September 2022, Ryan Aduddell, 2nd VP, Security
Protecting and Serving
Our Security Team:
The first week of September we saw just how good our Sheriff’s Deputies really are at their role in our community. My wife received a call from a friend who had just stopped and talked to a young boy who was standing in the rain with a bag. The bag contained some clothes and food, and he was running away from home. She moved her car to a spot where she could watch him, and I immediately contacted our Sheriff’s Deputies through our secure chat. S.D. Philipbar (pictured above) immediately matched him to the description they were given just a few minutes before from the parents. Within minutes she arrived and secured the child to return him home safely. That’s what it is all about folks, protecting and savings lives. I would like to commend the resident that reported this right away as well and kept an eye on the boy, potentially keeping him from harm.
Yes, we want our S.D.s to patrol the streets for speeding, running stops signs, and all the annoying things we deal with each day. But I think we can all agree that with limited resources it is more important to protect lives, prevent harm to residents, and to keep our properties secure. In the last few months, we have seen a decrease in theft, vandalism, and domestic disturbances. Our deputies have worked with several families that have at risk adults and children to get them the resources they need to live healthier and safer lives. Those things have a huge impact on the quality of life for those families and their neighbors.
While we continue to push the county to police their roads with-in our neighborhood and the major thoroughfares they developed, it is not possible for our officers to be everywhere at once. Our roads are still part of the district policing that is a responsibility of the HCSO as a whole, not just those on our contract. I want to encourage you to call and report violations that you see. Social Media is not a sufficient method of communication to our law enforcement. Shaming people on social media will likely cause worse behavior that could cause the person posting to be targeted for harm. Please call 911 about dangerous situations and report the plate and description. Please call the non-emergency line (713-221-6000) for those nesciences like illegally parked vehicles. We had a member at our meeting on the 6th tell me about an illegally parked vehicle. I asked him to provide a picture and address as a witness to this happening. The vehicle was stickered the same day and will be towed if not removed by the owner in 3 days.
The Security Contract:
Jay Jackson presented the security contract from the commissioners court at our meeting on the 6th. The contract has increased with inflation by $800 a month for three deputies to be in our neighborhood. Jay and I evaluated the option of changing to the Constables for our contract, being that the third option of no contract is not reasonable at this time. After finding that service have degraded further from the Constables office when consulting with other HOAs, and the Constables self-reporting to the Texas State Comptroller, Glenn Hegar, that they have been defunded and are short over 2,000 Constables. We recommended that we continue our contract with the HCSO and the board voted as such.
Texas State Comptroller, Glenn Hegar, released findings that Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo has moved to divert funds from the Constables to other agendas. Our crime rates in Harris County are now documented to be worse than that of Chicago, IL. Just 10 years ago we had less than 50 violent felons released on bond in our county and now that numbers is reported to be over 400. Here is a copy of the letter drafted by Glenn Hegar:
I sincerely hope that policy changes are made as soon as possible with the current elected officials or future elected officials to return more peace and safety to our communities. Please vote your conscience in the upcoming local elections and consider your choice carefully so that policies will change no matter who is elected.
National Night Out is coming up October 4th!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
“National Night Out is an annual community-building campaign that promotes police-community partnerships and neighborhood camaraderie to make our neighborhoods safer, more caring places to live. National Night Out enhances the relationship between neighbors and law enforcement while bringing back a true sense of community. Furthermore, it provides a great opportunity to bring police and neighbors together under positive circumstances.”
This year we would like everyone to coordinate a National Night out block party with their neighbors and friends. Please comment below the location of your party so that others can swing by and meet you. We will provide the address to our S.D.s so that they can swing by and say hello!
Traffic Lights Project:
Due to the jerrymandering of precincts in our area, our precinct has changed to PCT 3. Our project was being designed and vetted by PCT 4 and was going to be added to list of project beginning in October. I was in direct contact with the contracted engineering firm and precinct 4 project managers as things were moving forward in May. Our project has now been placed on hold as other projects had already been slated to begin and the docket of projects increased dramatically because of the lines drawn to change the precinct demographics and voting blocks. I am working to get our project back on the list and could use your help. Please click on this link below and fill out a traffic or safety concern asking for traffic signals on Champion Forest Drive. In the description please make a comment asking for the signals to be installed for the safety of all pedestrians and drivers, and elaborate on your concerns that the project was stopped. I hope we can help move the needle to getting this project back on track:
https://webapps2.harriscountytx.gov/servicerequestform/pct-form?pct3=
Regarding the Glenn Hegar statement, it has been my observation that those representing the city of Austin have always been antagonistic towards Judge Hidalgo from the very first day she was in office. This has always been a puzzlement to me.
Here is a good response from another resident in the neighborhood. The county shows that 3M was not allowed to be rolled over but our area had a 7% increase in budget.
https://www.texastribune.org/2022/08/23/texas-harris-county-constables-budget-hegar/?fbclid=IwAR1UYH2Okcihz7G-SD1qP0nWHfvEZdkfPQrgu5FGcYweI-3uC6D0puPlmRY
So is 7% not enough? What is wage inflation? What is operating cost inflation? Why are the constables understaffed by 2,000 officers? Why are our officers coming on shift to 50+ unanswered calls? Hopefully we get some answers…
I can’t believe you are actually in favor of traffic lights on Champion Forest Drive. It’s enough of a speedway now and will be much worse when drivers are speeding up to make the next green light. Not to mention that we will now have to sit and wait for a green light to pull out onto Champion Forest from the side streets. Also, traffic will increase with the installation of lights vs. stop signs.
This has been underway for years. The county has decided to move forward with this proposal after extensive engineering and safety studies. The County is moving forward at their own pace.
Thank you for your response, Kathy. We had many calls from the community for the county to make Champion Forest Drive safer. I contacted their office and asked them to do this. They are the ones that decide what is safe for their roads. I am not a traffic engineer or civil engineer, so I tend to trust them and their collective knowledge more than my own. At the end of the day, these are their roads and they told us that is the solution. We are just asking them to help solve our safety issues instead of putting it on the back burner for another 10 plus years.
Before you share partisan political attacks on our HOA blog a minimal amount of investigation should be done beforehand to ensure its accuracy and even then you should avoid it if it appears to be politically motivated, but that is just my opinion. I don’t think it would be good for this community if the board got the reputation of being a partisan political organization, but this is also just my opinion. On this topic, here is a yet another opposing opinion, this one provided by The Houston Chronicle: https://www.houstonchronicle.com/opinion/editorials/article/Editorial-Harris-County-defunding-police-17395642.php.
I appreciate your opinion and another article.
Statistics don’t care who is in office, they are what they are and right now they show that we have much higher crime in Harris County than in the past. The Constables may be politically motivated and the comptroller may be politically motivated, but we simply found this to be evidence that they are self-reporting they do not have the funds to do their jobs properly. We are in a politically charged environment with lots of mud slinging, but we still have to make a decision on what will keep our residents safe no matter what sign they put in their front yard.
So what are we to do? Believe them when they say that they don’t have the funds to do their jobs properly or stay with the department that has not stated this concern? Do we just sit on the sidelines because of political feelings or do we say “I don’t care who is in office, change your policies to make us safer”?
It is difficult sometimes to easily tell if someone is telling the truth or not, but sometime you can do some investigating and find an opposing view. Election season is not the time to be relying on partisan attacks as gospel, but that is just my opinion. It did not take me long to find articles challenging the truthfulness of the Comptroller’s statement and the bottom line is that this attack appears to be false. According to the Chronicle editorial board, “…each of the eight constable precincts saw budget increases from fiscal year 2021 to 2022 and will again under the proposed 2023 budget. Constable Mark Herman’s Precinct 4, for example, one of the two that complained to the governor, had a 2022 budget of nearly $59 million and a proposed 2023 budget of more than $66 million, according to numbers shared by the county. Constable Ted Heap’s Precinct 5, the other source of the complaint, meanwhile had budgets of nearly $45 million and more than $48 million, respectively.” Those increases in funding are now in jeopardy because of the Comptroller’s actions.
On the ballot I received in the mail, it said I could go to the Association website to get information on the candidates for Area 3 Director. I was unable to find anything on any of the 3 candidates. Could you please tell me how to obtain that information? Thank you.
Kathy, Thank you for your comment. I have submitted a post to include each of the candidates’ personal write-ups.
https://mnwhoa.org/meet-your-2023-board-member-candidates/