night and a friend of mine said that he believes this city council is the best city council he's ever seen, and he apologized to me after he said it. I said, I agree with you. I said, I see how much they're working.

I see how much they're in community, and not to mention what they're up against is very different from anything that I was up against or that any other council that I've seen has been up against, and you all have been navigating very difficult, tumultuous waters very, very well. Thank you all for letting us present today. Thank you for continuing to push us through probably the most A devastating fiscal crisis, we can imagine. Thank you to your staffs that have been getting you all the information you need so you can make sure that you can weigh everything that's in front of us. I'll begin with a review of our 2026 goals. Obviously, to effectively support victims and witnesses, achieve the best possible case outcomes, maintain a qualified and professional staff, and avoid, more importantly, avoid backsliding the hard-fought public safety gains that we all have achieved. The goals of supporting victims and achieving the best possible outcomes, marked in progress, largely due to the investment of this city council. I was at this table in 2022, USA Today, the two days before, had named us the murder capital of the country again. We discussed the issues presented. We came up with a plan. We presented that plan to you, which included the building of a one-of-a-kind homicide unit. We provided a very tight budget for that homicide unit. This council funded that measure. And in less than a year, we began to drive those numbers down, and we've continued to do that for four years since. And now there's people coming around from other parishes and other states looking at that work. And I'm always very clear that that work was only possible because of an investment by this council into our specialty units. The recent reports from Jeff Asch, Metropolitan Crime Commission, and FBI have described the conviction rate as hovering at about 95%. And those are Orleans parish jurors who are making unanimous decisions on these cases. Our SVU unit co-leads the Greater New Orleans Human Trafficking Task Force, which has complemented really exemplary work around the state. In this area, you've noticed many more arrests in that space than we've ever seen before. Despite the city of New Orleans always being a destination city. We've been fortunate for the things that we have collectively as a city, as public safety agencies put in place, to have seen early and sustained public safety gains. But as we all know, there are no victory flags in the space of public safety. And backsliding has occurred throughout the years. It is imperative that we maintain the level of investment that have gotten us this far. Personnel. Budget challenges and operational realities forced us to make some shifts in resources because we saw this coming. So you might see actual positions that are less than budgeted in one category and slightly more than budgeted in another category because we have already shifted to more than a year ago into the triage space necessary to deal with the fiscal crisis that we're facing. We'll likely have some additional shifts between now and year end as we continue to assess ways to streamline. Overall, we are a leaner agency today than we were a year ago. We thought it was important that we come in already demonstrating our commitment to tightening the belt, though we caution there is a tipping point. There is a point when absorbing cuts begins to trickle out into community in devastating ways. Our 2027 goals are to contain the backlogs in the dockets from what was just described by the judges. We're going from 12 to 9, which means we have closed the neck of the bottle even more in terms of expeditiously resolving cases. And so we have been working with partners and within our own internal working groups to find ways to expedite case resolution and timelines, to create efficiencies in managing data and digital evidence in order to continue to maintain those gains with fewer people. As we reach the beginning of a new year with those fewer courtrooms, that presents a huge challenge, which I believe was articulated by the judges in terms of managing a backlog and resolving cases more efficiently with more cases flowing into the other nine sections. Our jurisdiction, Orleans Parish, has the highest number of criminal jury trials compared to any other parish, a single homicide or a single rape trial can occupy a courtroom for an entire week. Your own Ashley Spears is one of the best prosecutors we had. She can attest to the number of woman hours and man hours it takes to resolve serious cases. Longer dockets will keep attorneys in court for longer, hours during which they are unable to actually work on the next case up, to work with the next victim up, to work with the next set of witnesses and experts that are up. As the amount of digital evidence grows, and we thank you for your investment in real-time cameras and to license plate readers and to body-worn cameras and dashboard cameras, but what that means is we have volumes of more information to absorb, synthesize, and get to the public defender's office and get to the judges so that a case can be presented constitutionally and fairly. Though challenging, we've been able to work with AI and Bancroft Global to figure out ways to expedite that work. I've committed to working alongside our other public safety partners to triage and expedite case resolutions. This is a goal that the public defenders representing defendants, our sheriff operating across the jail, and the judges have just described to you. It's a group lift. There's a direct correlation between the pace of case progression and the burden and expense placed upon OPSO and our other justice agencies. Every part of the justice system is going to need an investment to make sure that we are not pity-wise and pound-foolish when it comes to the jail. I was just during the jail with our two at-large members with Judge Afric.

I think we are remarkably close, remarkably close to getting out of the consent decree, but it's going to take certain key efforts from this council and certain key efforts from my office and other agencies to get us to that point, but we are dangerously, dangerously close. A smaller jail, and I say this, I know I'm here representing one office, the DA's office, but we are an ecosystem, much like a lake, much like an ocean, much like a forest. The players in that system depend on each other. A smaller jail means a safer, more efficient justice system and potentially millions of dollars of savings going back to the city coffers. Today we have approximately 1475 people in our Paris jail. Our goal, not the sheriff's goal, not the judge's goal, not the public defender's goal, our goal as a criminal justice system is to very quickly get that number to 900. That is 575 fewer people occupying very, very expensive jail beds every single day. We get there by moving cases faster. That takes not just an ADA in each section of court, but an assigned public defender, much the way it was when J.P. Morrell was a public defender. When the judge knew who his public defender was going to be every single day, it meant that they could hold that public defender and my prosecutor accountable for the trial date they agreed on to make sure the case either gets tried that day, gets resolved that day, so that it does not go into next week's docket. And it also requires dedicated case resolution days. The judges were just up here and you all are asking all the right questions. But one of the things that we were able to do with Section J's docket, that's where Darryl Durbney was, we had Chief Judge retired Calvin Johnson, we had retired Judge Fran Ziblage, we had dedicated public defenders and ADAs figuring out ways to triage that docket to get it down. And we got it down in that one section of court. Our goal now, and we've been meeting with Daniel Shanks and the Public Defender's Office and their stakeholders and my stakeholders, to figure out a way to take the lessons learned from Section J, apply them to all 12 sections before we go to 9, and then keep applying them to the 9 sections so that these efficiencies will result in fewer people in jail. Now this is not about everybody getting out of jail. Some of these folks are going to get convicted, but they need to be then processed to the Department of Corrections where they're supposed to be housed. Now that requires a state to do their job and send a van down and pick up folks after they've been processed, just like when that jailbreak happened. Four or five of those guys, their case has already been resolved. The state should have already had them in the Department of Corrections. And we need to make sure that's happening. I know that the sheriff has been reaching out to her state partners to make sure that there is an efficient Thursday case resolved, Friday come and get them so we can have those jail beds. And I want to ensure the people of this community understand that what we're talking about is not releasing people from jail to community. In some instances, that may be the case. But this is about ending unnecessary delays and delivering accountability sooner and ensuring that the state, not only New Orleans taxpayers, are bearing the appropriate responsibility for those state sentences. I'll say it again, a sustained reduction in jail population will not only help lower operating costs and Due to pressure for additional jail capacity, it will support the city's effort to achieve compliance with its stated goals and ultimately help us seek in months rather than in a year or weeks rather than months the end of the Orleans-Paris Sheriff's Office Federal Consent Decree. The choice is whether we invest in moving cases efficiently or paying for the consequences of that delay. We can spend less on unnecessary detention, protect public safety, and build a justice system that is delivering results rather than accumulating costs, putting the city in a position to decide how it better wants to use that close to $5 million that will be coming back after the Consent Decree, how it wants to use those jail beds and those other facilities that will then now be back online, and allowing our sheriff to be able to use the saved resources to actually staff Phase 3, which is non-negotiable, in order to get out of this Consent Decree, as argued very clearly by Judge Afrid during our tour. Our investments, going into 2027, if you look at how the investments move between 2022 and 2025, recorded murders also went down because of those investments. The proposed 2027 allocation of $6.94 million represents a 56% decrease from 2025 and would require elimination of entire divisions that this City Council built dedicated to holding violent offenders accountable, sex crimes offenders, murderers. For example, even if we eliminated our entire Homicide Unit, our Special Victims Unit, our Adult Diversion Unit, and nearly all of our investigators and most of our victim advocates, we still did not get close to the proposed reduction. Just to give you an idea of the families, human beings, survivors, and next of kin, we would not be able to serve. The proposed amount would result in a near shutdown of the work that is required to deliver for this community and, I believe, deliver the jail reduction efficiencies necessary to save money. In comparison, the local budget allocation for our neighboring parish, which does not have the same workload Jefferson Parish, was a little over $16 million in 2025, $17 million in 2026. Notably, the Jefferson Parish DA's office also received dedicated funds pursuant to a criminal justice millage. And I know there's been conversations about a millage. Their millage generates about $4.8 million last year. That jurisdiction held about 22 trials last year. Our homicide team alone handles more trials than that in a single year. That's all of their trials.

I say this not to disparage our great neighbors in Jefferson Parish, I love Paul Conant, but rather just to highlight the difficulties of the workload, the difficulties of recruiting and retaining and effectively managing the most challenging caseloads in the state. Prosecutors across the nation have struggled to recruit in the face of a lot of bad publicity, which is probably deserved based upon some of the work that was being put out over the past couple of decades. They've had difficulty retaining skilled prosecutors because of the budget crisis that have existed, largely attributed to insufficient resources, crushing workloads, and generally the stressful nature of the work. You all know that we lost a young lawyer to a suicide in our office. And he was working in our sex crimes unit. The public defender's office lost one of their public defenders as well. It's a crushing workload. On the defense side, you protect a defendant's rights. That's a crushing workload for the folks on the other side of the V. On the prosecution side, you're charged with upholding the rights of the defendant as well, making sure they get a fair trial, speaking to unanimous juries, victims, and witnesses, demanding that they have the protections they need and deserve to go back and forth to court. We also have the burden of proof, meaning we are charged with not just collecting but compiling evidence and getting the necessary witnesses to court safely and proving that case beyond a reasonable doubt every single time to all 12 jurors. It's extremely grueling work. There's grueling hours with non-competitive pay. It's a tough sell. The folks that work with us do it because it's a labor of love. It's a calling. With probably more than $100,000 in student loans, which the lawyers on this dais know about, and with government that has taken away the student loan repayment, that was once something that we could use as a selling point. We also, at the DA's office, have a number of auxiliary duties in addition to our core prosecutorial duties that the public defender's office does not have. We respond to post-conviction relief applications, expungement applications. We support the courts. Judge Holmes and Judge Lombard just had an expungement day. We support that because we have to play our role in doing that. I know you members of the city council have also played a role in those expungements because if people don't have that on their record, they can get back in the workforce, which is where we want them to be. We also have name change petitions, which you'd be surprised how many we receive. We receive open meetings, law complaints. We facilitate asset and bond forfeiture processes, and at times we are able to recoup large sums of money back to the DA's office for the police department and for the courts, but it takes money to do that work in order to go after those assets. We compete with the federal government for those as well. They've been a good partner with David Corsell at the helm. We also participate in child of need of care proceedings with DCFS. The public defender's office does not have to do that work. We also have a diversion program, which actually helps release the caseload of the public defender's office because those individuals don't ever go to court. They just get processed and get the help that they need to be good fathers, mothers, and good citizens. We also process hundreds of public records requests per year. Our responsibilities are vast. We understand that the city remains in a fiscally restrained environment. Our request is a substantial ask. In 2022, I asked this council to invest in a unit, and I promised results, and we delivered those results. That unit has since won recognition for its incredible success across the country. Today, I ask this council to make us whole. I commit to delivering the efficiencies that I have described, and I dedicate myself and my other partner agencies to not only delivering those results, but delivering that money back to the city coffers because of the necessary results of getting out of a consent decree. But I believe we can do it. I believe that it is incumbent upon us to do it, and I believe that we finally have a team that is willing to row in the same direction. Having partners, willing partners in the sheriff's office, willing partners in the public defender's office, willing partners on this dais, and willing partners across the hall from you all are going to allow us to achieve these goals. I want to describe the plan for you. As I've set it out with the public defender's office, we'll be presenting to the ombud next week or the following week. Number one, an early allotment change, changing the allotment process so that it allows the public defender's office to be vertical, but appoint a public defender very sooner. It will provide continuity of case management. A defendant will have the same public defender throughout the process, just as our next of kin and survivors will have the same ADA throughout that process. We hope that that will allow case management and allow case preparation days in the courts so we can do what we did in Section J. Pre-acceptance, we're working. We have Meg Garvey working with Andre Jeanfro in my office, he's the chief of screening, to very quickly deal with new arrests and screening situations and to put more pressure on the police department to provide police support sooner so that we can screen cases faster. And if they don't need to come into the system, they won't come into the system. And the post-acceptance, post-arraignment docket management system, we're working with Nathaniel Weaver to create a dashboard that works with JTMP reporting so that this council can look at that docket reduction alongside of jail population reduction to see if we're hitting our benchmarks as we get closer to the end of the year.

The court scheduling, preparation and case resolution sessions like we did in Section J, we're going to bring to all 12 sections. And we also are creating something new, and this was Daniel Shanks' idea, and it was a good idea, targeted review of aging and resource-intensive cases. Certain defendants cost us more money, either because of their age, the age of the case, or health challenges. A person who needs more health resources in the jail costs the city more money. We're going to make a list for every section of court so we can make sure those cases are getting earlier trial dates so that we can either get those individuals to the Department of Corrections or back into community just by being smart with what we do. And I'm not going to step on the sheriff's toes, but in terms of getting people sentenced sooner, we're going to work to get that work done. In terms of probation revocations, we're going to be pushing the courts not to wait until the new case is resolved, but to have that probation revocation hearing as soon as it appears on the docket so that defendant can be moved to wherever he needs to be but out of our jail. But I know the sheriff is going to speak to getting the state to come faster to moving inmates out. I just ask that you look at what we have asked for, you look at the plan that we would like to put forward, and we believe that funding this plan will return money. to the city to the city conference for you to decide where it should be best spent. Thank you. Councilmember Morrell. Thank you. I appreciate the presentation, Mr. D.A. I do think one thing we talked about yesterday while we're doing the tour of Judge Afric and I know this is going to kind of cross over into Sheriff Woodford's presentation, but there was a highlight of some of the procedural delays in processing probation and parole. Can you go over that a little bit? Certainly. I think it's important that there are logistical hurdles that we'll probably need legislative fixes to implement because it will shrink the period in which we are reprocessing people with DOC. One hundred percent. As it relates to probation revocations, a judge can decide immediately, I'm bringing this person into court, we're having a hearing, we're resolving this case on day one. As it relates to parole, we don't have that control and that's what you're speaking to. The state has not improved the parole hearing system in a way to deal with the influx of parole hearings and revocation, which means that our city jail, which is supposed to be a pretrial detention jail, is housing individuals who are waiting for the state to process their parole, to have their parole hearing. It's similar to what happened when we increased ICE raids, immigration raids. We didn't increase the number of judges that are dealing with those issues. We have the same number of parole officers as we did in the beginning of this gubernatorial term and so we're going to need a legislative fix to find ways of expediting those parole hearings. It's out of my control, it's out of the judge's control, but we face the consequences of holding those individuals in our jail pretrial. Right, so essentially, not to get in the nuts and bolts, but you often have to have a committee or a board come together to consider a parole revocation and they're trying to find space and time to have them show up and all those things are outside of your control, outside of the sheriff's control, and they're probably simple legislative fix, like having those hearings be virtual, where you can have them from Baton Rouge and have the person come in and have the data there. Those are things that we're going to have to go to the legislature and get fixed. I also want to talk about real quickly, when it comes to how we're dealing with probation holds for other parishes. How is that impacting, because obviously every time we have someone have to enter the courtroom and have to deal with those individuals, all those things delay trial time. How can we help you, working with the legislature, kind of remove these obstacles to make court operate more efficiently? So I mean, I think when you look at probation holds from other jurisdictions, whatever jurisdiction has placed the hold, I believe should bear the responsibility of holding that particular inmate. Some of the complexities come in, and the sheriff may speak to this as well, is when someone has an open case in multiple jurisdictions. Whether or not, but as you know, COVID changed everything. It allowed us to virtually handle matters that previously required people to be in the same room to deal with. If there are legislative fix that can expedite a parole hearing or probation revocation hearing, and keep the person housed in a facility in the jurisdiction where they need to be housed and should legally be housed, that's what Orleans Parish needs. Because we simply, I mean Jefferson Parish has prison overcrowding release. They've got a safety valve. They're never going to go above their number because they're just going to let them out. We don't have the luxury of that in Orleans Parish, and frankly, I don't think the press, the media, and the public would allow that to work in Orleans Parish. But what we don't need is the same issue we have with homelessness, is the rest of other parishes dumping their folks in Orleans Parish. And so a legislative fix can fix that. Well, I mean, also like we have the issue of warrant holds. Like for example, and this has happened frequently when I was a public defender, you would have a judge, let's say in like Ruston, Louisiana, who put a warrant out for somebody not paying a traffic ticket. And it was meant to send a message to that speeder. However, when that person is sitting in Orleans Parish prison, and Ruston's deciding whether or not they want to extradite him, the cost of sending that message is borne by Orleans Parish because we're having that person sit in jail needlessly.

When you hear probation and parole holds, you're thinking of the worst of the worst, but there are plenty of instances in which we have people in the system that are there in a way almost to inconvenience them and inconvenience the parish holding them. When the parish who made the original warrant hold really has no intention of sending an actual sheriff down to extradite someone over a speeding ticket, they just want to send the message that while they're sitting there cooling their heels, when they get out of jail after two or three days have passed because they released the warrant hold, that person's got to go pay that ticket, but we're holding that person. We're paying the freight. Right. We're paying the house, and we're paying for that penalty. And the lion's share of the time, and you said it absolutely right, and even in low-level nonviolent crimes, they do not send anyone to get them. So it is a useless hold in terms of delivering that person back in custody. Okay. Well, you've certainly given a lot of food for thought. I'm taking notes. I'm going to reach out to some legislators and see what we can do to bring some relief using technology because, I mean, the reality is having this work more expeditiously is not just about making the system function better for us, but also for the people that are in it because if you're going to have a parole revocation, it is easier for the person who's about to be revoked to actually begin serving their time versus hanging out in Orleans Parish for several weeks, several months, with no necessarily guarantee they're going to get credit for the time where they're chilling in our courthouse. So I appreciate it. I look forward to working with you on those solutions. Thank you, sir. Council Member King. All right. Thank you. Council Member Harris, good morning. Mr. DA. Good morning, sir. Thank you and all of our criminal justice committee. Our criminal justice partners in the audience. I have more of a comment or comments than questions. I consider criminal justice, like you said it perfectly, it's not one person, it's not one department. It's everyone. The courts, the DA, the public defenders. I consider that to be up there with essential services like trash pickup, grass cutting, public works, streets, street lights. And I believe the city has kind of gotten, well, I'm going to say this. Most people just want a safe city and a clean city, so essential services. I believe that we've kind of gotten lulled to sleep by the great work done by you and the rest of our criminal justice partners because crime is no longer number one on our worry list. Back in 2022, 2023, when the city was overrun with carjackers and the murder rate was high, that was number one on everyone's list. And thanks to you and hats off to everyone in the office, everyone in the room, sheriff, then police chief. World War IV crime has had historical drops and we've kind of gotten comfortable. And a lot of people are saying, well, hey, we shouldn't give as much money to our criminal justice partners because look at the crime rates dropping or it's not needed. Well, without your work, crime will not drop. Without being able to hire competent DAs, the courts don't run as smoothly. Without being able to hire competent public defenders, people don't get the adequate representation they need. Without being able to hire sheriff officers or give them a pay increase, you can't keep people to keep the prison safe or the jail safe. When I'm meeting with Sheriff Woodford, you have hundreds of people who live in that prison 24 hours a day and who work in that prison 12 hours a day. They need to feel and be safe. So when I was asked by the media, what are my concerns or my priorities, I mentioned, of course, trash and sanitations and streets, but right up there, not below it, not above it, I think on equal playing field has to be criminal justice because you can have the cleanest city, you can have all of the zoning issues resolved, but if you're not safe, you don't feel comfortable walking out your car to go pump gas, you can't live in the city. So I just want you all to know that my priorities and my goals will be to maybe not make you all whole because we have such a large deficit that may not be realistic. I just want to be honest and transparent, but to make sure you all receive as much funding as possible. And that's you, the public defenders, the Sheriff's Office, juvenile court, JJISC, Ms. Rome and her juvenile public defenders team, because without that, the city will crumble. And Sheriff Woodford, if you can have these numbers ready, you and Mr. Lumpkin, DA, you said you'd pay for it now, basically I'll pay for it later. So I want to know how much, you said it before, Sheriff, how much does it cost to house a female inmate every day? I think it's more than tuition at a state university. You can have those numbers for me when you come up. Just so the public knows, I'm going to stop talking, but this is a real passion to me. If you don't have a properly funded DA's office, people may be on the streets who don't deserve to be on the streets, because you can't properly prosecute the case. You can't officially prosecute the case. If you don't have a properly funded public defender's office, you may have, not may, you will have overwhelmed public defenders. I remember talking to a public defender who said, and I say this story all the time, he said, I have a hundred, I'm one public defender with a hundred felony cases. Now, you as a world-renowned criminal defense attorney know it's almost physically impossible to represent 100 felony cases. His words to me is, some of these people are going to get screwed. I just can't do it all, but while they properly funded public defender's office, how can you hire qualified and competent public defenders? Same for juvenile court, same for the juvenile public defender's juvenile jail. Without a properly funded, as much as possible, parish jail.

You're going to have a very unsafe prison or unsafe jail, which will cause crime to rise in jail, which will cause crimes to rise in the streets, because that is all connected. So I still have to say it's very important that we make our criminal justice system as whole as possible, because it's right up there with essential services like grass cutting, sanitation, street lights, and pothole repairs. And I know a lot of people don't want to hear that, but it's true. And I would ask anyone who doesn't believe that to spend a day in your office, spend a day in the sheriff's office, spend a day with the public defenders, or the juvenile court, and just see how imperative it is to have a properly, competent, funded criminal justice system. Not just one link in a chain, but the entire chain has to be as strong as possible. So that's my comments for that, and my commitment to you and everyone in here is to advocate as much as possible to not make you whole, quite frank, I'm not sure that's financially possible, but to make you as whole as possible. Thank you, Councilmember King. I would just say, you know, to anybody who thinks crime is down, we can wave the flag, we did it, right, it's literally like looking behind you in a track race. You will trip. And going from the murder capital of the country to where we are now, in the speed with which we did it, it was a pretty remarkable thing. But New Orleans is a destination city, right? We live and die on how many people we can convince to come here, to have a good time, to work, to have a convention, to do whatever. So when you start talking about getting out of the top ten most dangerous places, a destination city has to talk about that more differently. We're not Topeka. We're not Albuquerque. If we can go and say we're no longer part of the top ten, we're out of the top 20, and not only will we still be the most remarkable, most unique, most culturally diverse city in this country, but if we can also start saying that we're also the safest, I mean, I think we need to be really aspirational with our goals. We've shown what we can do. So if we can continue to drive those numbers down even lower, I mean, if you talk to Walt Leger, if you talk to folks at the convention center, they will tell you that their numbers are up because our numbers are down, right? And so we continue to drive those numbers down. I was at a wedding at the Sculpture Garden with about 300 New Yorkers, all singing, talking bad about New York, but singing the praises of New Orleans because of the story we have to tell. So we can flatline, we can backslide, or we can continue to improve, and I really think it would be a really remarkable story to give to Gail Benson, to give to Walt Leger, to give to the convention center, to talk about how much we're continuing to drive crime down because we're investing in it. Well, also, money doesn't follow chaos. So those conventions, they don't come to the city, they plan out years in advance, so they're not coming to a city when they see the headlines are filled with crime stories. Same as residents, people don't move to unsafe cities, they leave a city that's not safe. So we need to pay for it now and invest in our criminal justice partners and attract those businesses, attract those conventions, and more importantly, attract those families, those residents, or we can say, let's put it somewhere else for whatever reason and watch the residents, the numbers, the populations continue to drop, watch the businesses leave, and watch the conventions say, y'all, we may just want to go to Atlanta, may just want to go to- So raising families here has to be top of mind. Absolutely. Absolutely. So I'm done talking, but I appreciate your work and look forward to working with you and all our criminal justice partners to make our city safe as possible. Thank you, sir. All right. I would ask you to do the same thing that I asked the criminal court judges, which is just pick up the pencil, see if there's any cuts that can be made strategically. I know you guys are at the limit of cuts, but if there are more that can be made, then maybe we can find some money somewhere. I was talking to a couple of lawyers the other day about, they look really healthy, maybe we can start selling some blood plasma, some other things. I think about it all the time. Whatever it takes, I'm willing to do it. If I could cut my hair and donate it, I would, but we're looking at every rock. I know. It's a fire sale everywhere. So thank you. Thank you, Mr. DA. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. All righty. Next is the Sheriff's Office. Who's doing the slides? Elizabeth. Okay. Yeah, we need another chair. They got one over there. Let's get in. We're reading the text. The student's name. I'm a student, but I'm a student. I'm a student. I'm a student. I'm a student. I'm a student. I'm a student. That's my name. I'm a student. I'm a student. I'm a student. It's all over one. Okay. Good morning. Good morning, council members and everyone in attendance today. Thank you for the opportunity to make this presentation today as we look forward to our productive exchange. First, let me introduce my team. I have my chief deputy, Murphy Paul, my chief administrative officer, Keith Lampkin, my chief financial officer, Sean Bruno, director of finance, Elizabeth Boyer, and also director of our compliance division, Dr. Ashley Burns. And also in the audience, we have our interim warden, Jason Kent, chief Christopher Goodley, and I want to acknowledge and say that there are several other members from our agency in the audience, and I did that to make sure that the people of our agency understand why we may have to make cuts, understand why positions may be reduced. So I invited them here to make sure that they understand the budget process and they can pass that on to the people who work for them and with them.

I also want to acknowledge that every budget season is critical for every organization, and that is especially true when it comes to public safety agencies. But this year, for the Orleans Parish Sheriff's Office, it's probably the most critical in recent years for two very important reasons. First, our organization has experienced significant challenges in the last two years. There has been a financial strain on the organization that has affected our ability to maintain the infrastructure and basic constitutional operations of our agency. We also recognize that public trust must be earned through consistent performance, transparency, and accountability. The other thing that sets this year apart is that 2027 is the culmination of decades of preparation to implement massive institutional reforms and revolutionize the way the Orleans Parish Sheriff's Office has operated up to this point. We are at an important point in the federal consent judgment that will dictate how much longer the Sheriff's Office and the city remain under federal oversight, with an obligation to devote significant resources to monitor. The largest single mandate of the federal consent judgment centers on health care, the quality and the provision of medical services to the population of the people in our custody. There is no way for us to deliver on that requirement and reach substantial compliance under the consent judgment unless we are able to successfully open and operate the new Phase III facility that will house the acute and subacute populations. That building is weeks away from completion and being turned over to the city and OPSO. But make no mistake, there is still significant work to do before we can feel confident the building is ready to be opened, staffed and suitable to house those detained with special medical needs. We want to be clear that we understand that this is a difficult time for everyone, the city included. But we know that the stakes are simply too high in this moment for OPSO to absorb additional budget cuts that will lead to a restriction of critical services. Thanks again for the opportunity to present and now we can move on to our slides. Our goals for 2026 revolved around repairs and upgrades to the degrading infrastructure of our facilities, improving safety for our staff and the people in our care, and building a culture of consistent policy compliance to bring stability to our agency and get us closer to meeting the mandates of the consent judgment. We took office in May, which meant we took on some projects that were incomplete and in progress. But we also came out of the transition with a clear vision. for the office with a roadmap for success. We immediately prioritized security with expanded proactive security sweeps. In our second full week, we partnered with DOC to conduct a facility-wide sweep of OJC. We were assisted by roughly 120 DOC employees. We increased drug and contraband enforcement and re-established intelligence operations within our investigative services bureau. Our detectives are currently in training on the use of new tools that will allow us to detect and stop the flow of harmful drugs and weapons inside our facility. I created the Security and Accountability Council with representatives from multiple disciplines share their collective expertise within our team. And I prioritized repairs that directly impact safety. We are creating a safer facility every day. After taking my oath of office, we came back to the office the same afternoon for a meeting with the Louisiana Legislative Auditor to review their findings from the several months prior to our taking office. We immediately began planning to put our financial controls in place. That same date, I issued an executive order establishing guidelines to promote agency-wide budget stabilization and cost controls. This order also initiated a review of every existing contract. As a result, we've significantly reduced spending and we are preparing to reissue bids for all major agency service contracts. We've continued discussions with city leadership about transitioning to the BRSS financial management system as we work out the details of the necessary costs to stand up BRSS or a similar system and the process to mitigate historical data. We've added all contracts we could find to the city website and it's under contracts.nola.gov for the benefit of city leaders and the public. We fully embrace the responsibility of the consent decree upon entering office. We started this administration by strengthening compliance leadership, hiring an experienced chief compliance officer, and we built a roadmap to compliance based on best practices. We've entered office on an aggressive timeline with our first report response due within weeks of taking office. We've been in frequent communication with the judges, monitors, plaintiffs, and the Department of Justice since taking office. We've done this to get the historical context to the judgment and better understand everyone's stake in the proceedings. We've also granted them full access to the Beacon Jail Management System so that they have real-time review of our operations. We're also working to institutionalize reforms that will last beyond the consent judgment. We're engaging reputable accreditation bodies to support in our mission to full compliance. The prior administration engaged ACA to get basic jail standard accreditations. We're now well on our way to full ACA accreditation. The purpose is to make these improvements durable and not simply to complete a checklist. We took office with lots of uncertainty about our manpower, and we had to work fast to determine what positions were absolutely necessary and which ones we could do without. There's a natural rate of attrition with all transitions, but we had to look for ways to balance the budget in the midst but we had to look for ways to balance the budget in the midst of a major deficit.

As a public safety agency with major responsibilities to the people of New Orleans, there's only so much you can cut before the impacts are felt in our neighborhoods. Every day, we have hard-working men and women who get up and leave their families to come and uphold the values of this organization. Our deputies perform one of the hardest jobs in public service. They work holidays, nights, and weekends under stressful conditions. They respond to emergencies and intervene in violent incidents. They are sometimes assaulted and disrespected, but they maintain order and show respect for the oaths that they have all taken. We will continue fighting for the men and women of this agency until they can all feel pride and assurance in their decisions to serve. At the same time, we are conducting research to be certain we are using the taxpayers' money as efficiently and effectively as possible. We have engaged firms experienced in conducting staffing studies to examine staffing levels across various divisions within OPSO. Specifically, we want to establish a data-driven foundation of the personnel required to safely and effectively operate the Orleans Justice Center, Phase 3 expansion, and the agency as a whole. This assessment would help identify the number of deputies, supervisory personnel, and administrative staff needed to support facility operations and the broader responsibilities of the office. Establishing that baseline is an important step toward developing a sustainable operation and budgetary plan. It would also help us better understand our staffing needs, identify resource gaps, and build a stronger foundation for future discussions about recruitment, retention, and deputy compensation. The projections provided in our slides are based on our current staffing levels using the direct supervision model. We have worked to fill every vacancy in the existing facility, and we are vetting new recruits weekly to put them on the path to joining our team. With Phase 3 opening in the near future, we know we need to add an additional 27 deputies to supply the staff who will be moving into the new building from the temporary detention center. Moving into the new medical building is a huge step for OPSO, our city, and the federal consent judgment, but there are several things that must fall in place before we can confidently commit to the transition. Our goals for 2027 largely revolve around what it will take to make the transition and continue to grow this organization. We have operated well above the city-mandated population cap for much of 2026, with an average inmate count of 1,420. That number has to decrease for us to have the manpower and space to accommodate the people in our care. In order to achieve the level of reduction we will need, it will take a collaborative effort from the public safety ecosystem as a whole. We have been meeting with partners and advocates since taking office, and active discussions with courts, the clerk, prosecutors, defense attorneys, arresting agencies such as NOPD and LSP. Strategies include identifying those who are not supposed to be in our custody, such as sentenced defendants awaiting transfer to DOC facilities, and individuals who simply need to have a court date set to resolve their matters. Arresting agencies like NOPD and LSP, issuing more summonses for low-level non-violent misdemeanors, so some people never have to take up a jail bed. Faster releases for low-level non-violent crimes where someone is vetted, processed, and released within the next day or their court date. Expedited case processing through coordination between ADAs and city attorneys and the defense counsel where appropriate. Some people sit in jail for months only to receive credit for time served or have their cases dismissed. We're working with partners to identify those who may fit those categories for expedited consideration. We also met with probation and parole recently to ask for coordination between probation and parole and courts to get revocation hearings set faster. We are open to all suggestions when it comes to achieving a more manageable population. A related change that will help us better use the limited space we have is transferring youthful offenders back to JJIC. Deputy Mayor Harrison and Director Williams at the Juvenile Justice Intervention Center have been great partners in finding a way to safely accommodate the small number of youthful offenders in our custody. We currently have about 18 young people in our facility. They cannot be housed with any adult defendants. Therefore, we have to devote an entire 60-person cell block to this small group of juveniles. Not only is there a good amount of wasted space that could that could relieve overcrowding in other areas of the facility, but the adult facility is not the most conducive to the juvenile's needs. We have an agreement in principle to move the young people, but there are a few details to work out such as medical care and food services. We look forward to any questions the members have regarding our proposal, but I want the public to understand a couple of things. You will see a request for an increase in our budget. This increase has nothing to do with inflating our budget with unneeded positions and high salaries or adding a bunch of new services. These numbers represent the basic needs of this organization to meet our constitutional obligations, which include staffing the new Phase 3 facility. It would be a disservice to my office and the city to not correctly forecast the organizational needs. We cannot perform our constitutional duties and pay the people we rely on if we don't have funding to do so. This agency sustained major cuts in the last budget season. We were also put behind the eight ball because unlike my other elected colleagues, my administration took office in the middle of the year.

That meant we inherited a lack of resources and we were powerless to take any action to reduce spending and mitigate losses in the first half of the year. I have continued to work with my leadership team to aggressively pursue any and all funding from all sources to help us make up for the debt that we inherited. Some dating back as far as the 2024 fiscal year and digging out of the deficit we find ourselves in. Grant funds are scarce and many opportunities previously available to this agency are no longer available, but we are committed to exploring all possible funding streams. We are excited for the opportunity to take over from the beginning of a fresh fiscal year and we look forward to working collaboratively with this council and all partners to stabilize this agency. Thank you. Thank you. I have quite a few questions, so I'll go first. From your slides it looks like you're seeking an additional $17 million. Is that correct? An additional what? I'm sorry. $17 million. That also includes the medical contract. The medical contract. I do have a question. So it's more like, without the medical contract, it's more like $10,000, right? Am I correct? Okay. And on the medical contract, I guess I'll just go there now. One of my understandings is that the current contract, if you're above a certain amount, if you're above $1,200, then they charge you for additional services. Is that correct? Yes. Do we have an estimate of how much we're being overcharged or charged above the flat rate? We don't right now, but we'll get that information to you. Okay. Can you get that for me? Yes. Because, I mean, this goes back to the fact of reducing the jail population down back to where it needs to be and or renegotiating that contract so that we're not paying additional amounts if we go over a specific population. Yes. Do you know when that contract is up? June. Okay, good. June of 2027. And are we putting out an RFP? Yes. Yes. What is the status of that? Well, the CAO's office has already, they're working with us right now to put out an RFI. RFI. So we can know who has a present ability to deliver the service and that the RFP will soon follow. Okay. I also saw some information on provision of food, and Sheriff, you and I talked about it when I did my visit. Yeah. Is there any update on getting rid of the current food service and doing something in-house? Do we have a cost benefit of that? We have explored every option that we have, taking it in-house, looking at a new food vendor, all of those different things. What we're going to do is put an RFP out, just like all our major stuff we're putting back out for bid because we think several of them are costly and we can have some cost savings there. Exactly how much that will be, I just don't know right now until we put that information out. I appreciate that. I think the current food contract is like $2.9 million, and for the level of food that the folks there are getting, it seems high. It is. I am seeing on template number three that there is money in the reserve accounts, about $8.23 million. Can you talk me through why some of this is restricted and or the use of that money going forward? Well, if you look at it, the first, the opioid fund, it's restricted. Those funds are restricted to only fund projects or it could be some type of prevention. There are a list of things that we reached out to the LSA and asked them what the other sheriff's offices have been using their opioid funds for. Of course, because it is restricted funding, we want to make sure that we're using that money to do the right thing, and that could be security measures that we can use that funding for, some infrastructure projects that we can use it for, that, of course, make sure that the opioids that have been coming into the facility stop. So you can use it a number of different ways. We're different programs for those who have some type of substance abuse treatment that they need. So it's a number of different things. But we're working along with the LSA to make sure that we are spending those funds properly. The capital projects, of course, that is definitely restricted funds. And we're going to use those funds, of course, to make sure that we continue to shore up this facility, and that's OJC, and that's getting new lighting, making sure we do floors one and two, make sure we change the hinges and door locks there. So all that money is really accounted for. Okay. And then debt service, I know what that is. And then there's another 2025 capital projects. Do you know what that's for? That's the money from the bond commission. Okay. And those are some of the funds that we're going to use to do those upgrades inside OJC. Many things. We have plumbing problems, you name it, that stuff. All those things are going to be used to do the upgrades inside of OJC that need to be done. That amount is still not enough, not what we need, to make sure that those projects are completed. I did see a plumbing grant from the state as well, so I think it's, what, around $500,000? Yes. We requested that in order to repair or replace what they call the sewer grinder. Right. And that's to grind up anything that comes out from inside the jail to the sewer to make sure that is repaired. It's in need of repair or replacement. So we're waiting on those funds. The other thing that struck me when I did the visit was exactly what you were talking about with the juvenile offenders taking up an entire block. Meanwhile, there's another block with, like, pallets on the ground. That's correct. So do we know the timing of figuring out the food and the details of the transfer to JJIC? We are trying to reach a goal of January 1 to move those juveniles back to JJIC.

We're just making sure that they're going to get the proper medical care, or do we have to send Wexford over to care for those juveniles, or are we going to use the current medical provider that they have at JJIC? And also making sure that they attend school. So working those details out, working the, of course, security. We have to provide security and keeping them segregated as far as housing is concerned from the other juveniles at the facility. According to Deputy Mayor Harrison and Dashelle Williams at JJIC, we're all looking at a January 1 transfer. Okay, that will impact either your budget or JJIC's budget. So I guess we need to get the details on that sooner rather than later of the total cost and how that works out. On your staffing, you gave us actual current FTEs on your slide deck. Do you have the numbers of what you would want as far as staffing up? Currently, I did speak about it when I was talking. We need at least to hire 27 people on our staff to make sure that when we do the transition from TDC and TMH to have enough people to staff Phase 3. So absolutely right off those 27 folks. But beyond that 27, do you need any more folks? We do. I mean, we're talking about we want optimal or at least not the minimum staff. We want at least right in the middle, adequate. And so with that, we need to continue with our recruitment effort and also our retention effort and keeping some folks and also recruiting some new folks because our attrition rate is high. And so we may hire 10 people and 12 people will resign or some may even be terminated. So we are trying to reduce people from leaving our agency and actually making this a career. But we will also continue in our hiring effort so we can make sure that we have adequate staff in OJC and also in Phase 3. Okay. I do have a question about the jail population. I had a note that it was at 1,474, but you're saying it currently is at 1,420? 1,430. Yeah, as of today, this morning, 1,430. Okay. And the max is supposed to be at 1,250 according to what we implemented or prior council implemented. Yes. Do we know how many individuals are awaiting DOC transfers? I have 254 who have been, and it's a combination of people who have been revoked on parole, are awaiting a hearing, and also have gotten their time has not been calculated and they're waiting. And the 122 that have actually been revoked, and that's all in that 254, those DOC inmates, probation and parole, all of those things are in that 254. Okay. And for some of the DOC inmates, or I guess the DOC inmates that are awaiting transfer, the DOC provides an amount of money for them, right? Yes. But it's not enough to cover the actual cost of them? No. And let me make a little correction. 122 are awaiting just to be transferred. They have gotten their time or been revoked or all of those things, but that total number of folks is 254, and you're correct. We get approximately $29 per inmate, DOC inmate, but really the cost to just fund someone who is in general population is $160 a day. And for our special populations, whether it be females or mental health or those who are in those special popular juveniles who are a part of the population, it costs about $250 a day. Do you know how many of those 122 are women? Not offhand, but I can give you that information. Okay. And what's the holdup with DOC in getting those people out? Just like us and other parishes around the state, it's the room. It's the beds. They don't have the capacity. to take on those inmates so they remain in our custody. But I just really want to be very clear about this. If we do not bring down the jail population, it's going to be very difficult for us to close the temporary detention center and move into phase three. Yep, I understand. All right, I'm going to ask a JP question. How are we moving to brass integration? We have met with the CAO's office, and we are ready. But of course, there's a cost to those things. And you've got to figure out who's going to incur the cost of us going into something like a brass. But we're also open to the idea of going into having a system that is similar to brass, where you can see the same things that you would see in brass. And right now, because we haven't proceeded with the implementation of all of our things going into brass, what we've done to remain transparent and full transparency and integrity about what we're doing, as far as contracts are concerned, we've put those up on the city website. So all the contracts that we could find, we actually put them up on the city's website for you to see and for the public to see. OK, I'm going to turn to the temporary detention center. There has been some conversation about retrofitting it into a new low barrier shelter for our unhoused people. I know that Allison took a look at it and has some pictures of it. I want to come see it as well. But it belongs to FEMA, right? It is owned by FEMA. Yes, and what we would have to do is make an agreement with FEMA. Yes, we're going to take it. We don't want you to tear it down. But if that exchange happens and they release the building to us, then we could never, if something happened to the building, we had some hurricane event or some type of weather event that destroyed the building some way or we would have to repair it in some way, we would incur all the costs. And we would not be able to go to FEMA and ask them to help us repair that particular facility. I see what you're saying. So if it got destroyed or went into disrepair, it would be on us. OK. Finally, what was my last question? I'll turn it over. Who has questions? All right, Council Member Murrell. Thank you. Thanks for being here today, Sheriff. I just want to go real quick. So not to rehash, we toured the phase three facility yesterday with Judge Afric. And as you stated previously, and I say this, at the bare minimum, the judge expressed the necessity that the phase three facility be fully staffed at a minimum of 27 people.

And we were in that same conversation. Sometimes you have to kind of remind the public that when a federal judge says, I think this facility needs 27 people, it is initially a suggestion. But I think we are both of the opinion that if we don't follow the suggestion, it could later become an order, correct? Well, yeah. We said 27 additional people. In a perfect world, what would happen is we'd open this building, transfer our entire staff from TDC and TMH over to secure the phase three building, which leaves 27 positions open that need to be filled in order to properly secure and run this building. So that's where that 27 comes from. I'm not doubting the number. Keith knows where I'm going with this. What I'm saying is that right now, the judge is saying this is a suggestion. But as has been seen throughout this experience with Judge Africk, it's a suggestion until we don't do it. And then he comes back and says, you're going to put 27 positions in the Sheriff's Office to make sure that the new facility is fully staffed. So the point I'm simply making is that you're requesting 27. But if we don't provide 27, we may end up providing 27 anyway when a federal judge says that you need 27 additional positions, correct? Absolutely. And I just think it's even more cost effective if we put those 27 people, we fund those 27 people, we get this building up and operating, and it will cut down on it. And we can get out of this federal consent decree because it would definitely cut down on the continued cost of paying monitors and with all the fees surrounding being under a federal consent. My understanding is that 27 people, just that one appropriation is about $1.2 million, correct? Yes. OK. I just want to make sure we have that round number in our head because I think it is. And also, as you stated, a large portion of your request for an increase is the medical contract, which is my understanding part of the consent decree, so it's not really optional either, correct? Right. And in the proposed budget, it says that we would get like a 12% increase. I want people to understand what that 12% increase means. That means an increase for the medical vendor. Most of it is going to go to them. We're only going to, back into our general fund, it's only going to be a little over $600,000. So most of that increase that is talked about in this current proposed budget is 12%, and most of that money is going to go to the medical contractor but not to the jail itself. Right. And in the current proposed budget, there are several non-agreed upon facts yet where I think that part of the estimation and cuts is that there'll be a reduction in jail population. Now, obviously, under the law, the previous council passed, there is a cap, and we are certainly going to work with all partners to bring it down to that cap, which would see a reduction for your office, for the DA's office, for public defender's office. Everybody would breathe a little easier should that reduction take place. The challenge is we can't budget necessarily for tomorrow for there to be a reduction until we start to see the population move in that direction. And for the most part, out of all the parties we have here today, you're the person least in control of that reduction, correct? That's correct. Right. So as long as these individuals, by law, whether it be local municipal law or state law, have to be in your facility, you're stuck with them. Absolutely. Right. And in order to bring down our population, again, it takes the cooperation of all our criminal justice partners. We need DOC to come and get those inmates that need to be transferred there, and also those who are on probation holds. We need their cases to get moving, either those cases set for a revocation hearing, or they need to be released. We also need the DA's office, just like he mentioned in his presentation. Those cases, of course, along with the judges, they need to move a little bit quicker. Move some cases from state misdemeanors to municipal court, those low-level state misdemeanors to municipal court. There are a number of things that need to happen in order to bring our population down, because that would remove some people from this job. I think for us to properly function, we need to be right at 1,000. And then we could work with the budget that we currently have. I went back and looked at the budget from 2021 all the way up, and they had less people in our custody, but we had more revenue to use. Now we have less, but more people. And so it makes it very, very difficult to continue the way on the path to being successful in order to lower our population, in order to get infrastructure projects done, in order to move into this new building. And so all of those things matter, but what most matters is that our partners get some things done so our population can come down. Then that means there's less of a financial burden on providing for 1,400 people rather than 1,000 people. But we can't let anybody out of jail. We can't lift a probation hold. We can't change from making a state misdemeanor that's in state court, moving it to municipal court, or make the DA move faster on a case, or the public defender move faster on any of their cases, or the judges, for that matter. And I think it's critical that we do something and we do something now, because we're moving from 12 judges to nine. And so that's going to slow the process within itself. So I think it's crucial that we get those things done very, very quickly. And there's one more intangible I want to make sure the public's aware of. When you're looking at those people in custody that are DOC, what used to happen is that there would be surrounding parishes with capacity and DOC would transfer those people to surrounding parishes. But what has happened is the rates that are paid by federal government for things like ice holds have filled many of those facilities.

So whereas we used to have the wiggle room to move someone that has a potential DOC obligation, somebody who is potentially a violent criminal that has to be held for an extended period of time, we can't move them because the federal government is paying other facilities a premium rate to hold nonviolent people who have an ice hold. Absolutely correct. They're paying upwards of $150 per. And how much does DOC pay? $29, about $29. Right, so there is a cost-benefit analysis that's being done across the state where every sheriff has to maintain a facility, pay their employees, and they are being incentivized to have individuals there, hold them there in those facilities, and it's taking up spots that directly impact. So to the point that the DA made, you kind of have this, New Orleans has become a dumping ground for the state to send certain people here so that we have to deal with them. This is another instance in which we have people that should be in DOC custody that we're certainly going to work with our DOC partners to figure out the parole situation and probation issues, but there is a great possibility that they may not have spots in their system. And so we're stuck holding people that are not our obligation and that are keeping our jail above. of its number, which in turn is an additional cost to the people of the city of New Orleans to try and keep the jail operating at a constitutional level, correct? That's correct. And you know, with all transparency, we have been talking to the Department of Correction. We actually hired former Secretary Jimmy LeBlanc to come on our team as a consultant so he can, you know, keep that relationship with Secretary Wescott so we can work this out. We have been working with him, so we have been working with all our partners. You know, we know everybody is strapped everywhere, even my fellow sheriffs. You know, I've talked to Sheriff Turledge, Sheriff Lepinto, and the sheriff in St. Bernard Parish, talking to if there is space, sometimes they will help us. If they have some space and we need them to take a couple of people because we are just bursting at the seams, when they can, they have. So they are willing to help when they can, but of course, they have to do what they have to do for their parish jails. I certainly don't want to throw shade on the other sheriffs, because as I said, every sheriff has to pay the salaries of their sheriffs. They have to maintain their facilities. And so if you have the federal government willing to pay you a premium rate so that you can make sure you can keep the lights on and the air conditioning running, that's a consideration. But it is important to always note that the pressures at the federal level, when they are pushed down to the state and local level, it's a ripple effect. It's a ripple effect and it affects the ability and availability of those individuals to help us. So I just want to make the public aware, there's pressures that are completely out of our collective control that affect the availability of beds, because certainly we are going to work with our partners at the state level to expedite this process. But I don't want to bury the lead that we may expedite that process, we may get those probation and parole halls moving quicker, but if DOC has nowhere to move them, we're still stuck with them until they find somewhere to move them. So it's just, we can do what we can to make our system operate more efficiently, but we have to work with the state and our legislative partners and the governor and the like to make their system run efficiently, because at any point in this process, if something gets jammed, it backs up back to us, and you're stuck with the people that are there. So I certainly, I know Councilmember Willard and I toured the facility phase three yesterday. I think that when we're looking at a constitutional facility that will provide the resources for those in mental health crisis in particular, it is a premier facility, the likes of which I haven't seen ever, and I think that it will present a tremendous opportunity for those in mental health crisis to be returned to our community with the resources necessary to function. The challenge is on the city, how we help you get those 27 positions while it's being asked voluntarily of us versus when in a couple of months it might be mandated of us. Absolutely. I think this facility could be a win for everyone, a win for us, a win for the city, and a win for the state. It is a state-of-the-art building, but we need that cooperation from everyone in the criminal justice ecosystem to do their job to make sure moving folks out of this facility to bring our jail population down. That is at the crux of everything, is making sure that jail population comes down so we are able to house the folks in phase three. It's functioning for us for medical and mental health. It can help this city tremendously with dealing with a lot of mental illness. We've talked to, I had a representative from Senator Cassidy's office come down and talk to us about all the things about phase three and what's going on in the jail. We explained this could be a great opportunity to have Xavier or Tulane or LSU also partner and make this a real viable facility, not just for the city of New Orleans, but for the state. Thank you very much. Councilmember King. Thank you. Good afternoon. Good evening, Sheriff. I just want to first commend you for thinking outside the box and having conversations transferring those 18 juveniles to JJIC. We all know that adult jail is no place for a minor offender. Regardless of their charge, you're waiting to have their day in court, so thank you for that. How much would that be saving? Any idea how much that's going to save? It would save us? Yeah.

Well, we haven't looked at it just yet, but just with the understanding, even if we move them to, when we move them to JJIC, we still have to provide security for the population that we have there, so we have to have staffing there. We have not quite worked out how we're going to do the medical part. We know a little bit better how we're going to do the education part, so we don't quite know exactly what the cost for us is going to be in savings or if it's going to cost more because we have to provide all the security and stuff for our population that is being housed there. Well, if it costs, I think just, even if it costs you, I think getting those kids, juvenile children out of there, it's the right thing to do regardless of the cost. It's definitely worth it because it may not be monetary, but it will be in space. I guarantee you because, again, we are using up an entire pod which can house 60 people. We only have 18 kids there, and each of them has to be housed in a cell alone. They can't be housed together, and so there's a whole host of room that we are not using. Other pods are overcrowded because we cannot use that particular pod because we have to house those juveniles there. Speaking of pods, overcrowdedness, during the tour, not the one yesterday, but in the previous tour, something that was kind of startling to me was seeing a full pod with one deputy. That's one deputy. And look, I'm not saying a woman can't do it, a man can't, but it was a young female deputy, small in stature, and I'm thinking, are we putting her or any deputy in the best situation to be successful with a full 60-pod unit filled to capacity with one person? If something pops off, then what kind of success rate would that one person have? So I don't think people understand how, like you said before, I didn't put it together that people live in that prison or that jail 24 hours a day, and people work there 12 hours a day, so they're spending half their day there. So it's of the utmost importance that we keep that facility safe. And can you speak to having one deputy with a 60-man pod, what are the challenges that presents? It's a serious challenge. It's a security challenge for that particular employee, and it's also a challenge for the people that are housed there. So what we did is we have a new concept, and a new concept for us, but I don't think new to the facility, it was tried once before, or ran once before, and it's called a unit manager process. And that's where we have one person who is responsible for an entire floor with an entire staff, where we have a captain, four lieutenants, days and nights, same amount of people, and we also have sergeants under those lieutenants, and we have some deputies, too. We did it that way, or we're going to that concept because it puts more staffing. You won't have one person working by themselves, or you won't just have two people working an entire pod. That was one of the biggest and most alarming things that I saw in the transition, where you just had one person, or nobody, actually working at like four pods. They were not being supervised. Another thing, in order to get through this federal consent judgment, you have to have proper supervision of the people that are in your custody, for their safety, for your safety, and also to make sure that no one goes unwatched, because there are things that go on. When you're not supervising some of these folks, there are other things going on. There's contraband coming in. There are people taking pieces of the building, creating weapons, and using those weapons, doing different incidents. And so that's why we had to go to a different concept to make sure there are more people on those pods, working together for supervision reasons, and also making sure that we're not having contraband come into our facility, and that we bring down the number of assaults that go on inside the jail. And I don't think people know that y'all was short on staff. You even started, yourself, walking the halls and, you know. I do quite often. You know, I'm not going to ask the people that work with me and for me to do anything that I'm not willing to do. And I gave the instruction to the warden at that time, and our current warden, look, if we're short, call the entire executive team. Call the entire command staff, so that we can come in and adequately staff this place. And that's myself included. I already did it once. Got up at about 3 a.m. and went, when I was called, and said, hey, look, we have some people called off. We don't have enough staffing. And so we're understaffed. There are going to be floors that are not covered. I said I'm on my way. And then I called my executive team. So not willing to do, ask my staff to do anything that I'm not willing to do. It speaks to just who I am. It's, you know, I'm working with people. They don't work for me. I work with them. And so I'm going to get down and get it in the mud, just like they do. I have no problems with doing that. And it shows my commitment to this agency. It shows my commitment to this city and the people, the taxpayers. It's what they deserve. And so that's why I'm willing to go in myself and have the executive team and my command staff go in when we are understaffed. I appreciate that. My last comment, last question, is I always talk about the numbers of the jail population. And you don't make the arrests. You don't prosecute, accept charges. You don't deny charges. You don't set bonds. So exactly what is your role as a sheriff, or what can you do to reduce that number? Not much. The best thing that I can do is relax. My partners, you know, like I said, the DA's office, the courts, DOC, probation and parole. We need their help. We are pretty much at their mercy. We just can't release folks. You know, it has to be on order from a court. You know, we have to, we just can't do it. All we can do is house them, keep them in our custody and care for them.

But it's up to our partners to help us out, move people to the Department of Corrections when they have received their time, they've been convicted and received their time. Make sure we're setting the probation or parole hearings timely and getting those done so either those people can be released or they can be revoked and move on to DOC. You know, getting the DA's office and the judges and the public defender's office to get together and be creative about how we can have those who are arrested for those low-level crimes, to make sure that they're not spending a whole lot of time in jail, to make sure those cases are moving or moved to municipal court and so they can be adjudicated quickly and properly and that lessens our jail population. So we are depending on our partners and they have been working, communicating with us. They understand each and every one of them. We have had meetings and conversations, everybody understands the importance of getting their job done so we can bring down our population, close down TDC and TMH and move into this new facility, Phase 3, so that we can move on out of the consent decree and that would decrease our population, it would decrease the cost for the city, what it's costing us in this consent judgment, it just would bring down costs in caring for 1,000 people rather than caring for 1,400 people. So if we can get all our partners to do that, then definitely it would be a win for all of us. I appreciate that. One last thing, you say it's $250 a day to house a female inmate? They're in there somewhere, that population, special population, it may be a mental health patient, those folks that we have to care for differently, it costs a little bit more. And so the females are in there somewhere between $200 and $250 a day. I'll get you the exact number, but it's right in there. That's what it costs. I just want to bring that up because that's roughly the cost for a year, two lane tuition. So you pay for it now, you pay for it later, but we're going to pay for it either way, and what are we investing our money in? We're spending roughly $100,000 to house one person a year. You're right, and I understand what you mean. I'm not paying two lane tuition, but Lord, I'm sure paying USC tuition, it's a lot of money. It costs, in just one person, it's a lot. For those who are just pre-trial in the custody of DOC, we're not getting anything for them. We only get paid that $29 for those who are in the Department of Corrections custody, or DOC inmates, rather. Council Member Willard. Thank you, Madam Chair. Good afternoon, Sheriff, and to your team. I think you've been doing a really good job. You're showing strong leadership capability across the jail, across the Sheriff's Department, and I want to commend you for that. Yesterday, Council President Morrell was talking about conversations we had with Judge Afric. My big takeaway yesterday was, you have to staff phase three, and if you want to get out of the consent decree, you have to staff phase three, so it seems like we have to do it. That was the big takeaway that I walked with yesterday, but it's impressive. It's coming along, and I just want to thank you and your team. When we talk about doing the math real fast, if you reduce the inmates you have in the jail right now who are on DOC holds, it brings you under that 1250 number, right? Yes. On the DOC side, is this kind of standard? It takes them a while to pick up who they're supposed to pick up, or is it just they don't have availability right now? I think it just depends on the availability that they have on their end for housing the inmates. I think across the board, we all are experiencing overcrowding. You mentioned other sheriffs in the region experiencing those same issues. It certainly sounds like an area that the legislature needs to look into for next year. It's not sustainable. Just a couple of questions on your budget. How many budgeted but unfilled positions do you have right now? About 40%. About 40%? Wow. So you're having trouble hiring right now? Some of it is natural attrition, some of it is attempting to hire the number of people that we need. So it's attrition and retention, I guess? Yeah. Recruitment and retention. Recruitment and retention. We're getting ready to begin. We already started the Welcome Home program, trying to recruit some folks who had previously worked for the Sheriff's Office. Come January, we're going to start another recruitment effort, but we are out every day. I'm telling everybody, hey, go on our website. There are several positions available on our website. Please come and join OPSO. And I just want to say this, too, that you can't do this alone, right? You have to have good employees, a great team, not just my executive staff, but I definitely have to give a shout out to the men and women who work inside this facility. This is a tough job. It's hard, and they're paid little to do it. But I found walking on different pods, going to different areas of the jail, there are so many people who are committed to this organization, committed to this career. And that keeps me and helps me to be hopeful. And so I have to just commend them for the job that they have been doing. And I know change isn't easy. And we are doing a culture change here, which is even a little more harder than just changing from one leader to the next. We're trying to change the culture here, but they are embracing it. They're doing a great job, and I have to commend them. The reason why we can do all the things that we do is because they do a great job. I agree. Looks like in the budget, you're projecting about a million less in state and federal grants. Are you hearing from grants expiring, a reduction in state funding? Could you all elaborate on that, the cause of that? What I found or what we found is the grants that we did have, a lot of them were matching. And so we had to come up with our portion in there.

And then some of them are just expired, are going to expire. And so we're still now exploring new grants. One big thing that kind of like kicks us out of applying for certain grants is, of course, the immigration thing, right? Under the federal... The federal grants. Yeah. Yeah. Under the consent decree, we have to work in certain parameters. And so it doesn't allow us to apply for some of those federal grants. Gotcha. And so that's why grants are scarce for us, because we are working under this federal consent decree and we cannot, you know, we can't apply for those because sometimes a lot of them have verbiage in there about the immigration piece or the HSI piece. Do you have an idea of the additional costs that we bear for the consent decree? Well, I do have a little something on that. And I'll just give you... Let's talk about monitors cost, right? And I'll go from year to year. From 2022, it was $333,000. For 2023, $755,000 and some change. For 2024, $485,000 and a little bit more. This is just for monitors? This is just for monitors. That is just for the monitors. Last year, it was $609,377.40. This year, we are at $539,941.33. That's just through September. And so we have to pay them monthly. And so this is the cost that we, myself, my agency and the city is bearing to be in this And that's just a portion. That's not the entire thing. That's just to pay the monitors. Okay. A couple of more questions. It looks like the food service contract is increasing by about a half a million. Is that to... And we talked about this, Sheriff. The food that is served there is sometimes not edible. So is that to get a new vendor or increase the quality of the food provided in the jail? That's what we're exploring right now. Either the current vendor is going to have to produce a better quality of food and also bring down some of the costs. Because I think we are paying an astronomical number for our food service. You've compared it to other jails? We have. We went to our partners, of course. We went and visited a number of other jail facilities and other parishes. And we asked, what's best? You know, what's the best practices to keep costs down but give quality food? Depending on the amount of inmates that that particular jail can hire. Some say, oh, we use food service vendors. Others say we actually cook in-house and we use our own staff. So we're trying to figure out what works best for OPSO. And we're doing that. We're getting ready to... We actually now have a procurement department, which we kind of didn't have when we walked in the door. So they're working on putting out some things for bid. Those particular contracts, our food service contract, for bid to see what works best for OPSO to get quality at a less expensive cost than what we're paying now. Okay. Final question. I know the Sheriff's Office owns various properties throughout the city. We've talked about this. I think some of them aren't really utilized. Are you working on a plan to kind of offload those and put those properties back into commerce and sell them? Absolutely. You know, we've had... We have anything from... We own a cemetery. I don't know how that happened. But two... a lot to a townhouse and things that we are not utilizing and that we just want to put back into commerce and bring more money back into the sheriff's office. So we're working that out. We're trying to figure out where all, we figured out where all those properties are, working with the assessor's office to see, you know, what they're worth and how we can go through the process of getting rid of those, working with our real estate attorney who is assigned to our civil division, trying to see how we can get these back in the commerce or what can we do to make sure that the revenue from there is put back inside the sheriff's office and let someone else utilize that, those properties. Okay. Sounds good. Thank you, Sheriff. Council President, Sheriff, if I may, just one clarifying point. On that number of budgeted but vacant, I gave the sheriff the number 40%. That actually is, we're 40% under what we would call our optimum staffing for the security facilities. The actual budgeted amount that are vacant is a far lower percentage. We'll follow up with that. Yeah. If you could give me that. So to clarify, you have 40% fewer employees than you would optimally have. Absolutely. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Keith. Thank you, sir. Thank you, Council Member Willer. Do you ask the question that I was forgetting to ask about the properties owned by the sheriff? I would suggest that y'all reach out to the New Orleans Building Corporation, Annie's Amazing, and or Nora to see their process for assessing properties, getting them back into commerce. They have a rubric that they use. Good. And they also have expertise there. And then it takes it off your plate from having to even deal with it. Thank you. I do have three cards, Nadia Muhammad, followed by Press Kavakov, followed by Will Snowden. And as a reminder, please state if you're a paid actor your address and you get two minutes to speak. Good morning. Good afternoon. It's 12-04. I'm Councilman and Women, my name is Nadia Muhammad. I'm an advocate for human rights. My address is 2439 Delary Street. And I am not paid to be here. I support the proposed budget for the OPSO. I am grateful to say that I am good from the last time that I was here and I found a home in New Orleans East. So that's a great thing for me. Our juvenile justice is under attack right now. So I ask, where is the justice? When it comes to our youth, how can we help them to become productive, law-abiding citizens? We look into our homes, we look for love, kindness, caring, and the lessons. But how can that be when our youth are silent in their homes? They're stripped away from their family structure, mother's arms, fathers trying to provide, only to be placed in their own solitary confinement.

The state of Louisiana, JJIC, website shows services and this is what I support. They're assessing the needs and support the individuals, making recommendations for their treatment and placement. The public defenders hand the caseloads, not people. Why are so many of our African-American youth in jail by the scale of tips for others? Are they not committing the same crime or is it someone's son or grandson's status that the same crime does not get the same time? The service coordinator is there to help build stronger relationships and increase communications with the probation and parole officer. How can we push aside like a piece of paper that is shrunk each day without asking them why or moreover, how can we help them? This is speaking on the probation and parole officers. We have four minutes to speak, but as we continue. That's your time. Thank you, Ms. Muhammad, for coming down. Prez? Budget Chair Harris, council members, Prez Kabakov, 840, Pauline, I'm going to preach to the choir that you've already heard, support them. I was the convener of the city service coalition to approve city services and one of our categories was justice and safety and we had three major recommendations. First, criminal justice system is a system and needs to be coordinated and the city has moved effectively to put Daniel Shanks in that role and it's happening. Secondly, you can't solve crime with police alone. You've got to build the quality of life in those neighborhoods and I'm pleased to see that communities of hope and NOLA 360 are building on the no dice program for quality of life in many neighborhoods throughout the city. You need to support that. And then third, which is the most drastic, when jail populations hits 1,500 and you've got enough guards to handle 800, you have a disaster and a disaster waiting to happen. The systematic approach is the only way to change it. You need the DA, you need the public defender, you need the courts, the clerk. The sheriff and the state to work together to find safe ways and there are safe ways to reduce that jail population and that makes the system much more efficient and effective with a lower jail population and you can save a lot of money and you need to make sure that the DA and the sheriff has and the public defender has sufficient staff to pull that off because it requires their attention. Thank you very much. I'm just repeating what you've already heard from many people. It sounds like you're on board. Let's get it done. Thank you. Thank you. Will? Good morning, everyone. My name is Will Snowden. I am a professor at Loyola Law School and I am the director of the Juror Project. I'm here to acknowledge Sheriff Woodford's statement that as leading the jail, there's not much that she can actually do to reduce the jail population and we know that some effective strategies to reduce the jail population including the individuals like the public defender's office that are going to go and meet with the clients inside the jail to perhaps facilitate plea deals to resolve cases to help reduce that population. I want to remind us that we have, I believe, a capacity of 1,438 people in the jail and we're currently over that. When we think about by ordinance, I think our jail population is supposed to be 1,250 and that's kind of our North Star in thinking about how we can get to that particular number. We all know that fewer people incarcerated is going to lead to a safer jail. And as we think about phase three coming online, there's an ordinance that says when you bring these beds online in phase three, you have to decommission beds in OJC. So thinking about how are we staying true to that, one of the ways in which we can help facilitate that jail population reduction is supporting public defenders having access to their clients to help facilitate those plea deals as well as ensuring that the care that they need while they are in jail and that they are under the care of Sheriff Woodford, that they're being safe, that they're getting their medication. And when people are inside the jail having those needs met, I found that they're actually in a better position to make important decisions about their case. So as you are dedicated to ensuring that the sheriff's office is able to make sure that people incarcerated are safe, I just want to highlight that supporting the public defender's office is an integral part of that, because they're meeting with the folks inside the jail on a regular basis. And I also just want to remind us that we have this goal of 1,250 people in our jail, which is really calculated based on the size of New Orleans and the crime rate, which has consistently been going down. Thank you. All right. Hearing nothing else, you are free to go. Thank you. Thank you. New Orleans Parish Public Defender's Office. How are you? Where am I? Where do you want me? There. Right over here. What? Here? No, here. Do you want me to hold your hand? Yeah. I'm going to have to tighten up. Give me a hand here. Okay. How do you do? How do you do this? There's a chair down there. Okay, go on. Seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven. I'm always looking for a good meal. Whenever y'all are ready, you can start. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen of the council. Thank you for having us. My name is Danny Engelberg. I'm the Chief Public Defender for New Orleans. At the table with me now are Lindsey Hortenstein, Danielle Berger, our Deputy CIO and Deputy Chief Public Defender, Meg Garvey, our Director of Policy, Robert Jones, our Director of Community Outreach, Marcia Hortenstein, our Director of our Mental Health Unit. Together, there's more than a century of public service at this table. And Council Member King, when you said that at New Orleans Public Defenders, we are essential workers to the city and for our community, that there could be nothing that's more true than that.

At OPD, we not only fulfill our constitutional mandate, we protect innocents, we improve community health, we make our city safer, we reduce... crime and we save the city millions of dollars. All of that bluntly is at risk with not with the proposed budget for 2027. The proposed cuts for OPD cannot be viewed in this year alone. They are on top of the 31% cuts from last year and on top of over a million dollars of traffic camera funds that were turned off. In total the plummet of over 40% of our funding will create a crisis throughout our criminal justice system and as DA Williams said throughout our ecosystem that keeps us healthy and safe. Last year ours and the district attorney's cuts were larger than all other criminal justice agencies. We were asked to utilize our fund balance to get by and we've done that but we still had to cut. We've eliminated over 30% of all our contract work cutting 27 contract attorneys. We have cut our bond attorney division. We have implemented a hiring freeze that have left critical positions unfilled. As you can see close to 40 positions that have led to a decrease in overall operations and we have started to furlough starting with myself. The impacts in 2026 are small compared to what we will have happen in 2027 with the combined cuts from 2026 and 2027. Here are just a few things that will happen in 2027. Representation and advocacy at our first appearances will be eliminated. There'll be an ongoing hiring freeze and more staff cuts. There'll be a cut to overall case expenditures. There'll be delays in assignments and unconstitutional caseloads and as we've heard throughout today jail costs will not only get continue to cost the city millions of dollars but will balloon. We will have a continued gap in salaries. Our starting attorney salary is $7,000 less than our counterparts at the district attorney's office and more than $20,000 less than our counterparts at the city attorney's office that I'll note in this current budget is a proposed budget allocation to keep up with market rates for those attorneys and yet we even at where they are still over $20,000 less than their salaries and that's true with the district attorney's office as well. If we cannot restore or partially restore the combined cuts from last year and the proposed cuts for this year it will impact the most vulnerable in our community. We'll backslide in our progress on public safety. We'll put our entire criminal legal system at risk. It will in fact it will in fact cost the city more money. The impacts on us of us not being able to do our job will be great. Despite these budget cuts and the cuts that we had to do in 2026 and the depletion of our reserves we continue to represent near than 20,000 cases in criminal court, juvenile court, and municipal traffic court. We have not felt the drastic impacts of these shortfalls yet but 2027 will be a different story. Every day we work to increase public safety and community health and wellness by supporting our most vulnerable and in need clients. OPD is a critical part of the overall public safety infrastructure, specifically our client service division. They work alongside attorneys to connect clients with medical and mental health care needs, substance abuse and addiction treatment, supportive and transitional housing, employment assistance, education, other resources to reduce incarceration, reduce system interaction, and increase community health, safety, and success. Our CSD team partners with community service providers, work creatively with other system actors, leaving no stone unturned to find support for our clients to address the root causes of system interaction, generational poverty, trauma, untreated health care needs, and more with the hope of increasing stability, ensuring our own safety, and supporting them as they re-enter the community. I myself have my own caseload and just the other day I was deeply involved in just this part of the work at a client that we did incredible people hours to create a plan for re-entry for substance abuse treatment and to get him released from the jail. The hours that took for both the plan and to implement that plan from our social worker were immense and we took him to Odyssey House where he is starting a 30-day drug treatment regime and we'll both make him in a better place than when he came in contact with the criminal legal system, but also improve our overall community health and safety. No area can be more emphasized in doing that as in our mental health unit. Mark Still Hortenstein, our director of mental health unit, is going to describe that work. The mental health unit lives at the intersection of mental health and the criminal legal system. This team began as a collaboration and special grant funded project of the city to address recurring system interaction in municipal courts, to address the revolving doors of the jails and the hospitals. That initial funding allowed us to put systems in place to address the public health issues that frequently stem from people struggling with mental illness, excuse me, struggling struggles which too often are criminalized. That initial version of MHU was a success and thanks to the funding parity and the support of the city, we were able to grow the division and expand out of municipal court into felony court. The unit now includes myself, two experienced staff attorneys, a social worker and a paralegal. While the mental health unit provides direct representation of clients suffering from serious mental illnesses like schizophrenia and bipolar disorder and or cognitive impairments like intellectual disability and traumatic brain injury, this team also collaborates with community stakeholders on alternatives to incarceration. One such collaboration is the mental health diversion program. This is a joint program between the public defender, district attorney and instead which diverts people suffering from a mental crisis from incarceration.

Like Lee and the crisis response team, which I was privileged to play a part in creating, mental health diversion is a prime example of this community's effort to help rather than jail its people experiencing crisis. A healthy, safe alternative to incarceration that is also cost-effective. I want to thank Daniel Shanks and Andre Godin for their assistance in this with the district attorney's office. It is the correct fiscal choice but more importantly it is the right thing to do. Let me share the story of a recent impact with you. One participant in the mental health diversion program was admitted for a minor offense which could have held him in jail for six months but instead of paying for him to be locked up in a cage, not receiving treatment or improvements to his living situation, he was released from jail, placed into the care of instead. He worked with them and successfully completed diversion and his charges were dismissed. While we were not paying for him to be housed in a jail cell, he was helped by instead to secure a phone, get clothes, food, medicine, make his appointments with treatment providers. Instead initially helped him with securing temporary housing in a low barrier shelter. Still, he struggled to find permanent housing and after more than a year and a half, after he had completed the diversion, after his charges had been dismissed, he still worked with instead and finally secured permanent housing. This stability has and will continue to keep him out of jail. Like this person, hundreds of New Orleanians have been kept out of jail and given critical stabilizing support, care and programming thanks to the in-community meeting them where they're at model of the instead program and the collective work of the public defender's office and the district attorney. Between the mental health unit, our CSD team and OPD's collaboration with our community partners, we are addressing the root causes of system interaction. If left unaddressed, the roots will grow and they will lead to longer incarceration, more compounding costs. The work of OPD is already saving the city money. By prioritizing the biggest drivers of system interaction, inadequate mental health care and support, substance use disorders and housing insecurity and instability, we can actively lower the jail population, better support our most vulnerable communities and in turn save the city money that can be put to better use than a jail cell. Thank you, Mr Hornside. As I think I heard you say, Councilman Morrell the other day, how the really great strides we've made at a city in reducing crime and making us a safer place are often the unseen and untold work that's happening behind the scenes. There can be no further example of the work of our mental health unit and our client service division. It is part of that work that's happening behind the scenes, the unsung work that's making us a safer, healthier community and has been a part of the success that we've seen that we do not want to backslide on with this budget. We already talked about our staffing. Uh, Council Member Willard, you asked about unfilled positions. We have, as I said, close to 40 unfilled positions with our hiring freeze. That will just go increase much more with this current budget goes forward. We are here asking the council to restore the 40% cuts we've received in 2025-2026. We will, if restored, address the backlogs that are certain to come with the elimination of the three sections of court. Uh, the last several years have seen a wave of new laws that continue to increase our work in the complexity of cases such as increased body cam, real time camera and other private surveillance footage. And we've also seen exponentially higher sentence regimes. For example, I recently represented a client on a relatively low level felony. This case included over 20 hours of video footage from both real time prime camera and body camera that had to be reviewed. We cannot cut corners. This is not only a constitutional requirement, but you have to think about our work about what would you want the public defender to do for someone that's in your family? You wouldn't want them to not review the video and look at the evidence. Wouldn't want them to cut corners. We not only cannot constitutionally, but we cannot afford to do that. We have to review every piece of discovery, and that's just for one client's case. Imagine that times 20,000. We will continue to build on our mental health unit and improve our mental health representation and prioritize incarceration alternatives. We're also asking to for this cuts to be not only to be restored for us but also for the LCCR because through our partnership with LCCR and our own work we will do the needed work on behalf of the children that we represent. We will do the needed work on behalf of the parents and families when when we do the critical work of representing parents in our child in need of care system. And as you've heard a lot today because I know dollars are tight one of the things that we can do both on a human level but also on a fiscal level that can address the fiscal and financial crisis at the jail is the plan that you've heard District Attorney Williams discuss and Meg Garvey our Director of Policy will present further. Thank you, Danny. Good afternoon. Meg, can you pull the microphone closer? Yes, never had anybody want me to be louder but yes ma'am. On August 29, 2005 there were 6,375 people in our local jail and I probably a lot of you remember this is what that looked like, right? And so about 20 years ago Orleans Public Defenders was formed out of a desire to never go back to that place. It was formed out of a community desire to never leave people in this situation again. People were stranded all across the state without access to counsel and I do think that Orleans Public Defenders and in particular our partnership with the city over the years is a bright spot in New Orleans history.

I think it's something that we all can be proud of. We've come really far together to ensure that the right to counsel belongs to everybody regardless of means. But we heard today that there's 1,434 people in the jail. That's way too many. It's more than the counsel agreed upon with their ordinance of 1250. It's more than can be in the jail for constitutional conditions. It's more than is safe for the men and women who work there and it's certainly more than is safe for the people who are housed there awaiting their day in court. And it's certainly way too many to think that we are anywhere close to getting out of that consent decree. I've heard a lot of different numbers back and forth about how much the consent decree costs. We did hear from Sheriff Woodfork today just the monitoring costs and those are already sky high. Different newspaper articles are talking about numbers between $7 million and $22 million depending on who you ask. It's an exorbitant amount of money. And just to be clear, while we do want to save money with the consent decree, we want to make sure that we're getting there in a way that achieves the goals of the consent decree in the first place. With this jail population, we're not going to be able to do that. So I did a little bit of math and we actually have the fortune right of going after so we get to hear a little bit more of your questions and I'm more than certain that Sheriff Woodfork and her team are going to supplement this. But I kind of just want to go over these numbers out loud really quickly. One, I'm a lawyer. Math is not my strong suit. Two, I just want to show my work because the number is so staggering that I have recalculated it about 20 times in the past 15 minutes and asked all of my staff to back me up because it's nuts and I think the community needs to hear how much we're spending on the jail. So I estimated of 1,434, which I believe was the number that we heard of the current population, so we learned that not everybody costs the same amount, right? So if we estimate that about 25% of that population is at that higher number of $250 a day, right? So that I believe they said that housing women is more expensive. I know that there's certain people in protective custody, people with mental health issues. So let's say 25%. I think we'll find that's probably a conservative estimate. That's 358 people. So per day that's $89,625 on just that population. Now if we go back to the rest of the population, that's 1,076 times $160 a day. That's $172,168 per day. Add that together. $261,660 a day at the current jail population. What does that cost in a week? $1,831,620 a week. And so the reason that I'm bringing that up is that obviously we're public defenders, right? Our main priority here is the human cost. Our main priority here is the constitutional rights of our clients, right? And so no budget decision is going to come in between Orleans Public Defenders and our clients in terms of what we're arguing about to the council. But the money matters. And I think the main takeaway from all of this is that I don't think y'all can afford, I don't think the city can afford not to make us whole. Because what OPD does is we keep that jail population down, right? So before we get even into the great which kumbaya kind of situation where we're working with the DAs and we're working with the sheriff, and we have had great meetings, and I am extremely optimistic about our abilities to work together and cut through a lot of the red tape without jeopardizing public safety or constitutional rights. I do believe in that. I'm very optimistic about it. But even before we get to that point, if we're cut and we can't be there at all of the different stages where we intercede and work to make sure that people who do not need to be in jail for public safety purposes are not there, the jail population is going up. And all of these conversations that we've heard today about all of the efforts that everybody is trying to make are a move. They're not going to happen, right? Because we're there when people's bonds are set. We're there to point out when there are issues with the police report, why the person should not be held at all. We're there to go out and get body camera. We're there to go out and get interview witnesses from the jump. And if we're not doing that right away, a lot of that evidence and information is going to be lost, right? And that can result in wrongful convictions because it disappears after a couple of months, right? We're not there to get people into programming to get them mental health treatment, to get them drug treatment. We're not there to help kids make sure they get back into school and programming. We're not there to do any of it. The jail population is going to go up. So you've already heard the crazy number, right? And I would love for somebody to tell me that I'm wrong, but I don't think that I am. It's going to go up. So I do think that, I mean, that's basically the main thrust of our presentation. I mean, I had a lot more, you know, flowery things to say, but I think when we're hearing about the numbers and we know y'all have been, you know, trying your hardest to like scratch and dig and trying to figure this out, and you've heard from everybody about how they need more money. I don't think that the city can afford not to put us back where we need to be in order to be able to have lawyers and advocates at every point in the system to make sure that people are adequately and constitutionally represented. As Council Member King, I think you said the people most impacted by these cuts are our own community members, the most vulnerable in our community members. And the reality is we will pay for these cuts this year, not only this year, but well into the future. You will pay for what the system needs, but we'll pay for the extended jail and human costs both this year and down the road.

And I got to say, on most days we stand on opposite sides of the courtroom, but today DA Williams and I are here to stand together to make common sense funding that will not only save the city money, but improve our overall community safety and health. Robert Jones, our Director of Community Outreach, knows all too well the impacts of what the cuts can do to the public defender and what an under-resourced public defender can happen. Robert? All right. How y'all doing? How y'all doing this morning, well this evening, this afternoon? Yeah, thank you for the opportunity for allowing me to speak. And also, I know y'all been going, y'all in a tough time right now, but I also would like to state my gratitude to all of you all for the work that you do in the community, no matter what nobody say. And I know, because I know firsthand, because I see y'all everywhere, right? I see y'all within your own districts or within other districts, and y'all always showing up for the people, and I thank y'all for the commitment that, you know. So, you know, many of y'all may know my story, and many of y'all may not. For the most part, I've run from conviction. I served more than 23 years in prison for a crime I did not commit, and that's due to a failed overall system. A failed overall system. So, I could have come, I could have came home and just said, you know, I served nearly 24 years of my life in prison for a crime I did not commit, just move on in my life. But because of my lived experience, I decided to say, you know what? I'm going to dedicate myself and go on working within the system to try to make the system better so that somebody wouldn't have to go through what I went through, right? And in addition, I also wanted to work with folks in the community who grew up in the same environment that I grew up in, and to let them know that they have resources or give them access to resources to not only improve their lives, but also to give them a better quality of life, just like I have, right? And for nearly 10 years that I've been free, been exonerated, the Arlenes public defenders, they gave me the opportunity to do just that work that I wanted to do, and I'm always grateful for that. And as a matter of fact, there's a reason why I'm still there. I've been there almost 10 years. So, and, you know, I'm surrounded by real brilliant and passionate people who believe in justice, and who want to help people. And frankly, they want to help people that look just like me, because that's the majority of black and brown people we serve in this particular city. And that's over, we used to say 85%, I think it's approaching almost 100% now, because of all the things that's really happening in our government, our society, that a lot of people are falling. I mean, they can't afford anything. And so if they're running into the system, whether they make a mistake or not, they're looking for a public defender. And as you all know, and y'all mentioned it yourself, our work goes beyond the courtroom. We connect people to the resources. We actually strengthen families. We mentor individuals. And we partner with community partners. It's like the guy mentioned with the communities the whole 360 NODA, I'm a part of those coalitions, right? And we help people rebuild their lives and prevent them from coming back and getting involved with the criminal legal system. And I also want you all to take your own credit, right? I want you to take your credit because the events that you all put on within your own districts, by bringing people the resources, all that help with the people and the agencies that we partner with that provide people with the necessary service they need to get people on the right track, to get people on the right track. So not only that we defending folks, but we are getting them the necessary resources that they need to not only not real offend, but merge into society as a good citizen, right? To provide for their families and different things of that nature. And you all are a part of that, right? You all are a part of that as well. So don't discredit yourself because of the things that you all do by bringing these events, because I'm always a part of it. Either I'm partnering with you all, or I'm there. And I see that the resources that you are bringing to people within those communities. And I say that to say, when you think about funding public defense, I want you to think about, it's not just defending cases. It's about investing in people, families, and the safety of our entire city. And like I say, we understand it's a difficult time that you're facing. I really hate that you're all in the position to make these hard and tough decisions. But I want you to consider that cutting the public defense is not just dollars, but it impacts our communities. And when people lack the legal representation, access to critical services, we risk, and as we talked about earlier, the increase of jail population, right? And it's going to put a huge, huge strain on our criminal justice system. And few people are going to have the opportunity to have access to the resources that they need. And I hope I'm not keeping you all too long, but I can be too close to this because of my own personal experience. But it's serious, and it's real to me. And I can see the collateral consequences of a lot of these failures from a perspective that most people here can't see, right? And I know, like I said, that I lost 20-plus years of my life, two decades and something, right? Crime did not commit. And the thing that I fear, the thing that I fear, and the reason why I'm going to tell you I have this fear, because when I was incarcerated, I worked as an inmate counsel, or we classified as jailhouse lawyer, right? I worked with a lot of guys who had legal proceedings that were forfeited because they had underfunded public defenders. And that was the old office, the Orleans Inmate Defender Program. As a matter of fact, I'll tell a story.

I used to file a lot of complaints against those attorneys at that office over the period of years. And when I stopped filing those complaints, and there was getting less and less of complaints, actually, that would mean we want to go visit the Orleans Public Defender's Office, because I see that they was actually doing a better job opposed to what I was used to defending. And when I tell you a lot of those guys, they're not saying that they did those off a job intentionally, but they was underfunded. So I know what it is when underfunded office look like. And a lot of those guys, and I can tell you the things that I fear. I fear that all the progress and all the work that we've done in this particular office, because when I first came to this office nearly 10 years ago, people was calling us sellouts. We were losers. We was doing this, right? We didn't have no trust in the community. And we worked hard with the help of the city council that got us to the level that we are now. We worked hard for that, so I fear us losing that, right? I fear that all the progress that we made is going to bring back, not intentionally, it's going to bring back a lot of the old systems that were set in place. And the last thing is that a lot of those guys who have the rights that were forfeited, right? A lot of those guys, they're procedurally barred. And for many of you all who know what the law is, when you're procedurally barred, you can't move forward. And that, like I said, is the worst it's filled, because a lot of those guys are going to die in prison. They're actually going to die in prison. So that's always one of my fears, when we talk about underfunding something that we made so much progress in. So I just want us to just think about that. And as you said, that public defenders, and I know from my experience and from working there, is the central glue to the criminal justice system. Because we've got to defend those guys. Not only that, we've got to defend those guys constitutionally, but we've got to provide those guys with the necessary resources and the help to keep them from reoffending, reuniting with their families, and building a safer and thriving community. Thank you all for your time. Thank you for having us today and for your continued hard work on the council. We're happy to answer any questions. Council Member King? Mr. and I'm going to say Danny, you mentioned the effects that the budget cuts will have on LCCR. I know that's a line item in your budget. Can you expound on that? I don't think a lot of folks understand just how important the juvenile public defender's office is and how devastating those cuts may be. Or if not you, maybe Judge Roan. I'm sorry, I keep calling you Judge. Judge Roan. Yes, Kristen Roan. Kristen Roan, just explain how important LCCR is to the juvenile justice system. Yeah, so part of our budget is a pass through to the LCCR, and those have also been cut. And those cuts are going to have really drastic impacts on both the combined defense of children that LCCR does, and also the work that we do in representing children in New Orleans. It takes so much work to work with children, but it's necessary work. And it actually saves the city money in other ways, right? Because if we and what LCCR does in every day with their youth advocacy and their social worker and their lawyers working as teams and investigators, is they will, similarly to what we've been talking about, a young person will be in a better place through their work and their representation after they go through the juvenile court system than when they enter. And so that not only is important for youth and their families, but for the community at large. Ms. Roan. Thank you, Danny. And thank you, Councilman King and all council people. I'm Kristen Roan. I'm the executive director of Louisiana Center for Children's Rights. LCCR serves about 90% of the young people arrested in the city of New Orleans. Last year, that was 500. So far this year, we've represented about 387 young people. We absorbed some costs last year, some cuts last year, about 31% along with the public defender's office. And because of that and the way we did that was we cut our legal director, we reduced our supervising attorneys from two to one, and we reduced our client services team. I want to be very clear that an additional 8% cut will impact our services and will make it so that we will have to cut additional staff and have some hiring freezes. That is a lot with only a team of five full-time attorneys and representing about 500 kids a year. Briefly, I'll speak about the return on investment for the city when you invest in LCCR. Again, as Danny said, we provide holistic defense. We support them with a team of wraparound support. These young people, this includes a social worker to address the root causes of arrest. And our model actually works. 96% of our clients have not been re-arrested into the youth system within six months of their case closing. And then 84% of our clients have not been re-arrested within three years. I also want to say we are working in close partnership with Orleans Public Defender's Offices because we recognize if we are not serving young people well, they become OPD's clients. And so it's important to us that we stop at this very important moment to help young people. We support the attorneys there. We work in close partnership with them. We consider them colleagues. Just this week, one of our former clients, who is now represented by OPD because the case was transferred to adult court, was having some head bumps with his attorney. He would not talk to his attorney. One of our staff members partnered with his attorney to go over to the Orleans Parish Jail and talk to him and explain to him why he should talk to his attorney. This is the type of thing that is required with young people. It requires a lot of work, a lot of time, for us to be there for young people.

And importantly, the final thing that I really want this council to know is that for every dollar that the city of New Orleans gives us, LCCR brings in an additional $3 to serve arrested young people in our city. We leverage what the city does for us. And when the city partners with us and invests with us, it means something. And we're able to go to our philanthropic partners and to the federal government and say, we have a city that is committed to young people doing well. And they are then willing to invest in the wellness of our young people. So we've come a long way. Just a few years ago, there was a lot of talk about youth crime in our city. And we were all in a tizzy about what to do. We have come a long way. We're not having that discussion today. And so I implore you. I will say to you, Councilwoman Harris, I heard you say to a lot of people, get your pencil out. We can't give you everything. Tell us what you need. We need $525,000. That is what the city gave us last year. We have absorbed those cuts. We made the adjustments that we needed to make. We cannot make additional adjustments without losing footing. Thank you. Thank you. And when you go to your seats, I want to say thank you. And a shout out to 709. Park Boulevard baby been I see you and Sarah over there. I don't write myself y'all babies being graduates. And Councilman King I mean all cuts are not created equal as you've said and when we cut the work on behalf of our children our most vulnerable in our community that has a much greater outsized impact on our city as a whole. Councilmember Morrell. Thank you once again I appreciate your presentation. I think sometimes we have to remind the public of what has happened previously because many people in the city do not remember what happened the last time the Orleans Parish Public Defender's Office had a significant cut and how it impacted services because many people weren't just paying attention at the time. As you may recall when Derwin was in your position Danny and it got to a point in the funding of your office that he felt and the office felt that they could no longer constitutionally provide services to their clients they were left with two options. One is to accept no more clients and two was to not provide services at all. And at that time the entire criminal justice system pretty much ground to a halt almost immediately. And sometimes what people forget in this process is that in order for there to be a constitutional criminal justice system that functions appropriately there has to be a prosecutor, there has to be a defense lawyer. That is what is required under the Constitution. So for so long with prior DA's and the prior system it was let's give the DA's office all the money we can give it and let's give the Public Defender's Office the bare minimum so that someone shows up to kind of stand over there without any of the resources or necessary funding or necessary personnel to actually be able to do their job. And it was done so shamefully and so awfully you had people like Robert who experienced the outcome of that because the you already have the powers in the resources of the state that are brought against each individual in a criminal justice proceeding to talk about just making sure the staffing is at a parity level is really the bare minimum. And as you said previously and I don't want to rehash it the system working requires your office to work because if we get to a point where your office is not appropriately funded to either do its job or can't represent other people it doesn't matter what we do at the state level to expedite processes if they do not have legal representation the case can't move forward. So like when I keep using that analogy of like with criminal justice the different cogs the different widgets you're a pretty significantly sized cog because if you take your office and representation out of the machine there's nothing else I mean the cops could do their job the DA could do a job the sheriff could do her job you literally cannot move the case to an end even to a conviction or acquittal you can't schedule hearings if there is no lawyer for the defense there is no case.

And as bad as we complain about the prison population today if tomorrow your office was in a position where they could no longer take new clients you would put the criminal the criminal court judges in a position where they would have to go out and start assigning cases to private attorneys and that is something that's done before been done before and it is an unmitigated train wreck because you can't just stick any lawyer in a position to represent a criminal client one there are there are significant requirements for capital and felony cases above a certain level so you can't just grab somebody some older gentleman who's a real estate lawyer and go we've got a murder here this is yours there are proven cases Supreme Court case law that says you have to have requisite experience to handle these significant cases and then beyond that if you don't have a criminal practice background then the case never ends because that becomes the basis of appeals anyway because if you have inadequate representation which anybody will know after they after they get a real estate lawyer doing their felony theft case who doesn't call any witnesses or doesn't go through all the footage like you guys do then that client you were trying to get resolution for whether they're guilty or innocent or whatever the case perpetuates itself because their rights were violated and the process wasn't met so to your point as a as Councilman Harris has said repeatedly I think everyone the council is kind of being candid with everyone including the DA sitting out there we certainly are never going to tell you we can make everyone whole it's just not possible under this budget but we certainly will take into account that we have to do what's possible to make you more whole so you can do your job because you're as important of the system probably more important than people understand for all of this to move forward so we appreciate you being here today appreciate LCCR especially I know that we're working with juvenile court regarding the hearing officer to make sure they move in their process as well but it is going to be a whole lot of Sophie choice and robbing Peter to pay Paul to get things done thank you no no no don't get up don't get up yet we have cards but I also need to ask a couple of questions can you go to your but 2026 budget summary page all right because I have a lot of different numbers floating around including from your template and then my staff is showing me something can for the thousands of people who are watching this is a tribute to the council member green can you go in that slider is the system not working what amount of money are you asking so we that number which includes the LCCR pass-through is what we are requesting which number the twelve million three eighty okay we currently are proposed at seven so that is obviously a very big difference right to make us whole that is that is to make up for the cuts for 2025 and 2026 because a year ago both the district attorney office and on and the public defenders were told we want you to keep your operations going right he's 31% use your reserves to cop to cover that and we have and that's come to the end and it's in it and there's no more time to do that all right but if we took you back to sort of your 2026 actuals that shaves off about a million dollars yeah you know I get I'm not I'm just being honest with everyone and this is you need not what you want yeah like really what do you need yeah so I I'm excited about this plan to get and we're committed both across the system with with the district attorney's office to safely get that jail to under a thousand yeah we can do that if we will get to get that actual budget we can do that we can you can do that with the 11 million 440 correct right we can do that we can commit to that now if we are going to come somewhere between this the the current proposed budget for us in LCC are of seven and that number will be we can limp along and not do the drastic cuts as much as we did we we are planning to but it will not get the results that this council and the community want okay I again I just think people this goes for the presenters the thousands of people who have presented so far because it feels like it just be realistic I get aspirational but what we need is real because we all have to be real about the money that we don't have under percent all right and I you know I just think you know I know whether it's revenue generation or finding it from other places the amount to make us either core partially whole is relatively insignificant to even what we spend in the criminal legal system yeah over a third of our budget for jail and policing and I know there's an OPD in jail but just well so I hear what you're saying all right with that Lisa Marie Rhodes and look the timer is not working so I'm gonna time you and tell you when it's two minutes go ahead when I started this my name is Lisa Maria Rhodes I live at 3612 Bank Street I'm the founder and executive director of Alice and this is my 18th year as an educator and social worker in New Orleans Alice we provide leadership development for young people who are facing criminal court or immigration court and the way that vulnerable youth facing criminal court are connected to Alice is through the youth public defender at LCCR both LCCR and OPD continue to partner with us to provide deep wraparound supports that allow our young people to be kids to feel safe to walk in their purpose and to share their God-given gifts and talents with our community Danny also mentioned that this saves the city money and so I just want to share a few examples with you Kayla is caring for the unhoused population now Maria is a nail technician who opened her November slots today and they're already full Nevaeh is studying social work in college Lorenzo is a dedicated father who's so proud that he just took his kids to Disney World Kimberly is a high school senior who is a candidate

for the Posse scholarship Geriana is coaching elementary kids Marvin will greet you with a smile at the Audubon Aquarium Wayne just finished a two years associates degree in one year through next-level NOLA Norma just joined the military and got her first assignment Montrell's in his high school marching band he will make us all very happy at Mardi Gras Taj is so excited to be the father he didn't have to his newborn daughter Valerie just won student government rep and miss sophomore Yasmin is doing her master's at Tulane Ronald became a high school teacher and football coach at Carver and Derek is working at the Department of Education so I say all this to say it is imperative that all community members feel safe and when public defenders can fully do their job they positively impact community health and safety by providing entry points to care and the support that we all deserve so thank you thank you Kristen Rome do you want to speaking in you're good all right Sierra Sinead Good afternoon. 1100 B Milton Street. Good afternoon. My name is Ciara Chenier. I'm the strategic storyteller at Louisiana Center for Children's Rights. I regularly hold storytelling circles with young people in the juvenile jail to elevate their voices and pursue a narrative that communicates the humanity of black New Orleans children. This includes their published essays and poems in The Lens and their co-authorship of the Youth Justice Language and Ethics Guide. Programming like mine offers the education, empowerment, structure, resources, and care that many of the kids have repeatedly stated, if I received stuff like this growing up, I would have never ended up here. To disinvest in youth programming in JJIC communicates to these children that we do not care about their growth, success, or well-being and limits the staff capacity necessary to offer this programming. A child once told me that he didn't know he had anxiety until he went to jail and no point in his life had he ever received counseling or therapy prior to receiving grief services in JJIC. I reviewed the city's proposed 2027 budget with the young people and their immediate response was, wait, all this for the police? Where are we on here? Instead of cutting public defense, youth programming, or so many of the other cuts to necessary community and social services in this budget, they drafted a youth budget with the following priorities. Economic development, well-paying job opportunities for ages 15 and up, health and human services for family counseling and mental health, parks and neighborhoods. One child told me to tell y'all, can we make our neighborhoods a village? Housing affordability, so we don't have to take care of our families at 15. In court systems, one child specifically named more support of public defense because these are the people who have my life in their hands. Thank you. Judge Calvin Johnson. And how am I going to limit you to two minutes? Good afternoon. It's a joy to be in this space with all of you. This is a joy for me always. I have heard a little of what Danny said. I didn't hear it all. I didn't hear anything of what the DA said. I put on my cord, I came to talk for both of them, actually. But I didn't hear what the DA actually said. But one of the things that I think I heard some, and I hope the DA added more, is where a lot of your cost is. That is, is where a lot of the city's cost is. And that's the jail. And to be able to get the jail under 1,000 people will save, could save, the city a tremendous amount of money. Now, how do you do that, though? And to do it, you have to, obviously, you have to have a combination of the two working together. It's impossible otherwise. You also have to have the judges working with them. And I don't know where they are or were today if they were here today, but you have to have them working with them. But it also entails, actually, city, your office, that is, is Daniel's office, Jake's office, working with them because that office gives a lot of data. It gives them information about who's actually in jail. And so when you look at across certain populations in jail, you see what the cost leaders are. That is, is where those people who are in jail are in jail too long, and that drives cost, and where you can dive in quickness in terms of releasing people from jail. However, all parts of this system, the judges, the DA, the public defender must recognize public safety is the first consideration. But balancing public safety with the two of them, the three of them, aggressively looking across the populations. There is, I'll give you just a little insight in terms of population, in populations, if I can get this thing to work. Now, y'all, whoever's controlling this, you know you can't cut off judge. Look, just recognize in two months, look, in two months I'll be 80, and I'm trying to do this. Okay, so give me, give me some grace. I'm trying. Yes, indeed. And I will be able to do it. Okay, here are some populations of people. You have those who have been sentenced to the Department of Corrections, and how quickly they can get out of jail. Because having them in jail raises your cost, because they are here and not there. It raises your cost. So moving that quickly. DOC has to work with them to do that quickly. But they are doing it. That's the good thing. They are doing it. What we have seen, those of us who look closely at the population, what we have seen is that in the last three months or so, they have been able to get out of that jail over 100 people. That's what's kept the number in that jail actually below 1,500. But anyway, that's one population. Municipal offenders. Y'all, this is, I wish the DA was here, and he is, because I look over here at it. Because I argue with them why we have municipal offenders in jail for countless days. And again, this is a population of people, if they come into court on any day they come in and plead guilty, they are going home.

So if they are going to go home on any day they come in, why can't they come in the next day they were there? That's how that population works. We have parole violators. We have probation violators. And you look across the state, and this is data y'all can see, because I've seen it. But you look across those populations, and again, how long are they there, how you can get them out quicker, and this way a combination of the two can get that done. But they can't, this group can't get it done effectively without having the pieces in their system that works, I mean, aggressively with a population that comes in. Danny, I heard him describe a guy who goes to Odyssey House. That's social workers who do that. And the judges have data that shows in low-risk populations, that is those, let me back up, the judges in the judges' system, everyone who comes in is risk assessed. They use that process, that piece, to assess how great the risk is for them to be released. Those low-risk individuals who are released, who then are represented by the public defenders, the likelihood that they will come back to jail is less than 10 percent. It's actually around 6.5 percent. I'm going to try this again, y'all. That population who are released, that who they represent, that's what happens. It happens, though, because the public defender is working directly with these other pieces, parts, that you fund. You fund instead, you fund Ubuntu, I never pronounced that correctly, but you do. They work directly, those social workers, directly with those programs, and directly with the Odyssey Houses, the Youth Empowerment Projects, the Center for Saints, all of those pieces, parts. But the lawyers can't do that. I say can't do that. They don't have the time to make those efforts. So you need them as a part of it. And I'm running out of breath, and I'm going to shut up. But anyways, I'm not going to shut up just yet. I'm like a Baptist preacher. I'm not going to shut up yet. If, in fact, the judges and the DA and the public defender work consistently together, recognizing that you can get below 1,000 if you do it quickly and you do it aggressively and you do it together and you make sure that public safety is assessed at every release, and you're releasing people based on your knowledge that through those things that you do, the population, new audience, will still be safe. That's my talk. Thank you, Judge. Thank you all very much. That was helpful. Yes, indeed. Council Member Wheeler. All right. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm out of order. I am out of order. Let's get Sarah to speak, and then you can wrap it up. Hi, y'all. I'll be super fast. Sarah Mojula of Vera, Louisiana, and also Big EGC Budget Coalition. You've heard all of the things. We care about addressing the root causes of crime, violence, and involvement in the criminal legal system. And what we know is that our criminal legal system is the catch basin of all other systemic failures, which is why LCCR and OPD are doing so many other things in addition to defense. And I think the only thing that I'll really lift up is that ROI is the return on investment is super important because not funding these services means that we're spending about $43,000 to $91,000, I think from the sheriff's estimate, on jailing people per year, per person. So $43,000 to $91,000 per year on jailing people. And so all of the wraparound services, the youth advocates, connections to other programs and advocacy, all of that stuff is super, super important. And so they have the math. I also, lawyer who does not care about math, can't do math. Sorry, my parents are going to be so mad. I used to know how to do math. But all of that to say that they have the numbers, and I think the very minimum just to keep the services going is what we are really advocating for, and there is a lot of support across the city on, obviously. Okay, that's it. Thank you, Sarah. Council Member Willard. Thank you, Madam Chair. Danny, Meg, thank you all. Robert, thank you all for coming down today. A few questions. First, I'm going to get into some of the budget stuff. What are the adult conflict attorneys? When I was reviewing your stuff, I— Yeah, so that is about 20% of our representation are people that are considered legal conflicts that have to have separate law firms, separate attorneys that are not part of our full-time staff that do that representation. Oh. And those are for, like, two co-defendants in the case. One goes to the conflict panel or our conflict division. I understand. So you can only represent one person in that party. Yeah, and then there are also other layers of why we can't represent someone. For instance, if we have confidential and privileged information about a witness in the main part of the office, we cannot represent the person accused where that witness is the complainant. So you have to contract that out. Correct. Got it. A lot of vacancies. Chief of Trials position, I mean, that's—I would imagine is pretty tough. A lot of staff attorney positions. And you said right now you have about 40 unfilled positions due to that hiring freeze? Yes, we—yeah. Pretty much with that chief of trials, a lot of the contract lawyers, 27 contract lawyers, a lot of other fulfilled, unfilled positions. Just to get us to where we are functioning properly, we've got to fill at least 20 of those positions, and this current budget takes us 20 in the opposite direction. Okay. I mean, you talked about the real-world impacts of not having those positions filled. It's troubling, to say the least. I think you guys provide essential services. I've worked closely with your office over the years, and I think this is going to have to be a priority for us to figure out what we can do to help bridge that gap.

What about your reserve accounts right now? Do you have anything in reserve? Have you depleted those? We expect the— Initially, I thought we could get to the middle of 2027 before we got to our break point on that reserves, but that month has moved closer to February or March, and one of the reasons is—I think, Councilmember, you talked about the difference of what a Happy Meal costs now and a Happy Meal cost just a few years ago. Our overall costs just keep increasing year in, year out. We have an additional $300,000 that just got sprung on us for expenses for health care just a few weeks ago. So that is—as those happen and, you know, other revenues have been going down, like the traffic camera revenues that just got turned off, that's where that number—or that month of where we are going to hit that break point gets closer and closer. Have you guys ever done an evaluation or studied to look at bringing private investigators, social workers in-house, as opposed to contracting with them? We have had some—we actually have had what we call a conflict division, and we actually have restarted that because it does save money. Okay, so you're working on that right now. We have that up and running, but there will never be a day which we don't have to contract out because there's just— Too much workload? There's just all these different layers of conflict of interest that even two layers of a main office or a conflict division, there's always going to be a need for contract workers. Okay. And then I noticed that many of the grants that you've secured over the last five years are kind of exhausted or have gone away. Is there anybody who works for you that applies for and looks at grant opportunities? Yes, we very much aggressively pursue that, and Lindsey Hortenstein, our Deputy CAO and Director of Communications and Development, has brought in millions of dollars to our office in our close to two decades of public service. Yes, that is something we're always looking for, but I'll give you a good news example. We have partnered with State Office of the Public Defender Office and the federal government to fund our Child in Need of Care work through a federal grant, and you'll see in our budget that's over $100,000 of additional revenue from that grant that supports our family defense teams. We consistently put in for the burn-jag positions. Many of our staff have come through grants. We even got a grant several years ago through the Department of Corrections and their justice reinvestment initiative where we were able to hire four social workers, and then when the parity law was passed, absorbed them into staff. Okay. Yes, finding creative ways to do additional revenues has always been one of the things we're doing. I'll just give you one other example, Councilmember Willard, is that one of the things we are asking for, even though we're in a hiring freeze, is trying to get law school to fund fellowships for this upcoming fall, and even no matter what you do here today in the coming weeks, that will continue to be a way that we bring additional dollars to New Orleans. Okay. Thank you all for what you all are doing. Councilmember, I just wanted to add quickly that it's important to note that the landscape of grants, both state and local, have changed a lot, right? And there's a lot of grants that we've had in private years that, especially with private funders, are moving away from direct service. So where we had sort of a larger pot of money to look into and pull from, those are shifting their priorities to system changes and larger scale issues rather than those direct service initiatives that are really helpful for us. Got it. Thank you all. Thank you. Thank you all for being here, and thank you for putting the pencil to paper. We appreciate you all, and we appreciate all the community members who came to support us. Thank you. And last but not least, public safety and support. I think Ross just stepped out. He's probably coming home. He's probably going home. Yes, ma'am. That advocacy was not free. You're awesome, man. I wonder all these people that are stuck in jail. Limited vision. Thank you. All right, Ross, whenever you're ready. Good afternoon, Madam Chair, council members. Ross Bourgeois, Director of Public Safety Support for the City of New Orleans. I certainly appreciate the consideration that you all have given me in rescheduling to assist in my ongoing recovery from surgery, so I'm very happy to be here. The Office of Public Safety Support consists of a couple of different areas. Most notably is the Real-Time Crime Center. It's a good percentage of our folks. That's the folks outlined in blue. Our Grounds Patrol Division in purple. Our IT staff that maintain all of our technological infrastructure for the crime center in yellow. And our citywide electronics support section, which is the citywide radio shop that manages over 3,000 devices used by not only the public safety agencies, but the non-public safety operational agencies like Parkways and Sanitation and Public Works. That Tier 2 radio system is also managed by the two employees highlighted in green. Our proposed budget, our 2026 adopted budget was $3,560,470. Our 2027 proposed budget is $3,366,948 with a variance of $193,522. As it relates to other operating, our 2026 adopted was $4,361,000. Our 2027 proposed is $2,193,000 with a variance of $2,168,000. Bringing that total, that's $7,921,000 compared to this year $5,559,000 to be a reduction of $2,361,522. To unpack that a little bit, as it relates to personnel, the personnel reductions from the general fund is certain grounds patrol personnel, basically all of the grounds patrol personnel that are funded by the general fund are going to be reduced. We have created an additional IT specialist position, so we've converted a contract, a vendor-led position to an in-house position, so we have one additional IT specialist, but that did result in a $30,000 annual cost savings.

As it relates to our other operation, the largest portion of that reduction is going to be the elimination of contract private security services at City Hall, the VA hospital campus, juvenile court, and the Armstrong Park complex. So that's that reduction of $1.8 million from our general fund to eliminate that entire line item. In addition, we're going to transition to a more robust video evidence platform over the course of the next year. For our non-general fund-related budget, this year there was no other operating, it was all personnel. In 2026, we had $638,391. Our proposed budget includes $466,906 for a variance of $171,485. The personnel that are non-general fund are the grounds patrol personnel that are assigned to and funded by the French market. The variance is some ARPA-funded positions that are rolling off at the end of this year. And obviously we had no other operating for either year requested. This year, as it relates to our budget efficiencies, we reduced our overall network backhaul costs, which is primarily serviced by Cox, while adding additional devices by leveraging wireless technology. So our staff were placing more than one camera on a particular Cox account so we could eliminate those Cox accounts. And we've been very strategic when we needed to add additional cameras to make sure that we could place them and get the desired effect of the desired amount of coverage, but to place them within a predetermined area next to a nearby Cox service so that we could add the camera without increasing that backhaul cost. We negotiated an extension to our contract, and I appreciate the council recently approving that, to keep our security contract pricing the same through the end of 2026 so we didn't have an increase this year. And as I mentioned earlier, we reduced our dependency on an outside vendor by bringing a position in-house, resulting in an annual cost savings of about $30,000. Twenty-seven, we're going to transition to a more robust video management platform that's going to provide better forensic value to the videos that are placed there. In this budget includes five additional public safety cameras for each council district, five per council district, and we're going to work with OPCD and NOSIM staff to find some alternative funding sources for the additional dispatch councils, and I'm sure Carl will mention this when he comes, the current dispatch councils over at OPCD are at end of life coming up in 2030, so it's very important that we find some sort of non-general fund related grant funding to replace those, hopefully we can replace a third of them a year over the next three years so that in 2030 we're not looking at a big number, we can spread that out over the course of perhaps three grant years. Our building, we're working with Capital Projects for that hardening, obviously that's a long process, obviously our building suffered severe damage in 2021 that's been largely unrepaired to this date, so we have just started this week in replacing the windows, so that's very positive news, so we're going to hopefully next year drag that elephant across the finish line. That's it Ross? Yes ma'am. All right, I have a couple questions. The reduction of certain grounds patrol personnel, where are these personnel dispatched? They're assigned to, three of them are assigned to the Lafitte Greenway, three of them are assigned to city-owned cemeteries, three of them are assigned to, well two of them are assigned to Joe Brown Park, and one of them is just an overall supervisor. So it's ten people total, is that right? Nine. Three, three, two, and one. I feel like I'm on Clue. Yes, okay, nine, thank you. All right, and then elimination of private security services, and this is not a reduction, this is a pure elimination. Yes ma'am. And when we talk about the VA campus, we're talking about the VA building, correct? Yes ma'am. Okay, Juvenile Court, eliminating security there. Yes ma'am. And Armstrong Park, eliminating security there. Yes ma'am. For the park complex, has security ever sort of apprehended or stopped people from breaking in, to your knowledge? I don't know that we've ever apprehended someone breaking in. When we added security back in 2017, that was after the buildings had been vandal-proofed, and we added security. What has happened in the Armstrong Park complex is that we don't, there are no homeless encampments in that park. It is free to be used by visitors and community members, and we don't have any criminal incidents that occur in the park because of that visibility. Okay. Juvenile Court, that would mean that there's no security at all? No screening. No screening. So at the front door, there would be no screening at all? No ma'am. Okay. The VA campus, we're talking about the building over there. What are those, what does that private security, what is that? There are two officers that are assigned there 24-7, and that patrol the buildings that the city has offices, as well as the garage. And that is not, so the low barrier shelter has its own security, so this is just two officers to really secure the building. The remainder of the campus. Okay. Got it. City Hall, obviously, so that would mean nobody at this front? And the City Hall line item, yes ma'am, would include all of the screening, it includes the personnel assigned to the second floor, and it includes two people that are assigned to 1340 Poydras, where they have adjudication hearings, as well as safety and permits code enforcement area. I do have a question about Councilmember Willard, and my, and Councilmember McCarran's favorite topics, drones. Yes ma'am. You really have no involvement, even though you're the real-time crime center, in the NOPD's drone deployment. Not at this point.

Is there any discussion about you taking that over, or becoming involved? There has been some preliminary discussion about us getting involved, and or making our space available for them to use at our Rampart Street facility. At other, in other jurisdictions where they have a real-time crime center or something similar to yours, is it common for that center to deploy the drones versus the particular law enforcement agency? I'm not aware of a real, well first of all, we're the, we're primarily the only real-time crime center in the country that falls outside of the organizational scope of a police department. But everywhere that has a real-time crime center, that I'm aware of, and a drone as a first responder program, the drone as a first responder program is embedded in and or managed by the real-time crime center. I mean it makes sense, you guys monitor the cameras that are all around, and there are thousands of cameras, so if anybody's committing a crime, you're going to see it. It would make sense to me that if we're going to have a drone program, which I don't want to have a drone program, that it would be in your shop and not just in the 8th District, for example. All right, that's all I got. Councilmember Willard. Hey, Ross. Good morning. That's our Jefferson. Jefferson Parish has it set up like that, I mean they have all the screens and they launch their drone as needed, dispatch their drone. Two questions. What is the total dollar amount for your personnel reduction? Because I saw on one of the spreadsheets for Questica, it had a 624,000 personnel reduction, but your slides show 193 on general fund, and then 171 on non-general fund. Correct. So I'm going to ask Brandy to help me with that, because the total for the nine people is the 624. Okay. And some of that's going to come out of the grounds patrol. And then we have to add money back to that for that one position, for that IT position. And then we move, and you also have the ARPA reduction. So it's not going to be clean because we added it. The difference is from last year to this year doesn't necessarily compare his starting request from 27 to now. Got it. What's the federal treasury department funding? It's the ARPA. That's for ARPA. And the French market corporation funding? That comes from the French market. That comes from? Their self-generation fund. Okay. And that's just for access to, did you have grounds patrol out there? Yes, sir. We have, we manage through a CEA with the French market, the security for their properties. So they reimbursed the city for that. Okay. Questica, just to clarify, there was a line item that said ADDI crime cameras. That's additional crime cameras, right? I'm assuming. I think that should be ADDL. But it's for additional, it's for 250,000? Yes, sir. Then that's the five per council district. Yep. And then there's a $900,000 figure for RTCC Cox data for crime cameras, 900,000, is that like rent? What is that? That's the fee that we pay Cox to have those internet accounts out in the field for the backhaul back. So we pay 100. Okay. So that's an annual cost? Yes, sir. To the real-time crime center. Okay. And then there was 125,000 for repairs and maintenance of audio and video. Is that also something that we have to pay every year or is that just a big need right now for the audio, video repairs and maintenance? It's something that we're going to have to pay for the next few years because our systems are nine years old. So a lot of them are into life. So what I'd like to do is over the next three years- Start to replace them? Start replacing it before we start. Some of our equipment, if it goes, there is no fixing it. It's at end of life. Okay. Now I see Chief Harrison back there. It might be good to look at federal funding sources for something like that. There may be federal opportunities to pay for those new cameras instead of sinking costs into repairing and maintaining outdated cameras. All right. That's all I have. Thank you, Ross. Member Morrell, anything? All right, Ross. Thank you so much. Thank you all so much. Motion to adjourn? We can adjourn and we will be here tomorrow and District B will be providing pizza. Yay! Gluten-free. I might come back. Thank you. Thank you. 8 3 2 1 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 2 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r fideo. Diolch am wylio'r ffilm. Diolch am wylio'r ffilm. 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Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. 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Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Yn ystod y 2000 oed, mae'r cyfrinau'n dweud y byddwn yn cael gwyddoniaeth am y cyfrinau o'r gilydd. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cynghrair.

Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Yn ystod y cyfrifiadau, mae yna nifer o'r cyfleoedd i'r cynghrair. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr am wylio'r fideo. ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar.

Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Yn ystod y 20au oes, mae'r rhan fawr o'r rhesymau yma yn sicrhau bod y cyfnod hwn yn ddiweddar. Rwy'n gwybod y bydd y staff hir yn ddweud y pethau y mae'n cael eu cymryd.

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