Sacramento now smells like “smoke and homeless people” and, perhaps, we should “cull” the 5 percent of society “that give the other 95 percent a bad name.”
These were but two public statements from key witnesses in a four-hour hearing on state bail reform in Nashville Tuesday. Neither of these statements brought public repudiation from any House or Senate member in the room.
A joint session of House and Senate member of the Tennessee General Assembly convened Monday and concluded Tuesday to hear from a long slate of witnesses on bail reform in Tennessee.
The panel heard from bail bondsmen, heads of professional bail organizations, companies that work on monitoring technology, sheriffs, judges, district attorneys, legislators who have worked on bail issues in other states, local elected officials from across the state, and at least one national organization looking to reform the money bail system altogether.
But the two days of hearings were largely pro-industry affairs with a conservative-leaning, lock-’em-up, tough-on-crime philosophy. Many seemed interested in nitty-gritty topics like bracelet-monitoring tech and sharing stories about locals cops letting someone go on bond only to make trouble again. Few, it seemed, were interested in an overhaul of the money bail system itself that, largely, allows those with money to walk free until their trial and those without money to sit in jail.
The hearings came with many surprise statements from witnesses, many probably used to speaking from the heart, not in public, and not before a legislative panel. It also had surprise moments from some lawmakers, too.
Tuesday’s first witness was Jeff Clayton, executive director of the American Bail Coalition. He told the group he’d traveled the country talking about bail reform.
“Last week, I spent in lovely Sacramento, California, which smelled like smoke and homeless people,” Clayton said, apparently in reference to recent wildfires there and the city’s homeless population.
Again, not a single legislator spoke a word against this insulting remark, including Sen. Mike Bell (R-Riceville) who presided over the hearing.
Gardening, specifically pests in a cucumber patch, was on the mind of Memphis-based Ernie Arredondo, president of the West Tennessee executive board of the Tennessee Association of Professional Bail Agents, as he thought about criminals. In a bit of rambling testimony, he also suggested, maybe, getting rid of a chunk of society.
“It is just always a few things that will spoil your whole crop,” Arredondo told the panel. “If you don’t get the beetle bugs out of your cucumbers or where your squash is, they’ll eat up all your plants and kill it.
“Let’s say 95 percent of people are doing well. We just need to find a way to cull the other [3 percent, 4 percent, or 5 percent] that give the other 95 a bad name.”
Kansas state Rep. Stephen Owens was past his prepared testimony and well into question time before Bell, with obvious anger in his voice, reprimanded him.
“It almost cast a cloud on your testimony that you didn’t start out with, “I’m vice president of the bail bondsman association of Kansas. That I make my money in the bail business and I make my money in the monitoring business,’” Bell told Owens. “If chairman [Rep. Michael Curcio (R-Dickson)] hadn’t look it up online, we would have never known that.
“You come back before this committee again, at least in the Senate, I want you to lead with that before you say anything else.”
Owens explained that he gave up his position with the association when he was elected but admitted he was in the bail industry.
Look for even more surprising, silly, and strange moments, in our YouTube video.