Rice study: Merge Harris County law enforcement
Harris County could save millions of dollars a year by consolidating overlapping law enforcement agencies, from sharing technological resources to reallocating duties from constables to the sheriff’s department, according to a report by the Kinder Institute for Urban Research at Rice University.
The report, which was released Thursday, revives several decades-old ideas to combine resources between law enforcement agencies in Harris County, despite likely opposition from the agencies and county government, which would have the ultimate authority in enacting many of the proposed changes.
“The real answer to this is, people aren’t going to give up what they have,” said Harris County Precinct 3 Commissioner Steve Radack, who said he does not support many of the consolidation ideas. “They don’t want to give it up. Very, very rarely does anybody even talk about what we’re discussing.”
The report presents several cost-cutting ideas but makes no actual recommendations to the
agencies, nor does it prioritize any of the proposals and offers few figures to show the amount of money that could be saved by consolidating services.
Kinder studied the 60 law enforcement agencies that form a patchwork of separate but sometimes overlapping patrols within Harris County, including the sheriff’s office, the Houston Police Department, constable offices, school district police departments and smaller municipal police departments. Those agencies spend a combined $1.6 billion per year, according to the report.
“We do have a system that, for all intents and purposes, is working fairly well,” Kinder researcher Kyle Shelton said. “But there are clearly places where there are overlaps and places where we could see what efficiencies would work.”
Among ideas included in the report are merger of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s police department with the Houston Police Department, and the consolidation of smaller municipal police departments into a larger network.
One of the report’s most aggressive ideas to consolidate would be to move patrol duties from the eight Harris County constable’s offices to the Harris County Sheriff ’s Office.
Political opposition to that idea would be too difficult to overcome because agencies would have to cede governing power, Radack said.
“People can study it and study it and study it, but I can assure you … the people that are really familiar with this are all going to say no,” said Radack, who was formerly the Precinct 5 constable.
Having nine different agencies — the eight county constables and the sheriff’s office — means that deputies from different agencies often are responding to the same incident without communicating, said David Cuevas, president of the Harris County Deputies Organization.
“It’s interesting that in the 21st century, we’re always looking at innovative ways to maximize the dollar or be more efficient, but the state constitution allows for eight constables,” Cuevas said. “Every time you have nine different law enforcement agencies doprocurement ing essentially the same thing out in the county, we have to make sure the crooks aren’t communicating better than the cops.”
Several constables declined to comment Wednesday because they had not seen the Kinder report.
Other proposed options are to align constable and justice of the peace precincts with county commissioner precincts and to consolidate highway patrol and enforcement. Several law enforcement agencies patrol some of the same stretches of Harris County highways, the report notes.
One proposal would be for area law enforcement agencies to share so-called “back office operations,” such as evidence and property rooms, training facilities, technology systems and date processes.
Harris County Judge Ed Emmett on several occasions has advocated for the consolidation of government services, including law enforcement, as the unincorporated areas of the county have boomed. He declined comment on the Kinder report.
A sheriff’s office spokesman said the office would review the study but did not comment on its findings.
“If the study has shown that there are several options that appear to be logical, maybe those need to be considered,” Cuevas said. “We do not want to see any constable deputy lose their job. We would welcome them to join the sheriff ’s office.”