CONCORD, N.H. — The House Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee has met in recent weeks to work on bail reform efforts that will shape future legislation.
Representative Terry Roy, a Deerfield Republican, who chairs the committee, and the NH ACLU’s policy director Frank Knaack spoke about those work sessions and what to expect in the upcoming session.
Critics of cash bail call it problematic, because it allows people to pay to be released — and puts those who cannot at a disadvantage. And getting released on bail can be the difference between keeping a job or losing it. In 2018, New Hampshire moved away from cash bail.
In the wake of those reforms, however, there have been ongoing efforts to tweak the system. Roy’s committee has spent the last few weeks listening to — by his estimation — hundreds of hours of testimony on the issue to try to figure out what further reforms are needed in the upcoming session.
Roy said one big takeaway is that “our technology system in New Hampshire is so outdated.” This could allow for a situation where someone is arrested in Manchester, released on bail, and then arrested in Portsmouth two days later — without real-time data available to authorities about the status of a prior arrest.
“We need to fix that right away because that’s dangerous and could be driving most of our problems,” Roy said. He believes it will cost about $1 million to upgrade the current system.
Knaack agreed this update is a good idea.
There was also consensus about the need for more education and training.
Knaack said there’s been misinformation and a misunderstanding of what current bail law permits, so authorities are asking for powers they already have. Under the 2018 law, authorities already have the ability to hold “anybody, regardless of the offense type, if they were deemed to be a danger or flight risk,” he said. The idea is that those enforcing the law should know how they can apply it.
“We’re excited that the committee itself has been really focused on ensuring that we educate people about this and not rewrite a law that doesn’t need to be rewritten,” he said.
And, Roy said, some of the problems the committee has heard about are bigger than just bail reform.
“We’ve discovered that, you know, 80 to 90 percent of our problems with the criminal justice system are driven by a lack of ability to treat people for mental health illness,” he said. “So for that lack, the criminal justice system is being used as a crutch and the criminal justice system is not designed nor meant to be used for mental health treatment.”
Knaack expects those broader systemic issues — like mental health, substance use, and housing — to be addressed through a study committee.
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Amanda Gokee can be reached at amanda.gokee@globe.com. Follow her @amanda_gokee.