Austin officers will soon have more discretion to cite people rather than arrest them for certain misdemeanor offenses after police and activists made recommendations to reform the cite-and-release policy.

The Austin City Council requested in June that city staff form the committee after Council Member Greg Casar urged police to address racial disparities in arrests. Austin Police Chief Brian Manley approved the changes earlier this month, and they take effect Nov. 1.

“Arrests come with a lot of unintended consequences sometimes,” Austin Assistant Police Chief Troy Gay told the American-Statesman on Wednesday. “Individuals could potentially lose their jobs during the time they'll spend in jail.”

In those cases, Gay and other experts have said, those people can lose the ability to pay court fines and rack up failure-to-pay fines, which can lead to a vicious cycle of arrest warrants.

The Austin Police Department changes are twofold: Police officials shortened the list of factors that disqualify someone to be eligible for a citation, and made a few crimes eligible for a possible cite-and-release response rather than arrest. People accused of possession of the synthetic drug K2, certain types of driving with an invalid license offenses and certain graffiti crimes are now eligible to be ticketed rather than arrested.

State law allows for all these changes, Gay said.

Additionally, officers now have more discretion to ticket people for other misdemeanor crimes like possession of marijuana. In the previous policy, certain subjective factors previously disqualified people from being cited rather than arrested, such as if "the officer has reason to suspect the subject is involved in a more serious offense" or "there is reason to believe the subject would not appear at the time and place specified in the citation." Those parts of the policy are now gone.

The policy also gives officers more discretion to cite someone who doesn't have a valid ID if the officer can verify an individual's identity through other means, such as looking up a prior jail booking photo.

Chris Harris, an Austin activist with the civil rights group Grassroots Leadership who served on the committee, said he believes giving officers more discretion to cite rather than arrest people accused of driving with an invalid license will do the most good. In those cases, he said, an arrest's impact is more onerous because it also requires police to impound the person's car.

"The vast majority of license suspensions are on the basis of failure to pay different types of fines and fees. ... That has little to nothing to do with driving and just has to do with your inability to pay," Harris said. "In a state without a lot of public transportation options, the only way they can pay is by driving to work. If police take their car away, they have made it completely impossible to pay those mountain of fees and to get their license back."

Despite changes to the cite-and-release policy, Harris said he would have preferred that police never arrest people for driving with an invalid license.

Ken Casaday, president of the Austin police union, said the union supports additional officer discretion, but not increased leniency for people whose licenses have been suspended.

"What we’ve been taught to do is write them a ticket, close your eyes and look the other direction so you don’t see them drive off," Casaday said. "I think that’s ridiculous, especially if you can’t take responsibility and pay your fines or if your license has been suspended for (drunken) driving. Driving is a privilege given to you by the state of Texas, and it’s not a right."

Harris countered that placing breathalyzers into cars can keep repeat DWI offenders off the road. Travis County judges often implement such a requirement in bail or probation instructions.

Casaday has previously been critical of the Austin City Council when members pushed for these policy changes. He appeared on the "Fox & Friends" TV show in June and accused the council of "grandstanding" and "race-baiting" when Casar urged police to address racial disparities in arrests. Officers have no control over who has a suspended license and who doesn't, Casaday said last summer, and Austin police ought to arrest people who are breaking the law.



"Sometimes policies are made that I like, and sometimes polices are made that I don’t like," he told the American-Statesman on Thursday. "There was a lot of thought put into this by the administration and the community. If it doesn’t work or if we have problems, then maybe we need to rehash and look at changing it back to the way it was."