Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz wants to replace or drastically reduce the Assigned Counsel Program with either a government-run public defender’s office or an expansion of the Legal Aid Bureau of Buffalo.
He thinks it will save money. Or if he doesn’t really think it, he says it anyway. Perhaps he really doesn’t know, because after all, he has published no studies.
The comparison he makes – that of the model of nearby Monroe County – he makes without factual accuracy, along the lines of omitting half the truth or comparing the eating apples to onions and imagining no one will notice that what he says stinks…