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EL CENTRO 性视界传媒� A few days ago, Imperial County District Attorney George Marquez met with members of the Imperial Valley Regional Chamber of Commerce.

The meeting served the county officials to listen to concerns from the business community.

Once the meeting was over, the District Attorney interviewed with the Imperial Valley Press. Here性视界传媒檚 the full content of that interview.

Question: Maybe not a lot of people know that you were elected for 6 years for office性视界传媒�

Answer: 性视界传媒淵eah. They did 性视界传媒� Basically to align it with the presidential campaign. Mine and the sheriff's office election (were) for 6 years. It's a 6-year term.性视界传媒�

Q: Was it by state law?

A: 性视界传媒淚t was mandated by the state.性视界传媒�

Q: Do you have any plans for these 6 years?

A: 性视界传媒淲ell, we have a lot of plans, and we've already been here 18 months. So, right now we're working on several different types of initiatives. We've implemented technology into the office, and we've increased personnel. We're doing a violent crimes task force that's starting out right now.

性视界传媒淲e're going after sex offenders. We're constantly pushing the envelope here and we're doing several different things. Doing more community outreach as well, which is very important 性视界传媒� Being more aggressive with Fentanyl.

性视界传媒淪o for the 6 years, it's just basically going to be continuously improving the office. We've improved it with technology. We're running out of space. Here is what I'm finding out because I'm almost fully staffed. When I first was elected, we had 9 prosecutors, and now we have 18. We've increased it by double. We're doing more trials. We're running out of space, so I might need more space and that's something that I hope in the next 6 years I can resolve. And, yeah, maintaining that office, maintaining our personnel level up, and continuously finding ways of protecting the community.性视界传媒�

Q: One of the main issues that were constantly raised before you came to the office was the morale within the agency and within the department. How have you improved this issue?

A: 性视界传媒淚 think anytime when you come into an agency as a new department, there's always going to be challenges. So, one of the things that you can measure the morale is by looking at the turnover. When I came in, for example, there were 9 prosecutors, and there was a lot of turnover. Now you're going to lose some people because they simply don't live here for where they have a better opportunity, but then you do have some drop off because of morale issues. And I like to say that since I've been here, we haven't lost any prosecutors for that reason. We lost a couple for other reasons that have nothing to do with that. So I think I'm a DA who's always present.

性视界传媒淚 come into and I speak to my employees. I asked them how their day was going. I think that's important that they can see me in the office. They see me working. I made it clear to them that they could all come to me and talk to me, which is something very important because I need them to feel like that open line of communication. I think that's the most important thing. Just make them feel like you're here.

性视界传媒淚'm not better than anyone here. I'm the DA, and I'm the one who runs the office, but in a very human sense, we're all the same. It's my responsibility to run the office, but I treat people with respect and dignity.性视界传媒�

Q: Budget is always a challenge, right?

A: 性视界传媒淭he budget is always a challenge. There (are) so many things I want to do. I've just hired 2 prosecutors. They just started last week, I just swore them in. And from both of them, I had to make sure the pay was enough to get them here. I talked to human resources, talked to the CEO's office, and the board of supervisors, and they helped me make it happen. I think when they see you do something, they help you. One of the prosecutors actually had told me 性视界传媒業'm no longer interested性视界传媒� and I told him, 性视界传媒榃ait a second. Give me a chance to explain what I can do for you. You're going to have a great experience here. I'm going to give you a competitive pay, and let me go have lunch with you.性视界传媒� I met with him in San Diego. I had lunch with him for a couple of hours. At the end of lunch, she says, 性视界传媒業 want to work for you.性视界传媒�

性视界传媒淲hen they see you性视界传媒檙e being aggressive like that and going after people, they help you. And I've seen that.

性视界传媒淚 wish I could have a full-time public information officer. As you know in this day and age a lot of people put stuff on the Internet or put stuff on social media. And so we have to fight as well because our image as an office is important. We do jury trials. When we do jury trials, we want people to know that, 性视界传媒楬ey, these are good people.性视界传媒� These are hardworking people who are fighting for the community. It's not just stuff on social media. So it's important that we put our narrative as to what's going on out there as well.性视界传媒�

Q: You were commenting a few minutes ago that every case is different性视界传媒�.

A: 性视界传媒淵es.性视界传媒�

Q: Are there any challenges in terms of prosecuting criminals?

A: 性视界传媒淓ach case is different. Some cases are more difficult than others. I mean, some cases are very complex. You have sex cases that are very complex. You have murder cases that are very complex. Heck, you have DUI cases that are complex. So there's always challenging. Some cases are better than others.

性视界传媒淭he important thing is to get your prosecutors to a point where they can make good decisions. That's an important point. They can look at a case and say, 性视界传媒榊ou know what? This case is strong,性视界传媒� or they can say 性视界传媒楾his case needs more investigation or it's weak for this reason. And that takes time. It takes them a few years to develop that. But, yeah, we have a lot of difficult cases. But I do want to tell you something 性视界传媒� if you read some of our press releases, we're doing trials. And the fact that we're doing trials, that my prosecutors are doing trials, is a sign of a healthy DA's office because it means they're fighting the fight. And it means they're not backing down. So that's something important to me. I want them to make sure they go to trial in cases because they're getting better and the defense knows that they're not going to walk all over my prosecutors.性视界传媒�

Q: During your conversation with the Chamber of Commerce you were speaking about vandalism and how it affects a lot of companies here, businesses. Is this a main challenge in terms of prosecuting?

A: 性视界传媒淲e did a survey with the chamber and one of the biggest concerns for business owners was vandalism. 70% of the people who responded and business owners said they have a problem with vandalism. That's high, and I'm assuming that problem is throughout the county.

性视界传媒淭he other thing is 52% they have a problem with theft. So what those numbers allow us to do is that we're now going to be able to focus on vandalism. We're holding people who commit vandalism accountable. I think the most important thing is those types of crimes go to repeat offenders. Those are relatively minor crimes. They go to repeat offenders, but people who commit repeat crimes need to be held accountable at some point because they're hurting our businesses 性视界传媒� they're hurting our communities. My dad was a small business owner so I know firsthand what it's like and also the graffiti. Who likes seeing graffiti? It's just such a horrible look for our community.

性视界传媒淪o, yeah, we can focus on those cases.性视界传媒�

Q: In order to prosecute criminals or, misdemeanors or violators, you need a lot of coordination with local law enforcement, right?

A: 性视界传媒淵es, absolutely. So one of the important things for me when I came in the office was building the relationship with this office and law enforcement. And I think we've been able to do that. I have a good working relationship with our police chiefs. I have a great working relationship with the sheriff and we did a program we called the Prosecution Immersion Program. So what that did is I put prosecutors in each police station. I did that for a couple of reasons: 1, to build a relationship with the police and our prosecutors, and secondly, to give them an open line of communication with our office. So those police (officers) now have a strong relationship with my prosecutor.

性视界传媒淭hey call them on their cell phones and they ask them legal questions. 性视界传媒楬ey. Do we have enough to get a search warrant? Can you review this search warrant? Can you look in your system and see if this guy is on probation?性视界传媒� Things like that. It's really helped the law enforcement efforts throughout the county. Just building little things like that that build on a relationship with law enforcement really makes a difference.

Q: And at the same time, I think that increases public safety.

A: 性视界传媒淎bsolutely. So, right now, we're focusing on repeat offenders. We're doing that through our computer, through our database. We're going to tag certain people who continuously commit crimes and we're going to go after them more aggressively. We also have a retail theft initiative. We're starting that one store in Walmart in Calexico and that's going to be in the upcoming months. So they're going to be able to file cases directly to our office. So their police (officers) on small cases where there's no violence they don't have to respond to those. They're going to send them directly to us.

性视界传媒淚f we have everything we need to prosecute the case the police doesn't have to get involved and they can focus on just keeping the community safe and not having to respond to those cases. We're doing things, for example, people who are not registering as sex offenders. I have my investigators investigating those cases, going on knocking on doors, making sure that those people are registering because of our kids. We got to protect our kids.

性视界传媒淭here are a lot of things that we're doing in this office. I'm very proud of the work we're doing, but I got to tell you it's not just me. I'm just a guy here. It's these people here. My prosecutors, these guys are smarter than I am. I'm just a guy here that's kind of steering the ship. But I have some really wonderful people working for me and I really care about them.性视界传媒�

Q: Any other programs or initiatives you're working on?

A: 性视界传媒淲e have, for example, a gun violence reduction initiative that's going to take guns away from people who have mental health issues, domestic violence convictions, felons. We just got a grant with that in conjunction with the court. It's going to fund one prosecutor, it's going to fund an investigator and a legal office assistant. It's a huge grant because it brings money into our department. So we have to rely less on the board of supervisors.

性视界传媒淲e got a grant form from the state of California, the Department of Transportation Safety to prosecute DUI crimes. Not just DUIs, basically traffic crimes, but there are a lot of deaths as a result of DUIs. So we have one prosecutor dedicated to that as well, and we got another grant just recently for domestic violence. And so I have one person who's looking for grants (to) try to bring money in so we can launch these initiatives to keep the community safe.

性视界传媒淒omestic violence is very important for this office, obviously, because we know there's a correlation between homicide rates and domestic violence. A lot of times, domestic violence can start off with arguments or they can start off with when they go and start grabbing a neck, a woman's neck, that's a horrible sign because a lot of those cases later on escalate to homicide. Domestic violence is critical to this violence, and I'm dedicated to trying to hold people who commit those crimes accountable.性视界传媒�

Q: You had a meeting today with the Imperial Valley Regional Chamber of Commerce. Are you reaching out to other organizations around the valley?

A: 性视界传媒淥ne of the things that is important for the DA's office is having an open line of communication. A lot of times, if I go somewhere and I talk to people because I try to be out in the community and they tell me things. But when I can talk to organizations like this they can tell me about some of their concerns and things that are happening and then they, for example, one of them asked me to go speak at another organization. It's an open line of communication that I want to have with the community. I want to know what's going on and the only way I'm going to do that is by talking to people. That's the only way.

性视界传媒淎nd so by talking to them, by reaching out, now I know there's a problem with the vandalism of business owners. So now I can try to work on addressing that problem. Thefts, I know there's a big problem with that, so we're already working on that. This is just the first of many. This is something that's going to be continuous.