Board work session: county reviews pretrial monitoring as Close Street caseloads spike and sheriff proposes off-ramp

County leaders and justice-system partners held a work session to review how state, federal and other funding changes affect the county’s FY 2026 budget and to discuss the structure and performance of Multnomah County’s pretrial monitoring programs.

Sarah Mullen, executive director of the Local Public Safety Coordinating Council (LIPSC), and Multnomah County Chief Criminal Judge Michael Greenlick presented background and system findings. Mullen said the county now uses the Public Safety Assessment (PSA) for universal risk assessment, which increased the number of people identified for pretrial monitoring and changed how cases are routed between the Department of Community Justice’s Pretrial Services Program (PSP) and the sheriff’s Close Street program.

Mullen said the sheriff’s office caseload at Close Street has more than doubled since fall 2022, creating unmanageable workloads; she reported inconsistent data sharing between agencies and a lack of warm handoffs to services. The LIPSC pretrial subcommittee — composed of judges, public…