In order to facilitate the necessary cuts to balance the Saint Joseph County budget, I recommend the following:
▪ Cut all Judges salaries.
▪ Utilize less expensive alternatives to incarceration, with a particular focus on ankle bracelet monitoring and community service.
▪ Reevaluate duplication of service programs such as the Right of Passage program that should be utilized as an substitute for jail time, but is misused as some form of counseling service that parents of confined youth must participate in, not once, but twice.
▪ Reassess Judge Nemeth’s educational program to ensure that it is cost effective and provides juveniles with an adequate education.
Judge Nemeth’s judicial order to raise “probation user fees” will simply add more stress to already troubled families.
If Judge Nemeth truly cares about the youth of Saint Joseph County, he should demonstrate his concern by making his expenditures and the way he conducts his business transparent so that the common council and the public at large could see how he manages his office.
