TUCSON, Ariz. (AP) - Pima County officials voted to create a program to pay the bail of some people who are charged with low-level crimes and can’t afford bonds.
The Arizona Daily Star reports the 3-2 vote last week by the Board of Supervisors gives the go-ahead to fund the county’s own bail-bonding operation through a local nonprofit.
To be eligible, inmates must have bond set at $30,000 or less, and the charges against them cannot be for homicide, sex crimes or child exploitation. Defendants can’t have any kind of hold on them from another jurisdiction and would be supervised while on release.
Officials say the move will reduce the cost of running the Pima County Jail and avoid the job losses and family breakups that often occur when someone charged with a lesser offense spends weeks in pre-trial custody for lack of bail money.
“For too long, we have had a system that kept people confined in jail because they were impoverished,” County Administrator Chuck Huckelberry told supervisors.
Supervisor Ally Miller, who voted against the measure, said she was concerned that “this will lead to a lot of people not coming back to court because they have no skin in the game.”
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