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AUGUSTA — The Legislature’s Judiciary Committee on Monday began considering a two-pronged proposal to revise Maine’s bail code and to give judges discretion on whether to impose some criminal fines that are now mandatory.

Among the proposed bail code changes is one that would require the state – rather than criminal defendants – to pay the fees of bail commissioners, which would cost taxpayers an estimated $1.6 million per year.

The second prong of the proposal would allow judges to decide whether to impose criminal fines that are currently mandatory in three kinds of cases – simple assaults (not including domestic cases), drug offenses and operating a motor vehicle after the driver’s license has been suspended.

The premise for the changes started more than a year ago when Chief Justice Leigh Saufley, head of the state’s court system, said in her annual address to the Legislature that too many people are being jailed in Maine while cases against them are pending.

Saufley, in conjunction with Gov. Paul LePage and legislative leaders, later formed a task force of 36 people to study that problem. The task force included judges, prosecutors, legislators and members of the Maine Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and the American Civil Liberties Union of Maine.

Sen. David Burns, a Whiting Republican and co-chairman of the Judiciary Committee, served on the task force and introduced the changes in a bill now before the panel.

Judiciary Committee members Monday first heard public comments on the proposal and then debated the bill, L.D. 1639, late into the afternoon. The committee is scheduled to resume deliberations Tuesday on whether to recommend passage of the bill.

Superior Court Justice Robert Mullen, who headed the task force, testified first at the public hearing, explaining the task force’s work and the proposed changes.

“We had everybody who had a dog in the fight,” Mullen said of the task force.

Having the state pay a bail commissioner’s fee rather than a defendant would ensure that no one would be jailed unnecessarily because he or she is too poor to pay the fee of up to $60, Mullen said.

But Mullen acknowledged that the annual cost of $1.6 million to taxpayers could be prohibitive.

“I think the big obstacle is the price tag,” Mullen said. “But in my mind, that doesn’t make it any less right.”

Other proposed bail code changes would require a judge, not a bail commissioner, to set bail release conditions prohibiting a defendant from possessing alcohol or drugs and for there to be some reason for the prohibition. Another change would require police to have some cause to search a defendant on bail for drugs, alcohol, firearms or other weapons.

On mandatory fines, Mullen said he expects that judges would waive fines only in exceptional cases.

“Some people are just slacking or just not paying, and that’s the type of person I would not think twice in imposing the maximum fine,” Mullen said. “But some people are just having a difficult time for a variety of reasons in paying those fines, and I am just throwing more dirt into this hole that the person’s at the bottom of.”

Attorney General Janet Mills, who also served on the task force, spoke in support of the proposed changes and focused most of her comments on allowing judicial discretion on mandatory fines.

“This is a small safety valve,” Mills said. “This is not a complete revision of mandatory sentencing.”

Mills added that Cumberland County District Attorney Stephanie Anderson, who was unavailable to testify, also served on the task force and voted in favor of granting judges discretion on fines.

Other speakers in support of the changes were Alison Beyea, executive director of the ACLU of Maine; John Pelletier, chairman of the state’s Criminal Law Advisory Commission; and Jamesa Drake, a board member of the Maine Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.

Avery Day, LePage’s chief legal counsel, spoke in support of the bill in general but expressed concern about waiving mandatory fines and the cost of paying bail commissioners’ fees.

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No one spoke in opposition to the bill, but Aroostook County District Attorney Todd Collins wrote a letter of opposition to the committee with a line-by-line analysis of the bill.

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