The city of Ferguson, Missouri, announced Monday that it was withdrawing thousands of arrest warrants for municipal violations and taking steps to prevent the incarceration of people who cannot pay fines and fees, a response to the sharp criticism of its court system that emerged after the killing of Michael Brown last year. The measures go beyond a state law set to take effect on Friday that limits the amount of money municipalities can keep from minor traffic offenses and imposes safeguards on the amount of time people can be locked up for failing to pay fines and fees. Several other municipalities in the region have announced similar warrant amnesties.“The hope is we can go through and have people come, get right, get rid of the excess fines and fees, and have people deal with the original issue that brought them before the law,” Mayor James Knowles III said.Yet court reform advocates, while applauding the measures as a step in the right direction, said the region’s municipal court system needed a complete overhaul. They questioned whether the changes announced Monday would withstand changing financial times and changing judges, and whether the new standards could be enforced.“Until we have full-time professional courts that don’t have conflicts of interest and can be meaningfully monitored, all of these municipalities are going to undo progress whenever they need the money,” said Brendan Roediger, a professor of law at St. Louis University School of Law.The changes, ordered by Judge Donald McCullin, who was appointed as Ferguson’s municipal judge in June, called for withdrawing all municipal warrants issued before Dec. 31, 2014. That should amount to nearly 10,000 warrants, the city said. It does not apply to state charges for more serious crimes.Defendants will get new court dates, according to the order, and may be put on installment plans to pay off their fines or ordered to perform community service instead. Some indigent persons could have their fines commuted, according to the order.Defendants who continually fail to show up for court may have new arrest warrants issued, the order said, or they may get a setoff on their tax returns. People who have had their licenses suspended solely because they failed to appear in court or pay a fine will have their licenses reinstated pending the disposition of their cases, the order said.These changes come as Ferguson, with about 21,000 residents, had already stopped assessing additional fees for people who failed to appear in court.“These changes should continue the process of restoring confidence in the court, alleviating fears of the consequences of appearing in court, and giving many residents a fresh start,” McCullin said in a statement.The courts in Ferguson and many of the neighboring municipalities in the northern part of St. Louis County received new scrutiny last year after Brown, an 18-year-old black man, was fatally shot by Darren Wilson, a white police officer. Although both local and federal prosecutors cleared Wilson of criminal wrongdoing, the killing spurred passionate debate over law enforcement’s treatment of blacks, many of whom say they have been unfairly stopped and harassed by the police.What emerged from the discussion was a portrait of a court system that jailed people for minor traffic violations, and then piled on fines and fees. Activists, residents and political leaders criticized these small towns as using their courts to fill city coffers.A report by the Department of Justice concluded that Ferguson’s court system routinely violated people’s constitutional rights and targeted blacks. The report led Ferguson to replace its city manager, municipal judge and police chief.State lawmakers responded by passing a law that, among other things, caps the amount of revenue cities can make from minor traffic offenses at 12.5 percent for those in St. Louis County and 20 percent in the rest of the state - down from 30 percent.Thomas Harvey, the executive director of ArchCity Defenders, called Ferguson’s changes “things that are going to make a huge difference in people’s lives,” but said the impact would be limited because courts in neighboring towns do not have to follow suit.“No one in this region lives their life fully in Ferguson,” Harvey said. “Ferguson can make these fixes, and they’re a great start. They’re almost all the way there. But in terms of the impact on poor people’s life in this region, it doesn’t change anything” unless other courts make the same changes. -2015 New York Times News Service..