JPs support expanding justice panel

Quorum Court committees reject ordinance to ban noisy truck brakes

FAYETTEVILLE — Washington County’s justices of the peace on Tuesday endorsed adding a member of the community to the county’s Criminal Justice Coordinating Committee, but County Judge Patrick Deakins said he is still struggling to find people willing to serve.

In a joint meeting of the Quorum Court’s Finance and Budget and County Services committees, the justices of the peace voted 9-3 in favor of sending an ordinance providing for community representation on the criminal justice panel to the full Quorum Court.

Justice of the Peace Beth Coger sponsored the ordinance. Coger said the initial ordinance set out the membership of the committee, which was to be made up of “local judges, local corrections officials, the prosecuting attorney, law enforcement officials, county officials, medical professionals, and mental health professionals.” Coger said she wanted to expand the criteria to allow other members of the community to be part of the panel.

“We have a lot of smart people in our county and in our community,” Coger said.

Deakins said after the meeting he has been unable to find people willing to serve on the committee.

Deakins suspended the committee’s activities in October and said in a letter to Matt Durrett, prosecuting attorney and co-chairman of the committee, that by county ordinance members of the committee are limited to two consecutive three-year terms. Deakins said he stumbled across the information as part of his background research on the committee.

Deakins said during the discussion of the ordinance Tuesday that the atmosphere around the panel’s work had become “caustic” and “negative” and he wanted the group to consider ways to make the criminal justice system more efficient and to steer clear of focusing only on ways to release individuals from the county’s Detention Center.

“I’m not going to go there,” he said.

The Criminal Justice Coordinating Committee had voted unanimously in late September to ask the Quorum Court to pay for a $200,000 pretrial services program to help reduce crowding in the jail. The committee also has been considering programs such as a mental health court, modeled after the state’s drug court program, and expanded pretrial services meant to keep people out of jail while awaiting trial. The county has received a $550,000 federal grant to set up and begin operating a mental health court.

Also at Tuesday’s meeting, justices of the peace rejected an ordinance that would ban the use of compression braking systems in the unincorporated areas of the county. Only four justices of the peace voted to move the ordinance on to the Quorum Court while seven voted against it.

Justice of the Peace Charles Dean proposed the ordinance. Dean represents District 7, which is west of Fayetteville. He said he’s received numerous complaints from area residents about the noise from trucks using what the ordinance calls “compression release engine braking systems,” also known as “Jake brakes.”

Dean said the use of the braking systems causes a lot of noise. He said during the October discussion of the ordinance that Fayetteville has posted signs prohibiting the use of the brakes and he wants the county to do so in his district and anywhere else as needed.

The ordinance was postponed by the Quorum Court in December until the next meeting of the County Services Committee.

Justice of the Peace Willie Leming, who represents District 13, has argued a county ordinance is unnecessary. District 13 covers much of western Washington County. Leming said having an ordinance for the county would be redundant since state law requires trucks of the type Dean was targeting to have proper mufflers and drivers or owners can be cited and fined if they fail to comply with that state law.

Leming said trucks operating without proper mufflers can already be ticketed under state law. He said the county shouldn’t adopt an ordinance that could hamper others.

“You’re going to punish everybody over four or five trucks,” Leming said.

According to Jacobs Vehicle Systems, a compression release engine brake is “an engine retarder that uses the engine to aid in slowing and controlling the vehicle. When activated, the engine brake alters the operation of the engine’s exhaust valves so that the engine works as a power-absorbing air compressor. This provides a retarding, or slowing, action to the vehicle’s drive wheels, enabling you to have improved vehicle control without using the service brakes. This conservation results in reduced service brake maintenance, shorter trip times, and lower total cost of ownership.”