Anne Linehan pointed out the Chronicle editorial on the $AFEclear program that appeared in yesterday’s print editions.
That editorial criticized the White Administration for its missteps in putting together the flawed $AFEclear program, and suggested there was insufficient input from citizens in the process.
Today’s print editions carry an editorial criticizing the White Administration for failing to act as aggressively as the newspaper would like on the HPD crime lab. The editorial may overreach a bit, as I’m not sure that it’s fair to say this remnant of the Lee P. Brown Administration’s neglect is now about to “infect” the current administration, but it is fair to suggest what the Chronicle does suggest — that Mayor White needs to jump start the process.
Further, the following criticism seems spot on:
In August 2004, [HPD Chief Harold] Hurtt suspended an internal investigation after discovering 280 boxes of mislabeled evidence in the police property room involving hundreds of cases that needed to be reviewed. Since then, retesting has called into question the results in up to 20 percent of cases in which defendants were convicted.
Sen. Tommy Williams, R-The Woodlands, angrily rejected Hurtt’s explanation that he hoped to have an investigator in place by April and was moving as fast as he could.
“You had feedback that you needed someone in there (in August),” the senator retorted. “That is a huge oversight that you have made.”
Hurtt’s efforts to find an independent investigator have not been as aggressive as circumstances demand.
On Friday, I gave the HPD public information office a ring to see if Chief Hurtt had yet achieved the necessary accreditation so that he may begin wearing the HPD uniform. He still has not, but the public information office informed me that under law, the chief has a year from when he takes the job to pass the exam, that he has been very busy overseeing the crime lab problems, and that he should obtain accreditation in March or April. No mention was made of his early priority of obtaining Tasers for HPD.
But, I digress. The point of the post is that the Chronicle has followed with strong editorials on local issues two days in a row now. I don’t agree with every point and wouldn’t expect to, but I do like the local emphasis. As we noted in our 2005 Recommendations post (#3), the city’s only newspaper needs to focus more on local issues (instead of, say, Swaziland). Our community benefits from that sort of focus. We hope it continues.
UPDATE: It is worth noting that the Chronicle could have been more timely weighing in on $AFEclear. Talk radio and this blog have been blasting on this topic for a full week — and now it’s finally on the editorial board’s radar. That’s a slower reaction than one would like on a local issue.
