How to fix the Sheriff's Office to be sure it does right by all Philadelphians
Row Role Revolt?
No, we're non likely to get rid of the corruption-decumbent Sheriff's Office someday soon. But a former urban center official has a solution for ensuring the office does right past residents.
May. 05, 2021
Philadelphia Sheriff Rochelle Bilal institute her office on the hot seat at a recent City Council hearing held on her conclusion to restart sheriff's sales in the midst of the pandemic and move the process online. Historically, a applicant had to be physically nowadays at the auction in order to purchase a property. Recently, the sheriff's office announced a contract with a company "Bid4Assets" that would move sales online and permit purchasers to bid remotely.
Depending on who you lot ask, the decision to movement the sheriff's sales to a digital platform is just a long overdue modernization of an obsolete bureaucratic process. Simply other people bespeak to the Sheriff's Part'southward scandal-ridden history as a reason why Quango is correct to be concerned most this no-bid contract. Afterward a grueling half-dozen-hour Urban center Quango public hearing, the Sheriff'due south Part agreed to seek approval for an additional sixty (sixty) twenty-four hour period auction moratorium from the Beginning Judicial Commune, which was subsequently granted. However, this activity was not plenty to stave off renewed calls for the elimination of this row office and the consolidation of its duties into other existing agencies.
MORE ON THE SHERIFF'Southward Role IN PHILADELPHIA
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- It's time to go all the way with sheriff reform in Philadelphia
- A primer: What is the Philadelphia Sheriff'due south Office, anyway?
- Tin can we all concord to make this sheriff Philadelphia'due south last?
- An early warning sign on new sheriff Rochelle Bilal
The idea of amending the Urban center Lease to put an terminate to the indictment magnet that has been the sheriff's role has its claim and its cheerleaders, simply does it accept the necessary political back up to actually happen? Probably not.
But is at that place an achievable compromise somewhere between abolishment and business every bit usual? Now might be the time to try information technology.
Something in the Water?
More and so than any other elected part, the Sheriff'due south Office seems to regularly be the bailiwick of corruption investigations or employee lawsuits. The sheriff position itself is a holdover from colonial England, with a modern portfolio that includes: 1) providing courtroom security, 2) transporting prisoners and three) conducting sheriff'due south sales on foreclosed or tax delinquent properties.
Philadelphia has had four sheriffs since 1988, each with a "pull up a chair" story to tell about their tenures.
Sheriff John Green, the longest serving sheriff in Philadelphia history (1988-2010) was sentenced to five years in prison after pleading guilty to receiving more than $675,000 in bribes "in exchange for giving $35 1000000 in no-bid work to a man of affairs who became the office's biggest vendor."
Sheriff Greenish was so replaced by longtime aide Barbara Deeley, who served every bit 1 of the regime's star witnesses confronting him with a grant of amnesty from prosecution. Sheriff Deeley served briefly until 2011, when the vacant seat was won by former State Representative Jewell Williams. Sheriff Williams was accused by a number of employees of sexual harassment, intimidation and retaliation, with at to the lowest degree vi carve up lawsuits filed by former employees since 2017.
Let'due south make integrity our boulder principle and enshrine the Office of the Inspector Full general permanently in our Charter. The best time to practice it was 10 years ago; the second adjacent all-time time is now.
Voters ousted the scandal ridden Sheriff Williams and swept in current Sheriff Rochelle Bilal who campaigned on reforming the Sheriff's Office and "helping families stay in their homes." This reform agenda appealed deeply to voters tired of the seemingly weekly scandals and allegations of mismanagement to emerge from the Sheriff'south Office.
However, two years into her term, like her predecessor, Sheriff Bilal has found herself on the receiving end of three whistleblower lawsuits brought by former senior staffers "who say they lost their jobs in 2022 after exposing serious wrongdoing—including alleged financial impropriety and sexual harassment."
No-Bid, Bid4Asset Contract
The most contempo news story featuring the Sheriff's office involves an no-bid contract to a company called Bid4Assets (Ironic, right?). Council Bulk Leader Cherelle Parker and City Quango defenseless wind of the program to restart and move sheriff's sales online and immediately introduced a resolution authorizing hearings on the decision. In an op-ed she authored following the marathon public hearing, the Councilperson lays out her concerns for the virtual switch:
During the hearing, it became articulate that online auctions may have a substantially negative issue on the Philadelphia housing marketplace past opening our city to bulk buyers and speculators anywhere in the earth ( speculators who are notorious for non paying property taxes ), assuasive them to purchase backdrop without ever stepping foot within metropolis limits.
It also became clear that Bid4Assets, the company tasked with managing these sales, will exist collecting upwardly to a 10% premium on all sales in Philadelphia, while the charge per unit in neighboring Bucks County is only 1.5%—a contract so lucrative for Bid4Assets that WHYY called it a " windfall for the private company ."
Making an already problematic contract even more problematic was the fact that the Law Department never signed off on the contract, an apparent violation of the Habitation Rule Charter.
Now, the City is left scrambling to effigy out next steps. As reported by WHYY:
What should happen next isn't totally articulate, according to sources involved in metropolis discussions. Invalid contracts would demand to exist amended or possibly voided and reissued, but more than complicated is the status of hundreds backdrop sold at sale under the terms of a voided contract.
Where do we go from here?
In light of the recent controversy, a number of groups have renewed calls to eliminate the row office and fold its functions into other departments. There is precedent for such activity. In 2010, Mayor Michael Nutter signed legislation passed by City Council and approved past voters that abolished the Clerk of Quarter Sessions "which was responsible for maintaining courtroom records, staffing courtrooms, and collecting bail coin and fines in criminal cases." In fact, the Lease is littered with abolished elected positions, including the Coroner and Recorder of Deeds.
The City's Inspector Full general is charged with rooting out fraud and abuse from Urban center ranks. It is an function that has paid for itself multiple times over, saving taxpayers an estimated $ninety+ meg dollars over the last decade and resulting in the arrest or indictment of near 100 city employees on corruption, fraud or theft charges.
What fabricated the abolishment of the Clerk of Quarter Sessions politically possible was a scathing audit regarding the mismanagement of funds, coupled with the approaching retirement of a long-serving official, for an office that most people had never heard of. In other words, the planets were aligned. Barring a major public outcry, information technology is a scenario unlikely to play out again with this row office at this time. Procurement just isn't sexy.
However, the solution to ensuring an efficient and ethically run Sheriff's Part doesn't crave abolishing it. Rather than improve the Charter to eliminate an office, an alternative solution would be adding an office to its rank—that of the Inspector General.
Inspector general
The City's Inspector General is charged with rooting out fraud and corruption from City ranks. It is an function that has paid for itself multiple times over, saving taxpayers an estimated $90+ meg dollars over the last decade and resulting in the arrest or indictment of almost 100 metropolis employees on abuse, fraud or theft charges.
Unfortunately, the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) exists only at the pleasance of the mayor. The role was created through a Mayoral Executive Order and can get away with the stroke of a pen. This also means that the Inspector General simply has jurisdiction over the departments and agencies that fall nether the Executive Branch. The sheriff, as well every bit all other independently-elected offices, are not subject area to the investigatory jurisdiction of the OIG.
Past calls have been made to make the OIG permanent and aggrandize its jurisdiction to comprehend all government agencies. Only without the political will, there hasn't been a way.
The calls for Sheriff's Role reform aren't just about improving the city bureaucracy of more efficiently shuffling papers from i pile to another. It'southward about ensuring that the people who are unfortunate enough to find their names on the sheriff'south list aren't preyed upon by exterior speculators eager to plough a quick cadet. It'southward about ensuring that those people get every single cent that is coming to them from their auction, rather than unnecessarily enriching an out of state company at their expense. Information technology's well-nigh making sure that people have protections from a system when they are at their most financially and emotionally vulnerable. It's about keeping people in their homes when possible and otherwise ensuring a fair and thoughtful system of collections when not.
With that, I'll leave yous with the words of onetime Inspector General Amy Kurland, a woman I worked alongside while in the Nutter Administration and someone who I securely admire:
But integrity is non like picking upwardly trash or filling a pothole. It is more elusive and has to influence everything we practise. We must be vigilant every day and continue to reinforce the message that integrity is our bedrock principle. Nosotros must constantly remind ourselves and our colleagues that working in public service isn't merely nigh earning our paychecks; because we work for the public, we also must earn the public'south trust by doing our jobs the right way—openly and honestly.
Allow's make integrity our boulder principle and enshrine the Office of the Inspector General permanently in our Charter. The all-time time to do it was 10 years agone; the second next best fourth dimension is at present.
Lauren Vidas is an election law attorney and government relations professional in Philadelphia where she has spent over a decade working in and around urban center regime. Follow her on Twitter or sign-upward for her newsletter to stay on acme of the workings of City Hall.
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Source: https://thephiladelphiacitizen.org/sheriffs-office-solution/
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