Governor Larry Hogan on Friday announced he is terminating state funding for the Criminal Justice Coordinating Council, a panel formed in 1999 to tackle issues affecting criminal justice in Baltimore, initially focusing on streamlining the processing of criminal cases by coordinating the efforts of criminal justice system participants. The Council is fully funded through a state grant of about $272,000.

In a letter to the council’s chairman, V. Glenn Fueston Jr., the governor’s designee on the CJCC, says “the inability to deliver solutions in support of the governor’s initiatives forces the termination of the CJCC’s grant.”

According to WBAL,

The letter states that the CJCC mission is not being carried out: “Its goals to reduce violent crime are not being met. Continuing to fund the CJCC is simply not a responsible use of taxpayer dollars.”

The letter states that the funding will instead go to the Mayor’s Office of Criminal Justice — an office, the letter stated, “we are confident will not seek to evade the responsibility of providing the timely and actionable strategies to appropriately respond to this critical issue.”

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