By Kala Kachmar
Montgomery Advertiser
MONTGOMERY, Ala. — For the past several months, former inmate Robert Davis has worked hard to turn his life around.
Davis, a father of two from Decatur, has developed relationships with his family again, recovered from a drug addiction and learned how to control his anger.
Next month, he will be released from the Renascence program in Montgomery, a residential re-entry program he will finish his sentence in.
“(The program) refreshed my mind,” he said. “Things I already knew I shouldn’t do, I did them anyway.”
But Davis, 44, is one of the lucky ones. Not all Alabama’s inmates, probationers and parolees get the rehabilitative services they need.
Community supervision for offenders is one of three areas the Council of State Governments Justice Center is looking at with a panel of criminal justice stakeholders in Alabama, the Prison Reform Task Force. The goal is to determine what legislative and policy changes will help reduce recidivism, reduce prison overcrowding and improve public safety.
Andy Barbee, research manager for the CSG, said part of the problem is that there aren’t enough resources, but another part is that the existing resources aren’t always used as effectively as they could be.
Assessing the risk of an offender’s likelihood to commit another crime is supposed to help probation and parole officers triage offenders, manage their workloads and make sure the few resources available get to those who would benefit the most, Barbee said.
But during the CSG’s analysis of the criminal justice system, Barbee said a survey of probation and parole officers found that only about 24 percent placed “high value” on using these risk assessment tools.
Surveys of probation/parole officers and community corrections agents found that more than 70 percent in each group said mental health programs are sometimes available, rarely available or non-existent. Fewer than 26 percent in surveys of both groups felt they were usually or readily available.
Barbee said community correction programs, which are governed by the Alabama Department of Corrections but can be operated by a government entity, a nonprofit or an authority board, and the Alabama Board of Pardons and Parole “use” the tool, but aren’t always taking the information and using it to shape and guide the approach to matching inmates with services and programs.
Community corrections departments in the state perform assessments that determine whether an offender’s likelihood of committing another crime is low, moderate, high or very high based on factors such as a person’s financial situation, education and substance abuse problems, Brown said.
Community corrections programs vary from county to county, and not all counties have a program, Barbee said.
The CSG also found that participants in community corrections are generally low-risk offenders, even though it’s supposed to be a diversional program for high-risk offenders.
The key is that there needs to be a tighter connection between who is making it into community corrections and the kind of risk they present, as well as the programs matched with those on parole and probation.
“It’s not about the seriousness of the offense they committed,” Barbee said. “What risk means is what is the likelihood they’re going to continue committing crimes.”
Foster Cook, executive director of Treatment Alternatives for Safer Communities (TASC), which is Jefferson County’s community corrections program, said the essence of good programming has to do with good risk-needs assessments.
“Matching the level of supervision and the types of supervision with the needs of the offender is important,” Cook said. “One-size fits all doesn’t work.”
Cook also said the state struggles with transitioning people out of prison while ensuring there is adequate medical care, mental health care, planning and coordination of services between the institution and community supervision.
TASC is working closely with parole/probation and the ADOC on a strategic re-entry plan that will make transitions smoother and more effective, Cook said.
Barbee said Alabama’s system also lacks clear policies on targeting resources to the highest risk populations. The 200 to 1 caseload ratio between officers and inmates makes it difficult to ensure accountability.
He also said there isn’t a consistent, structured or timely approach across different counties for responding to supervision violations. About 43 percent of probationers in jail awaiting a violation hearing wait more than two weeks.
Paul Brown, executive director of the Montgomery County’s community corrections program, said it’s important to make sure offenders placed in programs get the frequency, duration and intensity they need.
“If you put a low-risk offender in a group of high- or moderate-risk offenders, he will start to socialize with that group of individuals,” Brown said. “The potential is there to do more harm than good, and you don’t want to waste your precious resources on those that truly don’t need it.”
Barbee said it’s not that tools aren’t available to assess offenders, but there’s evidence that there’s not a lot of quality or consistent “buy in.” He also said there’s a misperception that using these assessment tools to shape decisions comes at the cost of officer discretion.
Scarcity of programs
But Brown said another piece to the problem is that the services being offered through community corrections are the same services offenders compete for in diversion programs, drug courts and on probation or parole. He said availability of programs and services needs to be addressed across the system, both for inmates and offenders on community supervision.
The strength and success of programs and services for inmates also varies from county to county, Barbee said.
For example, Jefferson County’s community corrections program is one of the strongest in the state because it’s part of the University of Alabama at Birmingham and has several community partners. Rural counties have fewer offender programs than bigger cities such as Huntsville, Montgomery and Mobile.
Brown said part of the solution for rural parts of the state will likely be regionalizing services and distant learning technology that will give offenders the opportunity to engage in programs.
Alan Smith, executive director of Renascence Inc., said there is a shortage of programs in the state that give nonviolent offenders the guidance they need to re-emerge into society. Often, individuals who don’t have a stable home plan when they go up for parole will sit in jail until the end of their sentence, he said.
The Renascence program — which only houses about 12 offenders at a time — teaches inmates how to live healthy productive lives, both through mandatory programming and through the environment at the facility. Offenders can get there through community corrections, probation, parole or by being sentenced to a halfway house.
“It’s not just a place to lay your head,” Smith said. “We try to provide them with every step they need to be successful.”
The state has to invest more heavily in programs and services for offenders, Barbee said.
“Skimping on that part of the system forces you to spend a whole lot more money when you have large numbers of (offenders) failing in the community and ending up in the custodial part of the system,” Barbee said.
Low-risk offenders don’t usually need programming, Barbee said. Resources for the highest risk population is the most important, and the first step is to identify what exists and what there’s not enough of for those offenders.
After that, the state needs to step up and fill the gaps where they can, which would likely include putting out Requests for Proposals from organizations who provide services.
But Barbee said there has to be a continual assessment of what the population looks like in terms of risks.
“Lock them up and let them go does not work,” Smith said. “We’ve got to start treating these folks and the issues that caused them to have a problem.”
CSG research shows that with the right programs in place, 30 to 40 percent fewer people under community supervision will commit new crimes and go back into the system.
Data shows that 40 percent of all Alabama prison admissions in 2013 are violators of either probation or parole. Of the 8,313 total admitted that year, 39 percent had substance abuse problems, mental health needs or both, according to ADOC intake screening.
“When people come out of prison and they come back into communities without support, without jobs, without services — then they go right back to prison,” Cook said. “Efforts to get people out of prison are only as good as the ability to keep people out. The answer to that is what do they find when they come home.”
Impact of programs and services
After several months at Renascence, Davis — who had been in and out of prison for drug possession — slowly started piecing his life back together. He already has two job offers for when he’s released next month.
At first, Davis said he wasn’t looking forward to being at a halfway house. When you’re in prison, he said, it’s difficult to be at ease and focus on the things you want to change, even if you are in classes and treatment programs.
“As soon as you walk out (of the class), it’s back to reality. Back to prison life,” he said.
But he said after a week at Renascence, he dropped his shoulders and relaxed. He said he realized everyone in the house is respectful and treats each other like family. If there’s a problem, or if someone didn’t do their fair share of cleaning, they sit down at a designated meeting table and talk about it.
“You learn to man up,” he said. “It ain’t all about fun and games anymore. But you can still enjoy life.”
Over time, Davis said he built relationships with his family members again.
“My family missed me. It hurt me to go to prison, but like I said, it hurts them worse. My kids, sisters, brothers, nieces, nephews. I’ve got to stay right so, just in case they fall, I can pick them up just like they’ve done for me.”
Smith said the staff at Renascence helps offenders find jobs, find apartments and obtain things such as a driver’s license. They also offer support and advice for anyone who was previously in the program.
“The best approach to the criminal justice problem is a comprehensive approach and (one that) involves all the stakeholders at all levels of this continuum,” Brown said. “The resources need to be available to address the problem at whatever level the offender enters the system.”
Barbee said fully investing in resources for offenders will have a dramatic improvement on public safety and recidivism rates, which will naturally lower the prison population.
“In every way, if Alabama lets resources get in the way of this, what they’re doing is resigning themselves to some combination of a more expensive and dangerous situation,” Barbee said.
The state is already facing two class-action lawsuits; one filed by the Southern Poverty Law Center on the quality of medical care and another by the Equal Justice Initiative on the violence and mistreatment of inmates at St. Clair Correctional Facility. Both of these situations are caused in part by overcrowding.
“It seems inescapable that if something doesn’t change, the third shoe will drop,” Barbee said, adding that a refusal to put resources into these systems is a commitment to spending “vastly” more money at a later date or releasing a lot of inmates from prison that won’t really be controlled.
ABOUT THE SERIES
Oct. 12
Paroles: As Alabama prisons become the most overcrowded in the country, fewer inmates are being paroled
Oct. 19
Sentencing: Alabama has reformed its sentencing guidelines, but has more to do if there is to be a noticeable effect on prison overcrowding
today
Supervision: Insufficient and insufficiently staffed community correction and probation programs are one reason officials are hesitant to release inmates.
Criminal justice breakdown
(as of June 30, 2014)
• Inmates in custody: 26,265
• Felony probation: 44,854
• Parole: 8,391
• Community corrections: 3,673
NOTE: Data on how many are on pre-trial diversion or in specialty courts (drug, mental health, veteran) was not available.
Source: Council of State Governments Justice Center and Alabama Department of Corrections monthly statistical report
Community supervision facts
• 67 percent of people in the criminal justice system are being supervised in the community
• The average length of supervision for probation is 36 months, 18 months for community corrections programs and 42 months for parole
• Community corrections minimum standards do not direct programs to differentiate supervision and treatment based on assessment of risk and needSource: Council of State Governments Justice Center