Budgeting for indigent defense a tricky process
EDINBURG — With just $29 left in the county’s fund to pay court-appointed attorneys and two months still left in the calendar year, Hidalgo County Budget Officer Raul Silguero didn’t need an accounting degree to call the situation a crisis.
The lack of money threatened to put dozens of docketed criminal cases in limbo.
County commissioners already were forced to tap into an emergency fund once this year to replenish the coffer. But a second request for an extra $1 million faced a challenge from some: How could funding indigent defense in one of the poorest counties in the nation be considered an unforeseen expense?
The number of criminal cases filed in Hidalgo County generally increases each year. Yet the amount of money budgeted to cover that cost consistently falls short.
For Noé Gonzalez, presiding judge of the 370th state District Court, the math is simple.
“There are two things that are constant — population growth in our area and the increase in crime,” Gonzalez said. “We must assume that the increase in crime will necessitate an increase in indigent defense.”
While Hidalgo County’s actual spending on indigent defense has increased more than 64 percent — or by more than $3.4 million — over the past three years, the amount budgeted to cover that cost has increased by less than half that dollar amount.
Silguero, who helms the team that drafts each year’s budget, maintains those numbers are misleading.
The annual amount dedicated to indigent defense hasn’t kept pace with actual spending, but the county’s state and county courts have never been denied what they needed, he said.
Rather, a lack of state funding and a requirement that the county balance accounts each year has forced his office to be creative to cover the annual expense.
For instance, in the 2010 budget, county commissioners set aside $7.1 million to fund what is projected to be an $8.6 million expense. But that wasn’t because they weren’t prepared for the actual cost to increase.
For years, they have supplemented the indigent defense fund with money left over from the unpaid salaries of employees who left work during the year. While judges complain that this tactic makes it look on paper like their courts are constantly asking for more money, it has managed to cover their costs.
This year, however, budget writers were caught off guard by a $30-an-hour increase for court-appointed counsel that shifted their hourly rate to $100 for in-court work and $40 out-of-court. Approved by Hidalgo County’s Board of Judges in late 2008, the raises did not come to the attention of Silguero’s office until after the 2009 budget had been completed. And sweeping county salaries just wasn’t enough to pay the bill.
Ultimately, county commissioners agreed on Nov. 10 to approve a second emergency fund infusion that Silguero hopes will last through next year.
But the crisis demonstrated that the county should set aside more money for indigent defense as it budgets for future years, said Judge Letty Lopez, who presides over the 389th state District Court.
“We have to realize we have more people and more crime coming in,” she said. “I’m trying to understand how we just came to realize we’re the sixth-largest county in the state, and this is a cost we’re going to have to pay.”
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Jeremy Roebuck covers courts and general assignments for The Monitor. You can reach him at (956) 683-4437. Jared Janes covers Hidalgo County government, Edinburg and general assignments for The Monitor. You can reach him at (956) 683-4424.
