Austin council member Greg Casar will introduce a new resolution at the June 14 city council meeting that seeks to remove any jail time that may come with certain misdemeanor arrests.
According to a post on the city council message board, Casar wants nonviolent misdemeanor arrests to result in nothing more than a citation, citing racial equity as one of the reasons.
“The vast majority of people who commit nonviolent misdemeanors—and who are legally eligible to receive a citation—receive a citation and are not arrested. However, according to APD data, more than 1,000 people in 2017 were arrested for these kinds of citation-eligible offenses via discretionary arrest. The data also shows that stark racial disparities exist in who is being discretionarily arrested for these misdemeanors,” says Casar.
Some of the misdemeanors he’s talking about include possession of marijuana, driving with an invalid license, and petty theft.
“In some cases, the difference between being arrested versus being given a citation included the following – simply not having car insurance, being around other people who had warrants, or being a person who’s been in trouble in the past. I hope we can continue advocating for policies that treat people more equitably, regardless of their neighborhood, race, income or criminal history,” he says.
This resolution is one of two Casar is sponsoring that is tied to what he says is “prioritizing” the Austin Police Department, the other being a plan to inform illegal immigrants about remaining silent whenver an APD officer asks about immigration status.
