If Harris County Sheriff's Department needs a helicopter, we should fund it legitimately

Harris County Sheriff Adrian Garcia’s hiring of former Houston Chronicle reporter Alan Bernstein continues to pay dividends. This piece under the byline of Chron reporter Kiah Collier reads like a Bernstein press release, which it probably was. The link on Chron.com is broken but as luck would have it (or coordination), it is in full on AdrianGarcia.com.

More than four years after Harris County Commissioners Court scrapped a request from Sheriff Adrian Garcia to use federal stimulus dollars to lease and staff a helicopter, the county’s top lawman finally could get his wish.

Garcia will ask Commissioners Court next week for permission to accept a Bell OH-58A helicopter from a U.S. Department of Defense surplus equipment program, and use money generated from the sale of seized assets to equip it with an infrared camera, air conditioning and a video recorder, as well as pay for the first year of operation.

Garcia says the department, which has owned helicopters in the past but now has just one small airplane, needs a chopper to police the fast-growing unincorporated areas of the county, the nation’s third most populous.

“We have 1.6 million people, we have major city-type crime that’s occurring in our unincorporated areas,” Garcia said. “Having that aviation advantage adds to our ability to effectively serve the citizens.”

I agree with him. The HCSO needs a couple of helicopters. The problem I have with this one is the funding mechanism – using “drug war asset forfeiture”. Unfortunately, my commissioner, Precinct 2’s Jack Morman, is all for it.

Precinct 2 Commissioner Jack Morman, who supports the proposal, said paying for the helicopter entirely with revenue from seized assets would be “the perfect situation, where there is not any type of drain on the county’s general” fund.

Garcia said he is not sure the department will be able to pay for the helicopter with seized asset sales after the first year, and that it is something his office would evaluate during the first year of operation.

The department pulled in $2.6 million last year in asset sales. It will cost nearly half a million dollars to outfit the chopper, and about $250,000 a year to maintain it for 500 flight hours a year. Three deputies already are licensed to fly helicopters, and two more with commercial certifications are in training, a department sergeant said.

Nothing about this is “perfect” in the least. As the liberty movement continues to drive the youth movement in the Republican Party, politicians like Jack can’t see the forest for the “free dollars”. I tried to contact him but received a call from his Chief of Staff, Dave Walden, who told me that he was authorized to speak on Jack’s behalf. Walden was ready with a pithy quote:

If the sheriff wants to spend criminal’s money catching criminals, the commissioner is all for it.

Obviously, that will play well in a Republican primary. Too bad it isn’t true.

Asset forfeiture is probably the second worst unintended consequence of the “war on drugs”, the first being the incarceration of hundreds of thousands of US citizens. I won’t spend much time on it because this is a done deal, but if you really want to know about it, here are just a couple of links:

• FSA, LLC. – a business built on supporting agencies seize assets from individuals.
• Texas Forfeiture Law – an attorney that specializes in representing people when the government steals their property.
• Institute for Justice – a report on asset forfeiture in Texas.
• Google search on Drug War Asset Forfeiture Abuse

There are thousands of stories each year of the abuse of asset forfeiture laws. And that abuse is specifically because our elected politicians put pressure on our law enforcement personnel  to fund their activities using (and abusing) these laws.

Commissioners Court should force Garcia to cut his huge command and communications staff first, then completely fund a competent air support division. Air support is a proven activity that increases officer safety and criminal apprehension.

One other thing that caught my eye.

The sheriff’s department for years has used helicopters of other local law enforcement agencies, including the Houston Police Department’s Air Support Division, the Texas Department of Public Safety and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.

HPD, however, has cut its air support division budget by more than two-thirds, Garcia said, reducing flying hours from 21 to three hours a day;

If that is so, then HPD is wasting those three hours a day flying Wyatt Earp grand jurists around on tours. Remember the 185th Runaway Grand Jury foreperson Trisha “Wyatt Earp” Pollard? This from her Facebook page on June 4th:

But she did get a nice picture of the San Jacinto Monument:

HPD needs to disband its air support program completely if that is the best use they have for it. Chief McClelland should give the helicopter to the Sheriff and let him staff it and operate it in his budget. With legitimate funds from Commissioner’s Court, not asset forfeitures.