A $302,049 state grant will help Solano County Superior Court start a pretrial release program, Chris Hansen, chief of probation, said Tuesday.

The grant is from the Judicial Council of California and will be used for the new program put together by Solano County Probation Department and other partners, Hansen said.

“The goal of pretrial services is to allow defendants who are low risk to public safety to be released from custody without regard to their financial status, thereby reserving valuable bed space in the county jail for high-risk defendants,” Hansen said.

The program is part of the realignment program that is California’s response to a U.S. Supreme Court decision that the state’s overcrowded prisons were providing inadequate care to inmates.

Under prison realignment, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation has shifted to county agencies the custody, treatment and supervision of prisoners who have been convicted of certain non-serious crimes.

The Supreme Court decision came about in the 2011 in the Brown vs Plata case. By a 5-4 decision the court upheld a lower court’s order to drop the state prison population from 156,000 to 110,000 inmates.

Realignment, created by the state Legislature, became effective Oct. 1, 2011. Those considered not violent, not serious and not causing a convict to register as a sex offender were reassigned to local governments’ care. Each county fomed a community corrections partnership. Prisoners could finish their sentences in county jails, in local jails or under locally supervised probation or parole.

Even parole violations can be served in local jails.

Another goal, besides reducing the prison population, was to reduce recidivism.

Under pretrial services, Solano County and other counties would address a need mentioned in the 2011 Public Safety Realignment Report.

“Pretrial services will assist the county in addressing a need outlined in the 2011 Public Safety Realignment Report,” Hansen said. “Pretrial services provide the court with critical information at arraignment and focus on the defendant’s risk to commit new crimes.” They also address failure to appear in court.

The state grant will underwrite court staff time, training bus passes and drug testing for those participating in the program.

Judge Alesia Jones called the approach an “evidence-based tool prepared by Solano County Probation staff, intended to enhance the decision-making process of the judge at arraignment in order to maximize public safety.”

She said, “It has been a terrific learning experience to train with court staff, judges and probation officers throughout the state in implementing this new program. This is a collaborative effort of all of Solano County’s criminal justice partners.”

Pretrial release hearings currently are heard at 1:30 p.m. Thursdays and Fridays in Jones’s Department 22, 600 Union Ave., Fairfield. Once fully implemented, hearings will be conducted daily, Hansen said.

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