The Hays County commissioners were set to receive an update on the status of the county's public defender's office Oct. 25, five months after selecting Neighborhood Defender Service, Inc. to take on that challenge. However, there was not much of an update at the meeting that drew several community members who spoke in favor of the public defender's office and asked why there has not been much progress.

"I really thought that representatives from NDS, and the county court of law and district judges would be here. Apparently, they are not able to make it," Commissioner Debbie Ingalsbe said.

However, she said the county court of law and some district judges have been working with NDS to have the contract finalized.

The public defender's office has been a long, uphill battle to tackle the rising inmate population in county jail. Over the past several months, the commissioners have approved contracts and agreements with counties throughout Texas to help house inmates Hays County does not have room for.

The commissioners have approved other systems this year to help with the inmate population, such as GPS ankle monitors.

"As of last week, there are more than 600 people in Hays County Jail, 83% of whom are there pretrial. That's nearly 500 people," said Sarah Minion, outreach associate for the Vera Institute of Justice. "I'm just here today to support the passing of the public defender's office contract, moving that forward with all due expediency."

The county has worked with the Vera Institute of Justice to create a data dashboard for the inmate population.

Mark Kennedy, from the county's office of general counsel, said NDS has already begun conducting interviews for potential candidates. However, there are still bumps that need to be smoothed out, such as the public defender's office integration into the courts and the utilization of Texas Code Criminal Procedure, article 16.22. Code 16.22 is the identification of a defendant that may have a suspected mental illness or intellectual disability.

"The 16.22 is just an idea of how to trigger the appointment. The reason that that was selected as a potential trigger is because NDS planned to have about half of its cases be mental health-related cases and the other half being just general appointments," Kennedy said.

The most recent draft of the contract was submitted to the general counsel's office recently, and edits will be provided to NDS soon, Kennedy added.

"It sounds to me it's not a commissioners court hold up," Judge Ruben Becerra said.

The contract is set to be voted on at the Nov. 22 meeting.