Judge John Peterson, the circuit court judge for the county, told the Astoria City Council on July 28 that changes in state law and public-defense capacity are reshaping who is held in custody and for how long. "I can't talk about any pending or active cases," Peterson said, adding that he could explain how the system now functions and where its bottlenecks are. "We have 3 judges. They're all on the bench pretty regularly," Peterson said, describing court staffing and workload.

Peterson and Sheriff Matt Phillips framed Senate Bill 48 — the state pretrial reform law — as a principal reason fewer people are held just to see a judge. "It really made the assumption that you're only gonna stay the night in jail to see a judge if you commit felonies or a person crime," Peterson said, summarizing the bill's shift toward release presumptions and the removal of mandatory minimum bail in many cases. He added that local judicial districts retain limited, offense-specific override criteria set under a chief justice order.

The judge also described the county's pretrial and deflection programs and their outcomes. "Our qualification rate for the program is 92 percent," Peterson said, comparing the county's rate favorably with the statewide average of 83 percent; he said 79 percent of those who qualified entered the program (statewide average 66 percent) and that 21 percent have completed the program while about half remain in it.

Phillips and Peterson said public-defense capacity had been a major bottleneck in prior years but has improved recently. Peterson said the backlog of unrepresented people had fallen from about 160 to a floating list of roughly 12–15 and that the county is "getting them lawyers in roughly 28" (days). He warned the improvement could reverse if filings increased sharply or provider contracts constrain capacity: "That capacity is controlled by contracts between our local providers and the state agency ... the Oregon Public Defense Commission."

The officials described other jail and treatment arrangements. The county's new jail has a stated capacity of 148 beds; Peterson said typical local custody runs 60–70 people and the county contracted to accept up to 12 sentenced people from Benton County at about $98 per bed per day plus medical costs. He also highlighted in-jail medication-assisted treatment and deflection programs: "We've done a really good job with that," Peterson said, noting an outside research interest from Oregon Health & Science University in the local program.

Peterson and Phillips also raised concerns about competency-restoration (aid-and-assist) delays and state hospital capacity. Peterson said federal and state timelines for restoration have tightened, while state hospital throughput has lagged: "One of the ways that they're trying to free up capacity is say, okay, they're not restored yet, but we think they're stable enough that they can get the rest of the way there," he said, adding that the state hospital is accepting a smaller share of referrals than previously.

Council members asked how often override criteria are used to detain people pending arraignment; Peterson said that while many low-level offenses are now typically released, some offenses (felonies, many domestic violence charges, certain person crimes) remain subject to hold-to-judge treatment and that local override lists must be offense-specific.

The council requested more data. Peterson said the court keeps detailed case and booking data and that his trial court administrator could provide numbers if given advance notice. He also invited councilors to the mental-health treatment court graduation on Aug. 8. "When they get through, it's pretty exciting," he said.

The briefing ended without any formal council action; councilors said they wanted additional data and follow-up meetings with the judge, sheriff and service providers to understand how local enforcement, treatment and prosecution decisions interact.

Ending: Councilors said they will ask staff to compile specific statistics Peterson described — including caseloads, booking-to-lawyer timelines, jail utilization and program outcomes — and to schedule additional sessions with the court, the sheriff's office and local service providers to inform any policy or ordinance decisions.