Judiciary Committee - Senate and House
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- October 2, 2026
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
0:17
we're gonna call this meeting to order we like to start the day off
in prayer so if you'll stand I have askedpresentative John Eubanks to lead us in prayer this
Representative Jon S. Eubanks
Unverified
0:32
morning. Please fire with me in prayer dear heavenly Father, we're thankful for this day and we're thankful for all the blessings that thou hast bestowed upon us, even the blessing of life. Father, we're thankful for those that are intendance today that have concerns for the well-being of
thy children. Father we ask that thou will bless the proceedings here that the things that we hear and learn will be able to help us to administer the affairs of this state and be able to help those that are in need of our help. Father, we're we're thankful for thy sonn Jesus Christ and we ask that all these things in the name of hysonn Jesus Christ. Amen. thank
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
1:15
you all for being here let me go over the ground rules real quick you can see that
we've got a lot of people on the agenda the subject today is how do we reduce the number of prison beds we need we will stay on that subject we've got a lot to do between now and December I have stayed purposefully ignorant on the subject becau so that I do not have an agenda this we are gathering information so
that the legislature will feel comfortable hopefully come session to act whatever direction that may go and like I said I do not have any preferences I'm not trying to lead you in any direction just to gather facts so that we have some ideas what we can do the if you get off that subject whether you're a presenter or whether you're a legislator I'm going to reign you in because we will have other meetings where we can discuss other things the things that you
may want to discuss we will get to but today is about how do we reduce the number of prison beds because we have some I think a lot of these presentations will be joined together but because we have so many people we will be breaking for lunch because we have so many people I will be limiting time the chair will be limiting time whether we've got all of our questions asked or not so let me tell you first if you're here and you're a nonmember you are welcome always in my committees to ask
questions but you will be at the end of the line behind members so know that so we don't get to somebody it will be you so just be offended now and I'll apologize now the same goes for members if we have get in the queue early I'm one of the worst about waiting and getting left out so get in the queue early because there'll be a time where we may just call time and move on regardless of how important the subject or the those the questions being asked
the also if you have asked lots of questions I'll be as fair as I can if you have asked lots of questions during the day even though you may cuue in first and somebody else who has not asked any questions cu's in they'll go to the top of the list so that we'll try to be fair and balanced and and get people in as much as we can we just got a lot to cover between now and January and so we have everyone who was asked let me be clear about this when I
said I don't have an agenda everyone who was asked to
present today is on this list we will have more in October that we couldn't get
to today or couldn't make it today and so I not gonna tell you how great their ideas are or not that will be for us to determine as we go forward I think we will hear a lot of good things though I know that we will and so we are going to go to uhpresentativedalby do you have any comments
Representative Carol Dalby
Unverified
4:32
only to say I want to thank you Senator Clark for bringing these issues before the committees
and I'm looking forward to the discussion today and real appreciate you kind of driving this
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
4:44
bus as we go forward thank you the we're gonna go tob consideration to approve the August 2fith meetings we are going to skip over this we're going to approve these minutes next month and so if we're gonna move right to see and
the discussion of how to reduce the number of prison beds I may not stay in the order that you we have here but I am gonna start out at the top and we I will be asking multiple people if we have room to come up if they're appear to be on the same subject at all but in doing that you'll have more time to answer questions if it's just one of you there's gonna be a time limit if
there's if there's two groups we'll have doubled the time for members to get their questions in so Selena Coleman Hale founder Arkansas reststorative Initiative and do you have anyone with you OK and Mary beth Hill event coordinator art Archway Institute are you a
well I'll let you tell me what you are we'll just start with the the two of you and we have exhibit these folks have exhibits C1 in your packet if the two of you
would turn your mics on and introduce yourselves for the record le na Coleman Hale with Arkansas
Speaker 14
6:45
start? thank you all for this discussion it's very important for everyone involved in our state in this process. of course this question about the capacity and bed space that we have in the overcrowding is very significant. I'm speaking to you all from lived experience and all kind of tailor that into this discussion so as far as
I've seen on September 1st of 2026, um, AdC has reported 16,804 people in the units that has been listed against our capacity so 109.4% with that being said something that I want to incorporate with this decis with this discussion is the cycle of recidivism involving bed capacity especially internally in the carceral system. um, specifically speaking we can
start at the risk needs assessment the individualized case plans and things of that nature. all of this is one pressurized cycle and what I mean by that is we can start with our overcrowding and you have staffing and movement pressure. we all know that we are understaffed right now and there are different things that we can tackle there but that limits the movement and when that limits the movement you have canceled or delayed programming for
individuals that are required to meet specific, um, classes and courses for their release. now when that slower progression takes place that is going to bleed into our residual bed space and that's kind of what I want to talk about as well because on the external pressure cycle you equally have unstable housing treatment, transportation and that's where we bleed into the bed capacity increasing with your
stipulations, your recidivism rates your violations for new offenses. and I think that where I personally go with this is properly using the resources that we have and not siloing ourselves. we have many boots on the ground and armies behind these people including the state and our criminal justice system that are ready to be hands on deck for people and reduce these number of beds. some
proportional data that I've cumulatively, you know, just conglomerated together essentially with the capacity for recovery to be counted into this and reduce bed capacity if we can firmly work on our programming and consistency and documentation of why we have lockdowns how many, why is that reducing it? it can quite literally equate to reducing beds on page ive
I specifically had integrated this math where if you have40 people with30 fewer days that you're talking about your programming your stipulations, your requirements that you're supposed to meet including nature ofrime and those stipulations that accounts for 1200 custody days. Now when you divide that by365 days with those proper requirements you're meeting3.3 annualized bed equivalents. and so those are small portions
where we can use those resources and programming and movement and documentation to identify those problematic areas and carry out through the residual be OK I will go next I already introduced myself but I will do
Speaker 24
10:33
that again. My name is Mary bethhill. I am here today because I have lived experience on both sides of the justice system I also want you guys to know that I am a person in long term recovery. I am a mom, a
daughter, a sister, a mentor an employee. most importantly I am an advocate. I was given the opportunity to change successfully and regre reintegrate after incarceration and build a life that I once did not think that was possible Most importantly I know that a person's worst chapter does not define them and it's not the end of their story Today I work for the archway institute in the National Peer Recovery alliance we work to strengthen recovery ecosystems by connecting people and communities to support education
opportunities to build stable lives peer support is the powerful entity behind it because sometimes we cannot things that we can't be learned through a textbook. the understanding that someone who has been there and who has found a way out that's why I'm asking you all today not to view prison bed expansion as the only answer to overcrowding. we also need to examine what happens before someone reaches those prison beds we cannot incarcerate ourselves out of a public health crisis my own experience has taught me
that the most effective intervention was not one program it was a continuum of support May9th of 2017 I was indicted on federal drug trafficking charges. I was facing a future that I could not have even imagined and its it could have taken me into any direction and instead the judge offered me a conditional pretrial release. That opportunity changed the trajectory of my life. those years that I spent on pretrial release allowed me to establish stability, develop healthy relationships and learn
how to live differently. I was preparing for the life that I wanted instead of just simply waiting for my case to be resolved in a county jail. Treatment gave me a place to start. Support gave me a reason to continue and accountability helped me to stay engaged by the time that my case was resolved I was not the same person where I'd begun. I had already started the work of recovery and building a foundation for long term change there were services available to me while I was incarcerated programs like a residential drug treatment
program that I was mandated to take and reentry services were offered to me once I was released. Each of those parts matter I want to be really clear that conditional pretrial release into treatment was a turning point. I was mandated to30 days at recoveryenters of Arkansas. I was also mandated to six months of recovery housing all while ateling taking IOP classes before my sentencing and I was mandated to electronic monitoring and recovery housing once I was released.
I want to also recognize that the Arkansas department of Corrections is moving in the right direction. they're giving programming and peer support services giving people the opportunity to work on themselves while incarcerated matters programming peer support and reentry preparation are all part of the solution but we also have to look at what happens before someone enters the prison system. That is where our counties have an enormous opportunity. people are sitting in county jails right now other cases are moving through the system some absolutely need to remain incarcerated and I'm not negating that fact
However, others could be safely and conditionally released into treatment recovery support or other appropriate services while awaiting their sentencing. conditional pretrial release should be a part of this conversation because it was a part of mine if someone can be safely monitored and held accountable in their community while receiving treatment and support that may be a better use of our resources and our money rather than keeping in themena County jail bed. I also want to acknowledge that todayerry Williams will be speaking to you about the federal system and how it works
and electronic monitoring electronic monitoring can help create accountability while allowing appropriate individuals to remain in the community. Also being connected to our recovery community organizations like the Wolf Street Foundation NEA Divine intervention those are two huge community recovery organizations in the state of Arkansas that can help provide these services as well. A person could connect to treatment instead of just sitting in a cell and at the same time a county jail bed could remain available for someone who truly needs to be there
what if we work together knock down the silos, work together as a community to help these individuals heal from the root that's what it took for me so I'm asking the committee to think beyond construction how do we create enough treatment capacity? how do we create create enough recovery and reentry housing likeextep recovery housing and hidden Creek reentry how do we strengthen peer support? How do we build the countylevel partnerships and how do we create safe conditional pathways from jails into treatment.
on May9th of 2017 I made the decision to begin a different life. Today I stand here advocating for people who are still trying to find their way out let's work together to build a continuum let's strengthen our communities and let's recognize the progress being made within our departments already to give our community a chance I want you guys to understand that a person can recover a person can come home a person can become a productive member of society a person can become a mother, a daughter, a sister, an
employee because I am proof of that. Thank you. ue s tion s from the committee Hold on just a moment the
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
16:39
let me cover very quickly the decorum for our meetings there's lots of times I would like to clap myself but
we're not going to we're not gonna clap we're not gonna boo we're not gonna say anything unless you're have the floor so everybody understand that because I'm a real nice guy but I'm also an old umpire and I will have you tossed quickly so just if you don't want to be removed no noise. OK centriss thank you
Senator Terry Rice
Unverified
17:11
thank you Mr Chair. thank you all for being here today. Miss Hill, what first congratulations on your turnaround and we we always celebrate that with people who had done it and there's a lot of people that try and fail and try and fail sometimes they finally make it could you I didn't catch when you were talking about changing the trajectory of your life. werere you in an area
that allowed you to meet the conditions of having support around you to get to it I I represent all the parts of 10 counties that are very rural the the that's what I'm wanting to know is what your case was versus what my my district is looking at absolutely so
Speaker 24
18:08
through that system they have a process for pretrial release for offenders
who meet the criteria and I did meet that criteria. I want to really reiterate that there are multiple different agencies who are rural like White countunty, Loanoke County who offer peer support services inside of their courts they offer peer support services inside of their jail facilities I know as I was walking in today I saw Justin Buck who is here with the Wall Street Foundation I know that he is currently working with rural communities to be able to offer those services I firmly believe in the power of peer support and
when I say that to you sir it's a person with lived experience who has walked the path of recovery or reentry that is able to help those individuals navigate that path as well and so we are what we call resource brokers you know we work with all the peer support people across the state of Arkansas working to find new resources to new treatment options working with faithbased reentry clinical reentry, whatever those services might be to help those individualized people thank you very much and again
Senator Terry Rice
Unverified
19:15
we appreciate getting to hear your success story you sir Senator
Senator Clarke Tucker
Unverified
19:24
Tucker Thank you Mr chairir. I just wanted to echo what Senator Rice said. I I really appreciate both of y'all being here today. you've added a lot of value to this discussion for all the legislators who are here and it's a really important part of the discussion so I appreciate it more than that, I just want to thank you for the work that you do every day because y'all are in the trenches and y'all have had opportunities and you've taken advantage of them
and then you've turned that around to help countless other people accomplish the same thing and there's there's no words that can describe the the value that that adds to our state as a whole and I just I really want to thank y'all for being here today but more than that I want to thank you for the work
Representative Dwight Tosh
Unverified
20:07
that you do every day. thank you sir Representative Tosh thank you Mr chairir I'm over
here thank you for the bringing up the peer supportish point.
I'm not sure if you're familiar with this but you know the this legislative body I think it was a couple of sessions ago matter of fact I ran the legislation where we changed the peer support program here in Arkansas becausery the old legislation was that if you'd ever been convicted of a violent crime then you were not allowed to serve as a peerce sports specialist in one of our three drug rehab centers and that law changed to be able to allow that werere you familiar with that and realizing
that this legislative body at least we had moved forward with that taken that step in the right direction hopefully I absolutely was
Speaker 28
20:54
aware that I was there the day that Asahutchinson signed into legislation that was prior to my prison
Speaker 24
21:00
sentence and I can't thank you guys enough for allowing us to have that opportunity just wanted to make sure you're
Representative Dwight Tosh
Unverified
21:06
aware of it and that we had taken that initiative to try to do something about opening that up for those that had actually made that journey through drug rehab center to be able to come back because like you said
a while ago who better can relate to those individuals that are there than someone that has been there so thank you for bringing that point up.
Representative Keith Brooks
Unverified
21:30
you en ator Simon thank you Mr chair thank you both for being here and I've got a question for each of you and the first of all Miss Hill, I commend you for turning your life around the way you've done it's amazing. And
Speaker 68
21:44
I think you were the example of how the corrections system should work. I believe you used the word that
appropriate individuals we need to find a way for appropriate individuals to remain in the community my question is in your opinion how do we determine who those appropriate individuals are and how do we determine who are the ones that are actually a threat to society. when
Speaker 24
22:05
I say that I I mean like people who are obviously convicted of violent charges rape, murder, those are not people who are appropriate you know even and I want to reiterate something too like I am a domestic violence survivor so I think that those people need to be incorporated and who is not appropriate to be out on
a pretrial conditional release. but anybody with petty theft crimes even you know theft that's a product of substance use disorder. people who steal and who are doing things to make sure that they can fund their habits if you look at somebody's prior record and they have a lot of drug offenses that is obviously somebody who is struggling with substance use disorder my incarceration started, you know from 18 until I eventually was indicted in 2017 and so you know I have a
history of theft of possession of fleeing of things that were you know all conducive to you know my substance use disorder thank you and
Representative Keith Brooks
Unverified
23:04
itscom health the I'm a math person I like numbers so going back to your example on on page five. help me understand exactly where this math is coming from on the th30 fewer days are you just saying if
Speaker 68
23:16
we were to reduce sentences 30 fewer days that we could save prison beds or kind of stated
Speaker 14
23:24
that fragmented so I apologize where I was going with that is the we have a foundation of your good time you have your the disciplinary actions that take place it's a conglo me ration of all things internally with those pressure cycles. So when we look at the stipulations that people are being placed under they're going to the hole you know what what is their case management looking like that's where that math came into play. So if you are having someone who has to go30,6090
days waiting until they can be released because of a certain stipulation or program requirement etc. that's where that
Speaker 78
24:00
math would come from just calculating those those time frames. OK thank you sir
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
24:12
Representative beatty thank you Mr. Chair. I'm over here I I guess my question focuses more I understand your your point of coming
from after the crime has happened and and and you're in the system
ways to reduce and to allow folks early release or or an opportunity of life outside of prison but my question is what do you think would be a deterrent to the crime happening on the very front end and do you have thoughts on that how if we if we don't have crime then we don't have incarcerated individuals so you have thoughts on that how to prevent this on the front end to reduce the the number of beds that we have so
Speaker 24
24:54
I think it's important to note that the Archwaite
Institute recently just worked with prevention and we created something called the prep programming through Aorp funding. it is a prevention training that puts a prevention specialist inside the school districts to really work with those kids who are at you know at risk as a youth I think it's a continuum we have to look at prevention recovery, incarceration and obviously reentry if we can start finding the programs that we know that have evidence base that work like peer support, you know that
is where we begin to see a shift in the way that Arkansas and our communities look I know that right now Arkansas is leading you know one of the top leaders of incar ce ration in the United States and we have to look at you know like the previous center stated look at our rural communities. how do we offer these services not to just you know our metro areas but how do we provide all of these services to
Speaker 28
25:51
every rural and county you know that's out there as well I would also like to touch
Speaker 14
25:59
base on this. I said that I would circle around to my lived experience as well and this is where it comes into play. at a young age I grew up in abuse and abusive home and my my dad actually went to prison. He is a pedophile and throughout my childhood, I did not get well and I was also from Madison County rural area as well that equates to that and I did not have an understanding of the real world economics, financial means. I
was not taught that at a young age and seeing my parents act as though money has grown on trees I developed that same attitude and it was very poor. Now with that being said my father got out of prison. I was recruited to college volleyball in Kansas. I lost my way. I forged his checks I continued forging checks habitual offender I am a product of that environment. I have my own responsibility even at a young age but the teachings is where it happens and we are all teachers in life no matter what
stage. we're also all learners and I think that with the amount of people that are so excited about this discussion you have pastors you have nonprofits that's where the deterrent comes into play because I was not fearful of the sentence and I'm being very brutally honest with you I was fearful of who am I? What am I becoming? How do I help myself and where is this trajectory going? And so those deterrents and those extensive
sentences can do wonderful things for people. You do need a time out. I did. I needed to face my fears and my demons. um, but I also had cognitive behavioral thinking where Miss Denise Voss wardden and menn, they all helped me understand my wrongs and the cognitivehaal thinking is where we begin and just like Mary Beth said and all these other wonderful people, the deterrent is teaching and learning differently. appreciate you saying
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
28:03
written right here on on on my my note sheet to follow up is that deterrent is communicating the idea that the perceived cost is going to greatly outweigh the the the expected gains of of the crime it's exactly what we did with the ProE Act that you're going to get caught, you're going to get punished, you're going to lose your freedom, you're going to lose your money you're going to lose your status and and and then that's the consequence so I appreciate you saying that I appreciate you ladies coming
today and and sharing your personal stories with us and I I think collectively we as a group can address some of these issues and and and thank you for your thoughts and ideas. Thank you sir thank
Senator Clarke Tucker
Unverified
28:50
you Senator Tucker thank you Mr chairir. I'll be quick. I just wanted to follow up on the question that Senator Simon asked y'all about how do we decide who we let out? Is it your experience that a validated risk assessment is something that can be helpful in this situation where it's an evidencebased
researched process that determines the risk factors of an individual and that way we we really have objective criteria that we can use to make these kinds of decisions rather than just have one person make a decision based on how much they may or may not like a person. you as one category and then another point is that we can establish some objective criteria such as if you're employed for a certain length of time. if your drug tests are clean for a certain length of time then these can also be factors that can lead to a decision along those lines and
that way they're not really arbitrary decisions but they're informed evidence-based scientific decisions based both on the individual's performance and on the validated risk assessment of the individual. In your opinion, can those be helpful and in making those kinds of decisions. I
Speaker 14
29:51
think significantly I mean I was I had my own risk assessments and it was textbook following along my my sentencing and then community supervision it was very helpful and something that I've learned and as I'm learning in my
criminal justice courses as I go back to school is paying attention to those needs and the risk assessment. what's going on the body language, how they're interacting how they're communicating, paying attention to those fundamental basics that's the proper foundation so absolutely I do think that that's warranted and then stair stepping everything too I mean it's it's all together but you have to take it in slow motion as well. you go ahead and I agree with Selena as well. I think that
Speaker 24
30:32
the risk assessment is important but I do also want to reiterate that
I think it is important that we do have resources like electronic monitoring and stuff like that to be able to monitor these individuals to make sure that they are where they're supposed to be I am a person who is on electronic monitoring for almost six months. I still have the scar from it. However, it it really helped me in my journey you know for that accountability on how you know knowing that if I was to not be where I was supposed to be if I was some you know if I was late or anything I knew that this monitor was monitoring me and that they were going to come for
Senator Tyler Dees
Unverified
31:16
well. thank you both ent er des thank you chair my question kind of
dances around. I think what I've heard from some of the other questions and just would love your opinion on what you've seen when you look maybe at a rollup of our our total incarceration rates in Arkansas and maybe not I don't I don't really want to understand the
my question is not about understanding the most common offenses or crimes but really on the the preventative side of what you believe is leading to the to the incarceration rates. So for example, would you say that you believe that the most common issue we're seeing is economicdriven or is it drug offense driven? what are the precursors on the front end that are leading to the the large scales of incarceration rates what on the front end if that makes sense
Speaker 14
32:11
so from my experience understanding I would say that it begins a little bit controversial for me personally and other people that I've worked with economics because those hardships for example my mother forged hot checks to allow me to go to college volleyball. My Ozark junior's travelling she couldn't afford it because of what happened with my father.
I learned that nature from her and I did it myself and I firmly believe it begins with economics and an escape for things and then it transitions into drug usage. it's a conglomeration of it all. every individual is different. it depends on the precursors what type of environment you're in and that is very significant in watching how people have grown up in their environments because unfortunately you can't walk through a fire and not smell like smoke. it's the same principle.
Speaker 24
33:18
part in it. However, even though Arkansas has made huge advancements in the last decade as far as recovery and reentry are concerned we still have a long way to go there needs to be recovery community organizations all over the place there needs to be places where people can go when they need to seek help we also need to be working to fight the stigma behind it. my grandfather was a Southern Baptist preacher here in Arkansas and so with that being said the stigma behind my my
substance use kept me from receiving the help that is necessary and we have to work better with education, you know with schools we know which like Selena said before with churches with nonprofit agencies and we need to be offering the services that are available like in the downtown metro area to all places
Senator Tyler Dees
Unverified
34:07
in in Arkansas. So so on the front end what I'm hearing is if if we're creating great trainings and workforce development programs and
helping solve some of the job and economic issues on the front end. it could lead to some reduced rates of incarceration and crime that's I'm hearing some of those themes that those are tied in because there's there's a direct tie to when there's economic issues, no jobs no trainings it leads to drug usage and addictions and thank you Representative Mccullough
Representative Tippi McCullough
Unverified
34:48
thank you Mrir thank you both for being here today. I think my question is that there are some people that head to one of these transition houses and all they have are the clothes on their back. they have no money, they have no vehicle, they have no family help because they may have burned those bridges or that might be why they're in there in the first place is because of family help. so I I want to ask a question about there the transition houses that are in the state must run a
huge range of services, a huge range of what they have to offer a huge range of conditions and everything so I kind of like to know maybe what your experience is or what you know about or what you've seen. there are different ways to certify them. there are some are AccC some are national recovery and I'm wondering from your perspective is it luck that you get put in one that may be really great and all of them may have some good intentions but I
can't imagine that all of them are equal you know with the money they have and with the places that they have and everything so can
Speaker 24
36:01
can I can definitely speak to that like I said I was in recovery housing for almost6 months but also through my work through the archway institute we are actually a national nonprofit longshorere we raised money to give it away in Arkansas in the past couple of years alone we have released $10,000 to different multiple recovery housing organizations recovery
community organizations to help these indigent individuals who are seeking recovery. we also work very closely with Nar which is a national credential for recovery houses and I encourage anybody who you know in this space that we work in to to operate under the NarR standards you know it's kind of an evidencebased standard for you know recovery residences on how they should operate but one thing I would love to say too as well that you know while we are talking about you know what do we do with this money in the prison is looking at these
AccC ADC reentry homes and making sure that we are utilizing those homes my boyfriend is a product of hidden Creek reentry. it is a wonderful facility. I think you guys are going to hear from them today as well but making sure that we are funding the the facilities who are doing the work and then making sure that we are utilizing them to put people into these reentry facilities so that they are getting a full continuum of care to help them on their journey. Thank you I I did get to tour
Representative Tippi McCullough
Unverified
37:17
Wall Street and someone who was a success story like yourself what may I think
impressed upon me the most is that what she said is that she came into a clean nice place there were no bars on the window. Everyone treated her with dignity and it seems like maybe that that's the the first step for someone who may not feel very dignified or may not feel like they deserve to
Speaker 108
37:39
be treated certain ways thank you very much thank you so much p re s ent ative Tosh thank you
Representative Dwight Tosh
Unverified
37:49
Mr Chair and I'll be quick. I just want to make sure listening to your testimony today. I want to make sure I
understand you're not saying that the reason that we have overcrowding in in prison is based on policy decisions versus individuals that have actually committed crimes how would you answer that Can you repeat that one more time are you saying the overcrowding we have in prisons today is based on poli policy decisions versus that's all I'm hearing is this policy or
that policy versus individuals that have actually committed a crime? why do we have overcrowding in prison is it poly policy decisions are individuals that have committed crimes
Speaker 14
38:36
think the policy decisions it is tough to say come at a certain point but init ial ly us as individuals just like you and I we hold responsibilities for ourselves so ultimately is the decisions that we make personally but the transition along the way is where those policies come into play and unfortunately some
things can be put on paper but when it comes to operations that can be different especially with different generations that come through so it is a mixture of both but mostly it's a person's responsibility I want I
Speaker 28
39:07
want to touch on that as well I do think that there it is a is a it is a combination of both things.
Speaker 24
39:13
I don't want to misquote myself or no but I know that there are a lot of individuals who end up going back to prison based off of technical violations and that's something that we need to be looking at as well when you look at how the probation and parole landscape works you know you
have lots of parolees, lots of probationers to one you know one probation officer and once again I will reiterate the power of peer support and having peers in these positions in each of these facilities number one to kind of take off the stress and you know of having to find these treatment centers and find these places for them but if we could help at that level right whenever somebody's a technical violator and rather than sending them back into the system getting them the appropriate help that they need and I agree with you and I'll make it quick
Representative Dwight Tosh
Unverified
39:59
that the ratio of our paparole officers versus the number of proees is is I agree with you is unacceptable there's no way they can truly supervise those individuals on parole with the number they have so I agree
Speaker 112
40:12
with that and thank you for that comment. Representativeerra
Representative Tara Shephard
Unverified
40:19
Shepherd thank you Mr Chairuick follow up to Representativetasha's question in regards to you stated some things can be put on paper but makes it problematic so is there something that's
currently occurring within AdC that's on paper that makes it problematic for an individual to be released
Speaker 14
40:39
yes ma'am and thank you for that question. I think based upon my personal experience and also individuals that I've studied talk with etc. policies on paper sometimes can lead to open to interpretation depending upon the person reading them. You have training, you have your credentials etc. but when it comes to the
disciplinary patterns don't get me wrong, I am not negating that some people do act out. I acted out before and I will never negate that. However, what is put on paper is the determining factor for individuals incarcerated. So you also have to take into account the different volatility you have individuals who are maybe having a bad attitude with the correctional officer because there's no air conditioning. Well, they're going to get written up more than likely and that write up deter potentially determines their programming how
many disciplinaries do they have? why were they given those disciplinnaries and that is an equal factor there is responsibility for all individuals involved. However, it does bleed into that process and we have to have programming in those requirements for people to be released. So documenting that and paying attention to those discrepancies is equally important within the process of it all. Quick follow up Mr chairir so
Speaker 118
41:57
is your belief that how we are disciplined individuals within adC is a contributing
Representative Tara Shephard
Unverified
42:06
factor to individuals staying longer than they should not as
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
42:15
you Miss Hill one of the things I had in the back of my mind for months is the electronic monitoring and I don't think we have any experts signed up today to talk about this so I'm gonna go to you you do aterry Williamson is going to be speaking
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
42:38
questions you have thank you for informing me of that the tell me about that experience and why it works or doesn't work. Yeah so the way that the federal system
Speaker 28
42:49
works that whenever you get out of incarceration you are mandated to go to
Speaker 24
42:55
city of faith reentry housing I was released postOVID but I believe they still do it to this day I served almost5 months inside city offaith and then for the rest of the time on
my BOp sentencing I was issued an electronic monitor that would follow me everywhere I go and so the way that that system works now as you know carries a you know a a very good friend of mine so I know that they have came leaps and bounds in electronic monitoring now where they can use their tele ph one services to actually monitor people but back in se or 21 I'm sorry whenever I was released from prison you know I would just have this electronic monitor on I had to call and let them know whenever I was home whenever I was away
at any time somebody from the electronic electronic monitoring system could show up at my house just to make sure that I'm there and I didn't manage to take it off you know it was a it was a very useful tool for me for that time to just to just add you know to that full con ti nu of care that I needed postre release. Were you
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
43:58
required to stay at home most of the time what were the rules so once again my rules are a little
Speaker 24
44:03
bit different now because we are not in the midst of COVID at the time I was you know we weren't allowed to move around a lot
just because of COVID and we had to follow BOp guidelines as far as restrictions I was allowed to go to work every day so I was able to maintain a full time job go to work I was allowed to do church and I was allowed to go to my there were special circumstances that'd have to put in a request for like when my baby graduated from when he graduated in his elementary school I was able to go and to watch them so you know it it was a nuisance at times, right? I mean it's a heavy thing on your leg.
Speaker 28
44:43
However, it did allow me to still remain accountable and allowed
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
44:49
me to be home to be a mother to my kids. love
you to be home, allowed you to work what since you had a problem with drug abuse right so how does this work how does ankle an ankle monitor ankle bracelet electronic monitor work and if your proclivity for
Speaker 28
45:15
using drugs is still there. Yeah so once again you know whenever I was able to give that opportunity to go to treatment
Speaker 24
45:23
before prison and so I was clean almost two years before I was even sentenced. I went to prison clean, I came home clean and it was because I was offered that full continuum of care throughout the whole process of my sentencing so by the time that I was released and I was home and had the ankle monitor I had her already developed a multitude of tools and resources for my for my recovery use but I also
like to you know to add as far as the federal jurisdiction goes right? they also we had aodaone you know so there were times whenever we had a call every single day and at that time if you were mandated to drug test you had to show up
Speaker 28
46:00
for drug testing that day so that is another deterrent that they use you know as far as substance use issues
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
46:06
go uhpresentative McGruder you're gonna be last. thank you Mr Chan. thank
Representative Jessie McGruder
Unverified
46:13
you for allowing me to participate in this
discussion. I wanna first thank you ladies for sharing your stories how personal this is to you and how far you have come on your journeys that's remarkable information. I do have a question in regards to both of you at what age were you when you started doing these things committing these crimes or or were you introduced to these these things that you're discussing. substance use began at the
Speaker 28
46:44
age 10 and I say that because that's
the first time I ever smoked a cigarette. By the time I was 13 years old I was
Speaker 14
46:56
in full blown active addiction. for me personally I was actually forging my mother's signatures for my schoolwork at a very young age probably 1011 years old and then I transitioned to forging my father's checks roughly about 1819.
Representative Jessie McGruder
Unverified
47:11
one follow up Mr Chair if that's OK. do you feel like as you aged you reached the maturity
level where you felt like these things shouldn't be done and do you know exact around what age that was and I asked that question because my my father always said to me when I was growing up if I can get you to 25 without getting in trouble, I think you'll mature more and I do remember getting to a certain age and I started to think differently so I became a mother
Speaker 28
47:45
at a very young age. I was 19 years old whenever I delivered my
Speaker 24
47:51
first child. I've always been very transparent in my recovery journey I did not use while I was pregnant with him but I did with my other two children. you know and that is that is the disease of addiction. I know at the age of 1819 years old that what I was doing was wrong. However, I did not have control over like once that's what I want you guys to understand about the disease of addiction I made the choice to put the drug inside of my body after that point all rational thought and choice was out the window, you
know and now my days were filled with how do I get it and give me more and because there was not a lot of available resources I don't wanna say my age but that was 22 years ago you know that you know, I didn't know where to turn you know there wasn't anywhere for me to turn at that point and so it was about 1819 when I
Speaker 28
48:42
knew that I had a problem. However, I didn't know how to fix
Speaker 14
48:48
it for me personally uh, I knew right from wrong I hadn't been
introduced to any drugs or anything of that nature it was very difficult for me, no different than a bad habit you have to break those chains and through my young age into 1920,25 I had a victim mindset because of my childhood and it took me years to break that and understand my own responsibility and although yes, I knew right from wrong I had positioned myself to where I couldn't even care for myself
and so as I got older and understood my thinking and my impulsive nature to being scared that I don't have enough money let me go
Speaker 78
49:35
forge this. that's whenever I was able to make that change and overcome all
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
49:42
that roughly around 221. thank you
Miss Coleman Hill Coleman Hale Miss Hill thank y'all for being here. thank you for your testimony and answering the
questions want to cover about three things very quickly
we get ready to go to the next first I want to compliment you and I want to compliment the members for keeping your questions brief and your speeches short and y'all for for being very brief in your answers I hope you have set a pattern for the rest of the day the
I am gonna be skipping around in the agenda so don't feel slotted if I skip over you and if I skip over you a multi times I'm gonna do what I think makes more most sense for this committee
and we have one of the things I love about Arkansas that I did not know when to was in the senate is that we have laws that say that if the public comes and wants to address committee they can we put a sign up sheet having said that I love it let me tell you that you've seen the agenda and you if you don't realize by looking at it it's gonna be a long day we if we can get to public people who have come and signed up we will but we may not be
able to I want you to know that now we will be on the same subject inoctober so just be aware that it will
be late if we get to you at all and so I want to be fair to you if you have to be somewhere else need to
do something else but if we can get to you we will I am going to jump is centerhutchinson here? and are you ready OK we're gonna move to number 13, uhjeremyhutchinson director
of strategic initiatives unify US Senator if
you will introduce yourself for the record thank you Mr Chairman madam chairman and members of
Speaker 144
51:44
the committee Jeremyhutchinson as the chairman said I'm with a group called Unify US they're out of Washington DC and we work on criminal justice issues at the nation's capital and then about 17 other
Republican states mostly southern states we are a conservative organization some of the founders came from American Conservative Union otherwise known as Cpac faith and freedom coalition which is Ralph Reed's group, umtru's department of justice his first term and so we try to bring conservative and effective approaches to a lot of issues but primarily focused on criminal justice reform
and I must commend the chairman of this committee for trying to get this question answered it's the right question to be asked how do you reduce the need for additional prison beds while at the same time keeping your community safe and we think we have a few ideas I'll cover them at a very high level we may be able to dive deeper as this committee's work continues but there are some bills in the draft process
right now that I hope you all get a chance to review in the near future the first idea I'll start with in order of what could have the most immediate impact on the need for additional prison beds the first is a different names but earn time credit and you all are to be commended and the governor's office to be
commended you've certainly taken steps in that direction with theE actct and and even in prior's legislative sessions but I think there is a gap that it would make it better to fill in and that that the best example other states have done it but the best example is actually President Trump in his first term passed the first Step Act, with huge bipartisan support it wasn't unanimous but it was
pretty close in both the house and the senate and the firstep Ac says that you know certain nonviolent nonsex offenders can through taking classes and working and job training and GED and productive activities is the official term. they can earn credits toward one year off of their sentence which we're not proposing here in Arkansas but the second leg of that is
time toward early prerelea custody which is halfway house home confinement as the ladies who spoke before homeme confinement has become the technology is amazing and incredibly effective. that securing individuals at a much reduced cost to the government whether that be the federal or the state the first step A has had incredible success the
bureau ofrisons has reduced their incarceration rate by I believe it's 14%26,000 inmates fewer than when this bill was enacted they're closing prisons at the BOP level and yet crime rates are going lower both violent and overall crime rates so and the recidivism rate for those individuals who
are able to participate in the first Step Act is 9% there's even a sub section of that that was released during COVId a massive release of nonviolent offenders and that recidivism rate is less than 1%. so and again I credit y'all have already begun working in this area and we can get into the details if you want during question and answer but making that a firm statutory
where if you do this you're not subject to a parole board designation you're gonna get your time and it's reflected every month you do good this month you can look and see hey I've had 10 days or 15 days where I can go to prerelea home confinement or or transitional facility that type of consistency and reliability is what motivates
inmates to actually do the work needed to come out and and be a productive member of society the second proposal is a compassionate release a lot of states have some form of this Arkansas does too though it's seldom if ever used it's very difficult to actually use it and we can talk more details if you desire but this proposal would say if you're over the age of60
and the department of corrections makes a determination that you're no longer a threat to society and they would have to establish rules to determine what that is but that you would be allowed to go to home confinement the benefit of this is first of all these are these are people who are no longer a threat to society I would suggest maybe sex offenders are not eligible for this because their crimes can be done
even in home confinement with a cellphone but beyond that it would save the Department oforrections millions in healthcare costs because the most expensive health care costs is end of life care and we have I believe 15% of our inmate population is over the age of55 and that's growing so if we could designate even500
people who no longer a threat when they go home to home confinement even which they're still incarcerated. they're not their sentence isn't being relieved and if they screw up they can be hauled right back into the prison environment but they're still in custody they're still a custodian of the department of Corrections but they can seek medical treatment through Medicaid at least at the federal level permits it and that would they they've received you know as good a care as possible
through the medicaid and it would save the department oforrections a fortune and so that's the second option the third one is we'll not see the immediate returns but I believe it will see long term returns as a clean slate initiative this also has been done by a lot of states Republican states, Oklahoma, Missouri just did it last year. it basically says the the crimes that you all have
already designated the Arkansas doesn't expand the list but the crimes that the Arkansas legislature have already determined to be eligible for expungement this would just make it automatic the problem right now is a lot of people don't know first of all that they could get their offenses expunged but even if they do they have to hire an attorney which very few people can afford. go to court again and it's something that very very very few people
actually take advantage of this would make it automatic the administrative office of the courts it would be implemented in 2030 so there'll be time for them to set up a system that would make it automatic the beauty of expungement again this is only for the crimes that you all have already determined worthy to be expunged so no violent no sex offenses but the reason most people recidivate is because they can't get a job
and when you have an expungement you can check I I'm not a convicted felon and you can get a job you can get an apartment you can get a bank account all the things that somebody who wants to be productive needs in life you can now afford yourself of and every time there's less recidivism there's less victims that means there's less crime and and as you all are keenly aware
a lot of our population are due to recidivism, people coming back for the 2nd and3rd time and if you can interrupt that cycle by giving them an automatic expungement then you will in the long term not only create less victims, you'll create less need for additional prism space again I can go in deeper if y'all desire but I don't wanna assume there's interest but I would appreciate y'all at least
considering these when the drafts come out and consider it as part of this overall package to do as a chairman has suggested to reduce the need for additional prison space. thank you for allowing me to speak and willing to take any questions Committee
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
1:01:38
I'm gonna ask you to do something for me the we're gonna have enthutchinson back in October along with some
experts on these subjects we are preparing a couple of bills on the subject that are not ready so they're not on the agenda today but if
I could get someone to make a motion to
hear the ISp on two bills inoctober as we're looking at this subject I would appreciate it so move second any discussion hearing none all for the motion signify by saying aye all post
thank you if you have questions for senator Hutchinson, be sure and ask them but again he'll be back inoctober with help to really go in depth on the subjects that he's brought up. Senator Hutchinson do you have any idea and I told we're gonna have an expert that can probably answer this question do you have any idea on the savings betwe between being in prison when as
I know is between70 dollars and $80 or a day in Arkansas
and electronic monitoring I don't know
Speaker 144
1:03:02
Arkansas per se I can say the federal level it's usually5 dollars a day and that's probably more expensive thans because the feds everything's more expensive so even if we're $10 a day
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
1:03:14
we're talking about a savings of60 to70 dollars a day yeah and let me just say the
Speaker 144
1:03:25
Technology is unbelievable I mean I had friends who were on home confinement I mean you can get it down where they can't go into a certain bedroom. I mean it's incredibly precise and if they mow the lawn a little bit outside of their lawn they get beat and some somebody's coming after him it's it's incredibly confining but it's effective and it it can save the state a lot of money
and then for those one other point on the compassion release that I failed to make but if you have people with a very long sentence they're not they're they're realistically even if they're eligible, they're not going to be paroled and they give up hope and there's no incentive for them to behave or to pursue selfimprovement if you even have hope hey despite your long sentence, if you do everything right someday maybe you can be determined to not be
a threat and you can die at home with your family that that certain point is an incredible incentive and provides hope. so it it has worked in other states and again Arkansas has a method but it's it's very complicated and I don't know if it's ever been used there's not any public information that says it's ever been used but it it could reduce very
quickly the number of and that free those beds up for people who are violent who are sitting in our county jails right now and need a bed at the department oforrections
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
1:05:12
and as was pointed out earlier where it's appropriate because people who need to go to prison need to go to prison but but where it's appropriate children don't have to be separated from parents and the person can go to work and be productive and and versus
completely reversal of this is what we're costing the day today costing the state
Speaker 144
1:05:38
very little plus you're able for the proposal line referencing they probably wouldn't go to work because they're aged and probably infirmed and but as was discussed by the previous witnesses as an alternative for certainly people struggling with addiction or it it is a much better option because they have the support they need to battle that they
also as you mentioned chairman can go to work if there's any fees or fines or restitution or victim restitution they can actually work and pay that off whereas if you send somebody to prison the kids suffer and probably start a cycle of future incarceration and the victim suffer because they're not going to get recompensed while somebody's sitting in prison so for the right cases it is certainly a
viable option but you're right that and I met some of them there are people who I hope never get out because they are I should say they're redeemable. God can redeem anybody but from society's perspective it's a a society
Representative Keith Brooks
Unverified
1:06:56
Mr chair I think you mentioned the recidivism rate for the home monitoring people it's around 9%. Did I hear that correct
Speaker 144
1:07:07
you heard it correctly but those are the ones who went through the first step act program where there's job training there's skill development, there's education those who participated in the productive activities and then we're sent early to home confinement or a halfway house in the federal system their recidivism was 9%. OK, do we have any way to compare that to what it
Representative Keith Brooks
Unverified
1:07:31
was before that and because here in Arkansas we approach50% recidivism and if we
were to cut that down even I mean just a little bit you're talking about over 1000 beds that we we released6,000 a year. So you're talking about a reduction a significant
Speaker 144
1:07:48
reduction in beds needed you're exactly right and some would say well you know we we want to make sure they serve their full sentence and they but realize every time somebody recidivates there's a new victim and that's what we're trying to avoid is more victims so if sending them to home
confinement a little early creates less victims than but to answer your question specifically let me find it s 31 % so it went from31% to9%. the same population that did not take were not able to
take the first step act same crime same security classifications we're at31% and after the first step back it was dropped to 9% excellent I'm assuming that's a national
Speaker 144
1:08:54
120 prisons in the federal system. thanks Representative Bety Mr chairir, this is this is
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
1:09:01
more directed to the chair since since you mentioned that
we're going to be discussing ISps that
I assume are related somewhat to electronic monitoring my my concern is that the majority of the incarcerated Arkansas prisons are more along violent offenders and that the requirements on electronic monitoring are very different on the federal and state side so I I would like specific information on the percentage of our incarcerated that are violent offenders that that we could have at that
next meeting along with the current pricing because I know on the federal side those electronic monitoring it's somewhere 106 to138 dollars a day I think is the the going rate so maybe to get some of that information for us as well before the next meeting think we
Speaker 144
1:09:59
can do that but let me address the cost issue you're right I don't know the makeup of our current Arkansas incarcerated population as to who's considered violent and who's not but that's a good question
the costs at the federal level home confinement is that amount but that's not because of the monitoring the reason that cost is so high is because the BOP and I've tried to suggest they not do this anymore they continue to pay for the healthcare cost of people on home confinement and inmates who've been receiving lackluster healthcare while incarcerated get out and they're tied to home
confinement and one of the only few places they're allowed to go to doctor's visits and so they go see every specialist every doctor they can and they bill it all to the ureau ofrisons which is why that home confinement cost is so high. but the monitoring part of that is very small but thanks for that question and that answer that it's helpful but we will if it can bring us information
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
1:11:03
back I'll have that answer for you by the time we meet again.
all right senator thank you for being here thank you committee thank
you Mr Chairman see you inoctober victoria Parsons ' s Victoria Parsons here
OK then we'll move to Brittany Gilmore
Brittaney Gilmore not here? OK then we'll move to Jared Harper and Sharon Garrett.
you would take a seat turn your mics on and introduce yourselves and who you represent for the record
Speaker 170
1:12:24
ministries I'mharron Garrett and I'm the executive director of Safehaven Ministries Inc in Clarksville, Arkansas and I'm also the president or the chairperson of the Arkansas alliance of Recovery Residences which is the credentialing board for NA in the state of Arkansas which Mary Beth mentioned that that is a sober living facility license
or credentialing to say this sober living home and program lives up to the national standards thank you for having us here today who
Speaker 168
1:12:58
would like to speak first yes sir Jared Harper again I'm currently the executive director of Shackle Free Ministries are retired in January of 2025 after 29.5 years of local and federal law enforcement are retired last year as the assistant special agent in charge of the drug enforcement Administration here in the state of Arkansas
over 20 years also as an ordained minister so I thank you all for having me I I'll start with we'll never arrest our way out of this epidemic that we're in we'll never incarcerate our way out of this epidemic or institutionalize our way out of this drug epidemic we're losing 195 Americans everyday to overdose poisoning and at least 1 to 2 Arkansans everyda to overdose poisoning when when people come out of prison many times they come out a better criminal
there'll always be dope in prison we've worked cases contraband phones offenders utilizing those communication devices inside the prison and I believe dope will always be available there if somebody wants it and has the money to to buy it a prison has a purpose for violent offenders we talked about that today but also the long term faithbased recovery gives purpose and my wife and I have startedackckleree ministries where the founders of this minist ry after 20 months we've seen
284 men and women in recovering addiction give their hearts in life to Jesus who I believe is the true source of supply I believe there's two things that matter. one is when a person's born but it's also when someone finds purpose if you want to keep from seeing the same people on the court docket and I think long term faithbased recovery has to be an option here in the state of Arkansas you can't give a substance abuser 28 days of treatment and then send them back to the same environment, same people, same places or same things or you're gonna get the
same result I believe that in my opinion to reduce prisons the success supports sustained engagement continue continuity of care, recovery housing community involvement, ur affiliations things such as celebrate recovery mentoring and aftercare. Shackle Free ministries works with pastors recovery house directors prosecutors defense attorneys and judges to seek court ordered sentencing to long term faithbased recovery in 21 months
I've talked to seven different prosecutors here in the state of Arkansas and we've helped5 men stay out of prison anywhere between3 to fi5 years was the recommendation of the court they've all been court ordered long term faith based recovery and knock on wood maintaining relationship with these five men have all been maintained their sobriety got jobs got their kids back have careers many of them work in recovery and they have a purpose they have a church that stands behind them they have meetings
every day that they're that they're held to many I'd say about 9 of the directors that shackleree partners with and I say partner they don't pay us they let us in their doors to minister to their men and women in recovery all came out of addiction and now are running multimillion dollar recovery houses here in the state of Arkansas I would ask the committee to to research the association of Christian Recovery Ministries it's a national organization that has members in seven different states there's6,000
beds available nationally it's they have developed a certification process requiring certified pro programs to meet more than 200 standards those standards address areas including participant records program evaluation counseling medication protocols participant rights grievance procedures crisis planning facilities governance finance personnel f finances personnel staff development and admissions
there are 10 ACRM members that are currently going through this standardization process to be become certified members under ACRM and there's currently42 beds available in these faithbased recovery houses here in the state of Arkansas so the question should not simply be is this a faith based or non faith based recovery program the question should be does this program meet measurable standards for safety, accountability, quality and recovery I'm also asking the committee to consider legislation requiring
certified recovery programs to collect standardized outcome data if we're going to send people into these programs we should know what happens to them afterward. I believe we should require recovery programs to track graduates at6 months 1 year,2 years and3 years. I believe we should measure employment, measure stable housing, measure continued recovery relapse overdose arrest reincarceration measure probation and parole violations I know the state measures recidivism as it was mentioned
earlier I know they did a study in 2013 and2018 the ACc and the ADC and of about 11,500 people that went to prison about half of those recidivated I know there's 160 about700 probably inmates in our in our state institutions here in the state of Arkansas currently and we're paying about75 dollars a day for each of those inmates Arkansas already collects recidivism data
after people leaving incarceration Arkansas drug court system already uses standardized definitions and periodic data collection. We should bring that same commitment to measuring outcomes after residential recovery I'm not asking the committee to believe me I'm asking you to create a system that allows us to prove what works if a 28 day program produces lasting recovery the data should show it. and I do not believe that 28 days and I've talked to thousands of people abusers and users of drugs interviewed
family members who we also minister to whose kids have died from overdose and 28 days is not working I will tell you that it takes the brain about one year to recalculate itself before somebody even starts thinking clearly enough to live a sober and maintain a sober life if a six month or one year faithbas residential program produces lasting recovery the data should show it if one model works better for one population another model works better for
another population we're speaking of rural and non rural areas the data should show that too I would say let's stop making policy based solely on anecdotes assumptions or competing philosophies let's establish standards accountability and collect the data. I respectfully believe outcomes will speak for themselves. my understanding there's 8 catchment areas in the state of Arkansas and about $9 million goes to one short term 28 day treatment facility in each of those eight areas from my understanding maybe not be correct but maybe you could
that's what I was able to find respectfully even my even my own son and I put this on the record who's suffered since he was 12 years old and addiction he's now 29 years old short term 90 day30 days and a fine30 days in drug court does not work we are better together we need prevention we need education we need recovery we need local and federal law enforcement working de together
to save lives here in the state of
Speaker 170
1:20:45
Arkansas thank you. Miss Garrett yes as I said earlier I'mharron Garrett and I founded and I run an organization in rural Arkansas, Johnson County and we have I have ran a reentry home, an ACC transitional license home in a Nar accredited sober living facility. I also run a treatment program and a crisis center that
deals with homelessness and I'm in the process of opening the first women's leadership academy for people in long term recovery in the state of Arkansas the question before us today is how do we reduce the number of beds needed in the state. the my brain reads that is how do we achieve a sufficient number of beds to serve the existing need and I think that I I listened to the previous meeting it was
really interesting I got a little kick out of senator beatty, Representative beatty. I didn't know whether to be afraid of you or admire you so I settled on a fearful admiration. so anyway I'm gonna try to behave myself today but I think that we I think we have obviously three choices if we're going to solve the the bed crisis and that is build more beds decrease the demand or a combination of both and so I
can't speak to building more beds that's not in my realm but I think I can credibly speak to decreasing the demand as I have a substantial experience in dealing with the population of people that land in jail that struggle with addiction and land in prison and come out of prison. I actually have done quite a a lot of that. I I remember from the meeting chairperson Senator clark you said that you had three primary duties as a
legislature and that is to protect the citizens of Arkansas to keep those who work within the prison system safe and lastly to understand that the offenders are human beings and we need to give them the appropriate level of resources and efforts to enact change at the individual level should the individual so choose and so this is the age old question of justice versus mercy and so
even in this same pursuit God could not accomplish this without he couldn't mix make this balance without personal sacrifice and I think that we can expect no less. I want to encourage this committee and all the citizens of Arkansas to adopt the same mindset that we would become bold pioneers in bringing innovative ideas which may come at a personal cost to ourselves but
we'll achieve lasting impact upon the problem we are facing I do not believe the answer is to only look to the government. I believe we have to work together as a collective group of people bringing our resources to our communities to solve these problems and in Clarksville, Arkansas where I began in 2018 there was not one solitary resource for people struggling with addiction
I started in doing what I could. God met me there with many miracles and many likeminded people within my own community and today we have a recovery ecosystem or ecosystem that actually would rival a lot of other places because the challenges that face rule Arkansas are much different than the challenges that face the greater urban areas so to that end in order to solve the problem and the issues and the experience that I have
learned is that you cannot think of this problem merely in terms of logistics how many beds how much money how much staff we have if we are going to truly solve this problem we have to connect the dots between the number of beds needed in the state for prison and the heart of men and women that are demanding those bits we have to connect we have to draw a line between mentality and behavior and I have done this
long enough to know we can be successful at this and so there are two different ways well there's many different ways but in my realm of what my expertise is I see three primary ways that we can reduce the need for beds by capturing the hearts of men and women demanding those bets, one being let's get them before they ever go to prison as we have talked about extensively this morning. The other is of course while they're in the prison system, I can't speak to
that and then lastly the reentry reentry is very very important and so to do this I wanna I want to primarily focus on the the first and the latter. The how do we keep people from going to prison to begin with well, I agree that and we are currently in the very beginning stages I was called and asked by a person in our community that said hey we have 20 women sleeping on the floor of our gill of our county
jail. can you help us solve this problem Sharon and so I put my brain to it and I pulled my team together and as we've heard here today we have developed a pretrial release program and to answer I believe it was Mr Tucker question you have to have a solid metric by which you screen so that you can make sure that the person that you are going to pull post bond hearing out of the pris out of the jail and
into a long term program you have to have a a metric and a screening process that can be agreed upon by the judge by the prosecuting attorney by the pro personson providing the programming by the jail so you have to have a collab or ative effort within the community itself before you can make a process like this effective and we are doing that we're at the very beginning of it so I cannot give you stats on it. we just getting everyone to agree has been a great
accomplishment and so we hope to see great things from that but if but the idea of it is this you catch someone at a strategic point. they have been arrested. they have had their bond hearing and now they are looking at setting between3 months,9 months,18 months depending on the prison systems availability or the court's availability. they're setting in jail and so if you can if you can screen this individual, everyone come to an agreement this
individual is appropriate for this program and the individual is also in agreement to do this you can take this person and you can put them into a long term program to be learning the skills they didn't get to be learning how to get a job, how to manage their money, develop a savings account and this also joins the need to protect the citizens with the need to help the individual which is the balance we all need to figure out to solve this
problem. so as you because you're not s surrendering this per person of their own recognizance into the community. You are surrendering this person into a program that is structured with supervision and accountability and so this person has has been incentivized to work this program because their alternative is to sit in jail and if you are a person that has been arrested and you and you are working a program that could potentially keep you from going to prison then you
are going to be a little more incentiv ized than someone just walking in off the streets. so this is one of many possible programs that we could embrace in the state that would keep beds empty in the prison where we aren't constantly just funneling people through we know all of us know that the problem we face with recidivism and the overcrowding of the jails and the system it
is most so often it is a generational problem so if you can capture the mom, capture the dad before they go into prison before they you know a felon which which I so agree with Representative uhhutchinson that we need to have some alternatives to to making them felons it makes it so challenging which I will speak to you in just a quick second regarding the reentry but we have got to have these programs because if I can save
the mom or I can save the dad then I have effectively saved their children and if the mom comes out and gets a brand new life then their children are going to get a brand new life and I can speak to this personally. I have had over 800 women go through my program. OK? my program is predominantly women at least my residential program. and over half my staff are women that have come through my program and are still in
sustained recovery three years later and they have gotten their children back and their children are superstars on the football team and their children are on the volleyball team at school and their children are in church and their children are accepted and they're not going through all of the trauma that happens when a parent ends up in prison and so I strongly ask you to consider you know we we have heard the definition of insanity doing the same thing over and over again
and expecting a different result. And when I say bold pioneers it's scary to change what we have done for years and years and years but I don't think we would be here today if what we had done had worked. So I think we have to think broader and bigger and we have to begin to try to balance justice with mercy justice with how can we do things better out of the number of women that have come through my program 99% of them without fail were
children of people that struggled with addiction and incarceration and prison sentences so it is a gift that keeps giving but recovery and a new mindset are also a gift that keeps giving. the second way that I believe if we can't capture them pre prego to prison, then I am a firm believer in reentry I believe reentry can be a very powerful tool. However, I do not believe our current reentry
system is effective. I have ran a recovery a reentry home, a25bd reentry home for a year and a half and I decided to walk away from doing reentry this month, this last month and the reason I stopped is not because I don't believe in reentry it's because the the we have to change the way we do it for it to be effective So I this is just my two cents' worth I believe there are four reasons reentry
is maybe not as effective as it could be. The first being that it is merely an extension of prison. in our quest to make sure that we don't let these criminals out and that they reoffend and harm the citizens of Arkansas we have really created a system that is merely a prison outside of a prison but the problem with this is that prison mentality doesn't breed good citizens to change behavior
you have to change the heart and the mindset. what you believe affects your choices which affects where you land so if you want to capture the hearts and minds of men and women coming into reentry you have to do it by presenting it in a more dignified and way that allows a little more freedom to live a real life and learn by real life experiences while you are in a protected environment and a
highly accountable environment. I am not promoting we do not have accountability but the current system is a prison outside of prison and it traps many of them into the mentality of let me get out as soon as I can and it is not as conducive as it could be if we would approach it with a very different have a very different approach. The second is that the reentry program is not long enough. you cannot change if someone has
been imprisoned for 10 years 11 years,5 months when they come out with the clothes on their back, no IDs 10,000 warrants of a huge amount of fines on and on and on you've heard it all.5 months is not enough to capture and change a mindset which is what you have to do you have to capture their hearts and their minds and give them a reason to do something different. one year is not long enough. I'm going to share with you the statistics of Safehan in
sustained recovery the percentage of sustained recovery in my 90 dayy program is about30% that tells me that 70 % of the people that go through the 90 dayy AccC transitional Li home we will see again in the criminal justice system in sustained recovery of my reentry home, it raised to about40% but in my sustained recovery for the girls that buy in and choose
to go into my graduate program which is my NAR accredited home and complete the one year program. I have 88% success of them staying in sustained recovery. That is a massive change and I also want to quote three different studies. I'm going to they're the names of them are this long for the for the sake of time I'm just going to say study 1, study 2, study3 but I can supply you with these studies should you be interested
in the first study, long term stay in sober living programming versus not the return to use was31% in those who stayed and65% returned to use in those that did not.3% return to prison in those that stayed for the long term 9% return to prison in those that didn't. In study number 2, the return to use in those that stayed31%turn to
use in those that did not stay65%. 84% in the third study stayed clean46% went back to use there is resounding and sammsa is a great place if you want to get nationwide statistics there is a a direct correlation to the length that someone stays in a structured accountable sober living facility with the supports and the resources they need which
I agree with Marybeth peer support is amazing. we want the continuum of care. we need treatment we need we need that peer advocacy we need the entire system to come around them and by the time you do that for a year you have created the space for them to change the way they think and then the third thing that Jared hit on this is true I have been doing this work for 15 years. if you want to
capture and make lasting change they have to have purpose they have to see something beyond not using and not going to jail. This is scandalous I know, but I say this to my girls all the time. If your number one goal is not to use then why not? because we have to have a greater purpose in our life. we have to give them the opportunity to see the greatness within them and I'm telling you after to over 800 women have gone through my program. there
is greatness in these individuals that when you tap into it they become the most giving, the hardestwork, the most people that will go back and do the things that a lot of citizens won't just to rescue the ones that have been where they have been. They have heart in that matters that matters in the work before us because I'm fluffy snowflakes will not change this problem. Gutsy hardworking people willing to sacrifice personally to make a
change in our culture those are the workforce that we need and I challenge us to not let this incredible resource slipped through our hands because that is that is how we solve this problem and then lastly this will not make the people in my recovery programs love me more however it is true we cannot ignore the cost we've talked about the cost in many in many of these discussions and
I understand chairperson Clark that we I cannot get into this in detail today we're going to talk about this at another time. However I would like to just give a very quick little synopsis.ive me 20 seconds the people in coming out of the system the people coming into the reentry programs must share the cost of their re their journey of their recovery journey because that is part of the consequences and as they share in the cost they develop
accountability they develop buying. I have girls that are not required to stay in the one year but they come in and they capture the vision and they of their own free will choose to go into the long term recovery and they and they are very successful and they do that at their own cost so I propose that one of the things we change within the state and the reentry system is that we stop paying for it all
currently it costs4,120 dollars50 cents to send one person through rein our current reentry program but if we would change where the state only pays a pays a full50 dollars per day for45 days and then nothing the resident the participant picks up the cost in the form of the community rate that anyone coming off the street would pay. This would
save the state 1870 dollars50 cents per person that goes through the program. Now let me just put this in a very quick comparison if you're talking about 2 participants that come out of the prison to keep 2000 people in prison for one year is51 million dollars51,100,000 dollars the state currently would pay 824,100 for those same individuals to go into the
reentry program as it stands under my proposal the state would pay 4 million500,000 dollars that is half what we currently pay and if you will pay me and I'm not even doing reentry currently but I'm just using this as representative of other reentry homes. If you would pay us50 dollars a day for45 days that gives us time to stabilize gain employment and make the participant responsible for the
for the remainder of their programming. So I propose that we treat them with dignity we make them stay longer we inspire their vision and we let them share in the cost of their journey and we all win if we can do this OK members a very
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
1:41:45
good presentations but we don't have a lot of time for questions so if you're goingn in jump in quick. uhpresentativeerra shepherd
Representative Tara Shephard
Unverified
1:41:57
thank you Mr Chair thank you all for being here today and thank you for the presentation. Mr Harper, I first like to start you made a statement that we should prove what works and I agree with you totally Miss Garrett I think my question is more directed towards you in regards to Nars what what was your title? I'm the chairperson of the board and and and so really quickly my colleague uhpresentative Mccullum kind of led to it earlier approximately how many
programs arenaar certified currently in Arkansas do you
Speaker 170
1:42:35
know this is the first year that our that that's our acronym for Arkansas alliance which is the affiliate of NAR and we have just recently received our affiliate license so we have I want to say35 homes in the state in a in another50 waiting on us to be able to get to them to get them certified in approximately how many homes are there
Representative Tara Shephard
Unverified
1:42:55
total in the state do you know
Speaker 170
1:43:01
I I can't say on how many homes across the state that are not no or are certified or have not applied to be our certified. I do know that there are a lot of sober living facility programs that are we are in ever increasing measure interested in getting our certified. thank you thank you Mr
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
1:43:24
chairir Representative beatty thank you Mr Chair. I appreciate both your comments my question is you hear a lot of folks that come back through that
are in long term recovery do you find that there's a direct correlation with long term recovery and incarceration, a longer
term incarceration that those two are there's a correlation to that are you asking the longer
Speaker 170
1:43:47
the term in prison the more willingness to do long term not not so much the
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
1:43:54
willingness but the success rate of the long term recovery of those that that are in long term recovery that it it it directly involved
Speaker 170
1:44:06
a longer term incarceration. I have not found that to be true. What I have found to be true is the whether or not you can capture the hearts and minds of the individual which takes time. So I think there's a much stronger correlation between the amount of time they stay in that program rather than how long they've been in prison. Some of my ACc girls 8 months they've only been in they were only in a prison for eight months. I have another person
who was a prostitute murdered her brother. it was probably merited. OK, I know I'm not supposed to say that but anyway, but she ended up she she ended up being one of the best people that ever came through my program and now works for me. So I don't really see a correlation to whether or not they're successful being so much how much time they had in prison. I will say to be honest age does have some to do with it. It it's really hard to capture those 18 to24 year olds because they're
not sure their way doesn't work yet. but as they get a little older late twenties all the way up through their
Speaker 179
1:45:13
ix0s they're a lot more ready to listen and go, my way doesn't work. I feel like it's she
Speaker 168
1:45:21
hit it the nail on the head when she said it's a heart change when their heart meets Jesus's heart the game's over. thank
Representative Carol Dalby
Unverified
1:45:32
you both chairwomanalby thank you Mr Chair M Garrett I'm up here you you were reading from a script and had
some facts and figures on it could you please make sure that that gets to our analysts so they can email that out to us I'd appreciate it thank you en ator im
Representative Keith Brooks
Unverified
1:45:55
mon Thank you Mr chair and thank you both for being here Miss Garrett, I've sat in your office, talked to you. I know you're passionate about this and thank you for coming. I do hate to hear that you're no longer doing reentry, because you're really good at it and we
need more of you not less. you did share some facts and figures about the the short termm program that they go through I think 90 days you said you had about a70% success
Speaker 179
1:46:20
rate no a30% if it's 90 days, 30 % % success or30% recidivir0% success3% success when my year
Representative Keith Brooks
Unverified
1:46:32
mean that those are astonishing numbers so one thing that we talked about
um, last time was your definition of success and I think that needs to be stated as well because your definition of success is much more strict than what the state defines as success. So can you expand on a little bit or explain to the committee what you mean whenever you say
Speaker 170
1:46:56
success. I believe true success is when you take someone from where they are and you bring their mentality up to a level to where they encodings, they're gifts that they've been given are actually utilized
to help society at large so that looks like going from crisis to stabilization to recovery to purpose. So I don't believe that we, I think in Arkansas we have done a very good job of going from we are currently let's say making headway from going from crisis into stabilization into recovery but right now in many many ways we stop there the individual can go forward but as a collective
group of people that that have this goal in mind we have not done this which is why I'm starting the Safehavenomen's Leadership academy which is to to take women from recovery because what happens is when you're a felon in Clarks vi ll e Arkansas the absolute only job you can get is with Tyson and Tyson is one thank God for Tyson. we we would be in real trouble without them. However, that is a very difficult job though the women work 10 hours a day uh4 days a week, sometimes5 days a week and
the best they can hope for is to meet their car payment, get their house if if they move in with another person, and then God help them if the car breaks down. We have to propel them into professions we have to give them higher levels so that they can move up the socioeconomic scale and began to not only provide and survive but to thrive and you do that by creating purpose so the academy is designed to remove the barriers where they do not have to pay program fees, they
can come in we navigate we teach them how to be professionals we teach them you know the one year program is to teach them life skills that the next level is to teach them how to be professionals how to dress, how to talk, how to say I have done instead of I done and how to present themselves and then we want to help them navigate through the educational systems and other credentialing systems so that they can be propelled into a higher level of of earning not only just to make a better paycheck but to find what they're great at and then that's
when the entire community benefits because they're out doing what they're amazing at and then their kids are their kids are going to be more likely to do the same thing so I think the vision of success is to capture the gift set for the community at large and then future generations
Speaker 179
1:49:33
we want to change the trari trajectory of heritage. That's the ultimate success thank you very much so
Representative Keith Brooks
Unverified
1:49:40
it's not just they didn't go back to prison they're actually they've got jobs they've got their families
Speaker 157
1:49:48
back they're contributing to society that's what you define success as that's exactly right that's right
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
1:49:57
thank you Representative beatty again my question's more for the chair and planning for the
next meeting you know, I think these are are very productive discussions that we're having and tie right back in with the recidivism reduction actct that we our our chambers passed last session my my concern and what I'm
gonna request is in the future meeting the the folks that are going to speak to the
committee that we have a bio on those individuals as
well as a written opening statement. I think that would would save some of the time in in our meeting and then some of the information they're going to share we'll have that to carry with us for consideration after the meeting so I'd asked the chair to maybe incorporate that in with with the folks that are going to testify and come before the committee in future meetings. I think we can do that can'
Speaker 205
1:50:52
well I'll let you know if Kobby fails. Thank you sir calledllby the new dad fails
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
1:50:59
yeah working on no slate the who we got up entreimmon thank you Mr chairir just just one quick question for Mr Hary something that you said
Representative Keith Brooks
Unverified
1:51:12
early on was dope will always be in prison why is that and how can we stop
Speaker 168
1:51:23
that because criminals and and and dope dealers some of the most creative people I've seen over 30 years of more than half my life I've I've worked in and around them and you know just from interviewing thousands of people and and talking with even the people that we're trying to help get into recovery they've all seen it in prison and it's available it's gonna come in one way or the other either through guards it's gonna come in during visitation it's gonna come in through the mail they're gonna come in through
drones I mean we all it's just the way of life when you know we work some of the biggest drug trafficking organizations in the world and when one cartel member gets knocked off there's another one that that is right there ready to take take the position of of that next cartel leader so in in my opinion we can have the most strict prison in America it's still going to come through Conterbrand is still gonna come through
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
1:52:30
I'm going to follow up onen Simon's question because I
have been dismayed this past month in the conversations that I've had with former inmates and reentry folks on this subject that I had no idea that drugs in prison were so prevalent some many former inmates say
it's easier to get in prison than it is outside of prison and they also said something
else that particularly dismayed me is while we get lots of opinions from corrections people and experts former inmates tell us that it's almost the the biggest percentage is coming from employees
it's coming from staff and that seems to be something we ought to be able to stop I don't know if it's stiffer penalties I don't know just being aware and and investigations but that just shouldn't be should it?
Speaker 172
1:53:31
no sir and you're absolutely correct. the screening process for staff members and employees of prisons I think should be extremely there should be a a very big extensive background done and just like a special agent they should have the same standards of of employment and background investigation etc. polygraph whatever you want to use to get into those positions they're the those are the weak
links that are it's it's astonishing to hear just from the inmates people that that that I've come across over the years of of how readily available dope is in prison because
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
1:54:16
I was assuming that that's how these conversations came up I was assuming that people
coming into reentry were clean and we can't assume that at all so but here's I do appreciate both your
presentations formeration secret William Bennett under Ronald Reagan I was at a educational reform seminar and he he
said something profound wise and simple at the same time as a profound and wise often is simple he said we have we have learned how to do great things in education he said we're doing great things with the Navajos and I'm just repeating him because I have no idea what we're doing with the Navajo Indians but he said we're
doing great things with that Navajo Indians we're doing great things in the Appalachians he said the problem we have is rolling it out and I have observed that in education so as I listened intently and knowing that by tomorrow I will forget much of what both of
you said so I appreciatepresentative beatty's comments the is you're impassioned you've brought good ideas and things that I think that are probably facts
the to us then we have to then figure out what can we do to in as far as legislation that would then allow and cause someone else to do the right things in other words how do we roll this out how can we can we do more and if we do more based with ministries and y'all have said a lot and others have and I
think others will and I had nothing to do with the agenda other than saying if you if you want to talk about this subject come talk about this
subject what you've said about faithbas is correct I'm a preacher's kid and as a as a senator I don't care I don't come to it I I always come to everything based on who I am and what I believe but at the same time I'm a numbers guy
and the only reason that I favor faithbas because I've seen the
numbers nationally and and otherwise and it works better than anything else works and part of the problem in trying to roll things out is if we roll them out as programs it becomes government it becomes hiring whoever shows up versus who's impassioned to help somebody and then it ends up not working it
it just ends up being another program so do y'all have ideas one can we do more? are are the
people out there are the people out there to help people if we allowed more people to be helped as a state are there are there the people out here to do that yes sir in my career with
Speaker 168
1:57:27
DEA I've been in nine states. I've never seen recovery done better than in Arkansas and I've never seen places like John316 ministries in Charlotte, Arkansas and renewal ranch in
Houston Arkansas and armm180 out in Dewitt Arkansas and safefehan andextep recovery housing in Clarksville Arkansas I've never seen things like that until I got to this state and like I said earlier 9 direct I have 9 directors that I work with all the time in recovery that came out of addiction those are the people that are passionate enough and they'll put the boots on the ground to make things happen and people with the the lady that's sitting next to me that's passionate about these programs so yes to answer your question there are people and if we could somehow
get the chair or a law passed to say there's treatment facilities already out there that have this 88% success rate can we just say hey these are licensed treatment centers and can we start advocating to move money in their direction to get that money and in and allow those people to do what they're already doingjon3:16's already graduated3,000 graduates and probably the last 20 years and they have a proven path of
of success just like safefehan just like next step recovery housing we're all five of those men that we were able to help turn their lives around so I think we are spearheading and on the front lines of making something great happen here in Arkansas and I think you all are the are the ones with that that that will make it happen let me add to that really quickly yes please do
Speaker 170
1:59:09
because I love your question. it's very near and dear to my heart Here's the thing
o ur s we're doing this without the resources OK there's a lot of people doing it well. there's some that aren't hus I'm very passionate about the credentialing boards right you have avenues by which you can fund that are not government agencies that will turn this into another program. You have are you have accrum. these people we cared enough to start it on our own, right? And so we care about the standards we don't want the flop houses we do want to reduce recidivism. I personally care that my gel is
over c row d ed and my my county is stressed right? And so I'm doing something about it with a group of other people that we care. if you take the resources and you decentralize them and you bring them to the communities where the communities are are understand their problems and they are meeting they're they're already working to solve their own problems and you help them with resources funneled through responsible governing bodies
Speaker 180
2:00:22
I believe that that is one very real way you can actually help make
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
2:00:29
this change across the state. so Mr Harper you mentioned some things that we needed to do as far as measuring would and I'm putting you on the spot but if we need to do it and it needs to be legislation would you be willing to work
with an attorney atblr to to craft some of that legislation absolutelyok well get get with me offline and we'll make that happen I can't tell you you know unless you have the other people and reentry agreeing with you it may not go anywhere so so we'll have to do more than just write it but we'll have and again and we'll have to find out if your ideas are the right ideas but but that that'll give us a place to start and other than you walking out and me
forgetting if you'll get with me offline we'll we'll start working we'll get you with them to start working in my stead on legislation and and someone else may want to carry it but we'll get it written I'd be honored
Speaker 168
2:01:39
to do that and when you're talking about the association of the association of Christian recovery ministries that's 206 standards that these recovery ministries have to have and you're going to weed out people automatically that aren't going to be able to maintain those standards and those are the
organizations that we need to to beat the boots on the
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
2:01:59
ground to get this thing going so sounds like it would be very
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
2:02:04
important Senator Johnson Mark Johnson. thank you Mr Chairman appreciate you allowing me to participate although I'm not
a member of the judiciary committee Mr Harper you've clicked a lot of things in my mind and I won't belabor all of them the chairman would cut me off if I did but but one thing that has come clear is that where we are right now
and theE Act was the beginning of that and I absolutely supported it but we seem to have a societal intolerance for crime it's like we've we've coddled you criminals too long and we're going to get tougher and have a more mandatory sentences and we're gonna build more jails so we'll have room to lock everybody up which you know may or may not be the solution which is why we're here today and I applaud the fact that the chairman is drilling down deep on this but
you touched on the drugs in prison issue and what I would just call corruption within the corrections bureaucracy maybe maybe I'm asking if we should be throwing the book not at the first time criminals and the people that have had the kinds of problems that our first two witnesses told us about in their lives but maybe throw the book at people who are government employees that are
making a very good living and eventually getting a huge pension for being part of the problem as as my dad once said you know if a judge or a prosecutor or a police officer is caught breaking a law he ought to get double punishment instead of what is other in the law would you see that as at least a partial solution to this where we we don't ignore the fact that there's some institutional corruption that probably had all
kinds of levels the drug thing I never thought about until this recent thing happened in Arkansas where they were taking books away from inmates because people were soaking them in the drugs and they were some somehow able to get the drugs out of the paper would you see a maybe part of our aim being at some institutional corruption that allows some of these many problems you point out to exist yes sir I think you could develop a whole
Speaker 168
2:04:27
task forcece and I raised my hand over30 years
ago to protect and serve I knew that I was going to be held to a higher standard and I should be held to a higher standard just like every government employee and so what I would say is you could develop a a task force and you could keep them busy around the clock to stop the corruption stop the dope coming into the prison and all the other contraband phones and everything else that ends up in prison that shouldn't be there so 100% yes you resounding yes that we could stay busy on that and I don't I don't know that that it should
not be it should be a priority that we should
Speaker 172
2:05:06
be staying busy and keepe keeping the corruption out of the institutions and prisons thank
Senator Mark Johnson
Unverified
2:05:12
you very much Mr. Harper thank you Mr Chairman Representative McCullo
Representative Tippi McCullough
Unverified
2:05:20
Um, so some of the places you're talking about are these places that are certified or places that could be licensed or are they
Speaker 170
2:05:33
yes we have we have several licensed facilities both withacccram and with NA. accram is specific to faithbasar is a broader you can be of faith or you cannot. it's it's a it's a national standard for but yes we have several already across the state that are Nar certified and I'm not sure on accrum how many
Speaker 168
2:05:55
so there's42 members currently several that are that are applying for accreditation shack le f re e ministries is is one
of those as well still applying because we know we're not where we need to be it's just my wife and I so we are trying to do all the things to get ourselves in a position to be accredited and that's insurance that's all the all the things and when you're smaller ministries such as ours the regulations and standards obviously won't be as as stringent but it is a very stringent protocols and regulations that you have to meet in order to become and and you're inspect ed just like a headquarters inspection. if you know anything
about inspections you're inspected on a yearly basis and if you're not cutting the mustard then then you're
Representative Tippi McCullough
Unverified
2:06:44
now wanted to ask a question and I could ask this probably of anybody today but there's some a practice that's come to my attention called labor trafficking and to give you an example, somebody pulling up asking people who are in these recovery centers or transition houses they don't have any transportation. Well I've got a truck I can take you and you can work
for me and I'll pay you like $8 an hour and then work somebody for 12 hours and still they're almost killing themselves and still can't get out of the position they're in because they're not able to make enough money to do that but they're kind of at the mercy of of that kind of situation too. Do you guys
Speaker 170
2:07:24
know anything about that? these kind of things happen but they're generally I would say safely they're not accredited homes h ing s like that may happen but
it not in actually reputable programs and when
Representative Tippi McCullough
Unverified
2:07:38
you say that do you mean like the nat the the nationally accredited ones or are you talking about the ACC ones
Speaker 170
2:07:46
or can't speak to what happens across the board in ACC I know what the rules say and you're not allowed to do that. For example, there's there's a lot of strict rules Nar and Akron both have more strict rules than even ACC but ACC has a a guidelines you're supposed to follow which protect from
that kind of thing. For example in my AccC home and in my reentry home, I was required to transport my residents to everything that they needed including their work and they had to get honest like legitimate jobs full time jobs, consistent jobs they had to work a minimum of42.5 hours per week. So the in these licensed homes that that is not supposed to happen. I I don't I've know fairly
well most of the nor accredited homes and I don't believe any of that kind of stuff is going on in those homes. I can't speak to Akram and I can't speak to what all's going across the board to AcC
Representative Tippi McCullough
Unverified
2:08:49
understand that I just I just feel like there's so many out there that it's really hard to tell if everybody's following thers rules like they should but thank you they're not yeah exactly thank you but a real quick point to that is if we do
Speaker 170
2:09:09
tie resources to credentialing we we incentivize more and more homes to want to be certified which would then force them to be brought up to the standards of good
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
2:09:24
care I hate rules however
I'm in a job where that's what you do because it's necessary and the I think some of the things that Mr Harper pointed
out about measuring again assuming in a perfect world that measurements will be done correctly and but even once you put the rules in place but I think the biggest thing is is always results how you do it doesn't matter so much to me I I as we get ready to recess for lunch one of my favorite quotes and I'm not going to quote it exactly or even close was from Napoleon and he was asked how he promoted
officers to general and he said I promote the lucky ones and by that he meant the ones who win he it wasn't it didn't look at how they trained their men how they what their strategies or tactics were he promoted those who won and we need to promote the things that have shown themselves to work and try to find a way to do more and again saying that's easy doing it is is something
else altogether and I don't know how many beds we can save I mean it ultimately we're talking about lives but but again but we also have to deal with dollars and
cents so you know how many beds can we say because there is a core of people that we're not talking about because that's not what we're here to talk about people
who belonged there but need to stay there and I don't know how how big that is and how big the group is that can be helped
and how much quicker we can help them
and how much better we can help them but that's what we whatever it is if it was only 100 people that's 100 beds it's also 100 lives which is if I'm not talking as a senator is even
more important but we've got a duty to not take any more taxpayer money to to do something then we need to and if if we can do it more successfully that's what we need to do so we appreciate the ideas we've had some great contributions this morning great discussions we've got a lot more people with a lot more to
contribute this afternoon appreciate y'all being here it is 12:15 we will gavel back in at 115. we are in recess
There we go lectronics decided to give our members another minute
grace period OK we're back to number3 Victoria Parsons
are you in the room? come forward
right and exhibit C2 will be ethical before y'all get started let me clear up some things one the go back to what I said this morning there is to be no talking unless you've got the floor and if you're not up in these seats or up here you don't have the floor the let me clear up especially
I talked about public comment and we have some people signed up I'm not sure how many because some
of you on the agenda misunderstood and signed up what I said that we might not get to those who signed up from the public that was the public if you're on the agenda we are we have ever planned of getting to you and cutting people off if we have to to get to you so with that we have Victoria Parsons and
ok if the two of you would introduce yourselves for the record and who you're with who you represent now y'all having the same problem
we were having so we'll give our members a little bit more grace period
Speaker 237
3:16:30
Can you hear me now OK well my name's Victoria and I'm a citizen of White countunty what's your last name Pparsonsy so I just wanted to first start out and say I'm so thankful to God for the ability to be here today, to be able to speak to you guys it's really a blessing and an honor thank you committee members for allowing me to be here as well
before I get into my proposal that I put together just kind of want to make a quick mention of why I'm here I personally have never been incarcerated. I've never been to jail. I've never been in any kind of trouble. I think the only thing I've ever experienced is maybe a speeding ticket. so I put this together and and started working on this because I've I've been on the other side of incarceration. I I've seen I've been the one that that walks through
those doors and gets to see your loved one incarcerated and I've seen the environment that they're in and what incarceration not only does to the prisoners but to the families that are also serving alongside with them I've put probably a year's worth of time into this proposal I feel like it's not only a way to free up bed space but it's a way to improve the prison system as a whole so
you know we don't have to choose between accountability and compassion. I believe that we can have both and I think to understand how we got here we need to kind of take it back a little bit so in 1995, Arkansas passed a law that we commonly call the70% law for certain serious offenses a person had to serve at least70% of their sentence before they could become eligible for parole. So that policy's now been affecting the correctional system for about30 years and
I want to be clear I'm not saying that this one thing is what's caused the backup. or the overcrowding but I am saying that we need to say see how that it contributed so when people remain incarcerated longer, you know, year after year, decade after decade I mean the bed space it adds up right? so Arkansas revisited this issue on a say it was back in 2005. the law changed that those70% requirements for certain
methamphetamine offenses so those individuals were allowed to earn good time and they served50% of the original sentence and this change was part of the legislation that addressed the prison overcrowding and the increasing incarceration rates at the time more than 20 years ago Mike Huckabee was governor and he spoke about mercy and hope in our justice system and this was in 2001 it was regarding the the system overcrowding that we were experiencing at that time and he said without any consideration
of mercy there is no true justice if we take hope away any sense of optimism we may have destroys the soul of that very individual that we hope to change and I think that there's a lot of truth in that because I do believe that people absolutely have to be held accountable for what they do but accountability and hope do not have to be opposites and that's what my proposal is really about. and I I want to show you guys what our system currently looks like and I know that you guys should all have copies of the
proposal that I put out so in the first set is just the summary and I'm just kind of touching base on page two right now we currently have 19,000869 individuals incarcerated this is off of the border corrections workbook that they put out every year or every month august numbers is what my proposal is based off of I do realize they put out September since then but I had these printed up before then so I think it has increased about73
by73 from august numbers to September numbers we are looking at 2,351 of those individuals currently September numbers that are in county backup we have things called your rated capacity listed capacity operated capacity and basically what I've learned through all of that is we want to go off the operated capacity that's what they have they put a bunch of different beds in places they can and bunk beds where they can they've just
stuffed people where they can at this point. So you're we're looking at 16,809 individuals that are operating in bed space right now we're 118.2% overcapacity as we speak. now I had a snapshot in some stuff that I had worked up it's not currently in here but I just gonna make a quick mention it's the snapshot of that whole workbook it's the whole summary basically it divides all of
the people who are incarcerated right now by violent versus nonviolent crimes and how many of those have been eligible for parole for the past year and how many of those have been eligible for the past five years and they have gone past their TE date as of right now there's7,614 of those individuals that have been eligible for the past year and past their toE date. there are 1125 of those individuals who have been eligible for the past five years. so I kind of dug a
little deeper and went into what we're looking at in parole hearings I compared last year to this year as of last year we were on average or releasing about631 individuals per per parole session as of right now this year we're averaging399 with August of last year they only released302 and they reviewed 1132 cases so we got to kind of look at well we're going up for parole here what is the reasons
that people are not being released are they not you know, meeting the required classes. I mean we've heard all of this already I know that there's over3,000 people on a waitlist as of right now waiting for the types of classes and things that they need to take in order to proceed past their parole so that's that's an issue that can be addressed with theor corrections I believe. but I I kind of want to get into the meat and bones of my proposal because I know we don't have a whole lot of time
so on page three I kind of just address three different ways that we can make this into a legislative decision here so first we have option A and that's to refocus on those70 percenters. I don't think that that is something that you know we can say it shouldn't be considered because it has been before we can focus on certain class Y cases and let them earn good time I would exclude all sexual
offenses. I don't think that anyone would be on board with that but as far as I want to give an example so we might have a convicted aggravated robbery or a firstgre murder and they weren't the primary actor but they weren an accomplice or secondary participant Arkansas doesn't do accessory charges so someone could essentially just be in the wrong place at the wrong time didn't know someone had a gun or whatnot and they're
convicted of the same crime they signed a plea deal at the age of you know under 21 they were young at the time of the occurrence they were on drugs there's several different things that could put these pers these these people in these classes and they accepted these things and they've actually shown good behavior. they've been incarcerated for over 15 years. they've shown good behavior, they've been rehabilitated so in option A I'm I'm not saying that we would automatically
release these people but I am suggesting that we could make someone eligible to earn good time under that same decree that they had done before that that that they've served that50% just like the methamphetamine charges that they could be eligible for the good time as well so that's kind of where I'm hitting you know especially if somebody committed a terrible mistake at 181,920 years old they were a secondary participant and now they've served 15 plus years they've clearly spent those
years demonstrating that they're no longer the same person who entered that prison. I believe it's reasonable for policymakers to at least ask whether our system should have a way to recognize that change and I did compare that workbook. there are 1480 qualifying candidates and that scenario and option B that we have underneath that that would focus on an individualized review as I said in my proposal I make that at a 15 year mark
now if you turn to page I think it's on page six there's an actual illustrative scorebased review model I think that was mentioned earlier on in the session something like having a reviewbas model. Alabama actually does this now and they they work in tangent with their OA scores and Arkansas already implements OAz that's a ohioris assessment score and that is what puts an individual inmate in their risk category that
are they a lowris moderate risk, highri individual OKok and then it gives them different tests and programs or I'm sorry different programs and things that they can take and before they have to be eligible for pa ro le right? so if we can do what Alabama is doing implement this review model along with OA score the OA score would initially determine
OK, do we need to bring them up for review and then they meet this score model what Alabama's currently doing is if you meet a score of a0 to7 you would be eligible for the review if you score 8 or higher you're not eligible for the review. under this option here you're looking at 1833 qualifying individuals now I will say I heard
someone mention prep earlier in a program Alabama did implement their prep program and they do have statistics on that and it's based off the review chart whereas scores and all of that and so from 2022 to2024 they reported an 86% decrease from they went from30% to4%. through their prep program. So I believe that that is something that we could definitely implement and it would it would work great now me personally I would love to do
both options I believe you know, implementing both of these would be essential for bed space. it saves money. it does all of the things that people are asking for in today's hearing that I've heard so far there are441 people that overlap in that category. so they qualify for AM B so you can't essentially total those two together so there's actually 2872 that would be eligible for both.
if you look on pages 8 and 9 in my spreadsheet, I kind of spread this out for you guys and give you a couple of different scenarios I tried to be conservative because we know that not all these people are going to qualify, right? I mean there's disciplinaryries so there's there's a lot of different things that can go in the a factor here so I I worked up a plan 25% planning case718 individuals
that is would be qualifying to free up the bed space there, OK? and that would save us $19.51 million over the course of one year now where I get those numbers that's you know Arkansas reports74 dollars46 cents a day to house an inmate. so you're basically tallying that up then you know multiplying that by through65 and then that gives you the number per inmate per year and then you times that by718 and that's where you get that number. These numbers are not definitive they're just projections OK? so
40 % that's where I would like to lean more towards. that's why I feel more hopeful that's 1149? beds that we could free up just just in this scenario alone that's not bringing in the the umower Act that's not you know trying to get more people through parole process that is just this plan alone and that would save31.23 million per year. If100% selling we hit that 100% ceiling that's78 million a
year OK Now I did a fiscal impact I know ADC or not AdC but the correction system in general their fiscal year they received628.8 million dollars for the entire year is what their allotment they've already got fiscal year 2027 out and there's674.7 million so they've already increased next year's projection by45.9 million so if we can take this
proposal and implement it in some form or fashion I've I've listed below you know if we build a new prison obviously there's the projections iss in the red and then in the green we have what we could save over the course of 10 years only on a 25% basis that saves us 195.14 million now d I'm not saying that or I want to address the Arkansas umtect Act at this point because I don't want any
of you thinking you know well we make room now or what keeps us from being overcrowded again later, right? I mean that's a general question so I know in 2025 we enacted the Protect Arkansas Act and some of those individuals will serve their 85% sentence and some will serve the 100%. so I think that we can learn from that70% law here. I ' m not saying again that it caused all the issues and but obviously keeping people incarcerated longer
without meaningful ways to earn a review or show rehabilitation adds unwanted pressure to the system over time. so what I'm asking for is breathing room right now. it gives us a chance to look at the people who are already sitting in those beds then we can determine who truly needs to remain there and who may be safe for a review for release that gives Arkansas time to save money plan better and get a more honest picture of
how the prison space is actually needed moving forward and this proposal cannot only apply to just the the prison system now but it can if we choose option B or that combination where we can allow that review process. it can apply to that 85% and 100% later on down the road after they've served that 15 year marker they do the work they stay out of trouble, they complete their programs, they show the rehabilitation then they too can earn the option for review, right? that doesn't mean they're automatically going home
it just means hey we're gonna give you something to look forward to we're going to give you an incentive to do better. and then if we hold those people accountable we also give rehabilitation a purpose at the same time we're being smarter about bed space or being smarter about our money and Arkansas is going to need the next you know and what what are we going to need in the next 1020 or30 years from now, right? so I'm almost finished if you draw your attention to page 11
we have that rehabilitation programming and reducing recidivism I just kind of put together a model for you guys to kind of look at if we were to do the 102540% projections that I alluded to earlier what we could use that money for, right so if we're in that 25% there we have officer safety retention it's I know at one pointorterorrections was on a
hiring freeze. I don't know if they still are but it was pretty recently they they do not have enough staff to keep these inmates I would say inze but it's not really but anyways so anyway I have several different things. there's program capacity reentry and community programs data and evaluations and then keeping things in to reserve because you you know what
Arkansas's growing by 2% each year. we've got I think the the online it says 2% all the way through 2035 our population is gonna grow by 2% so I'm not saying we'll never need a new prison. I will never need to add on or need to make changes but this is a way to kind of help make that for now but in closing I'm I'm just gonna ask you know that the end
of the day that I know none of this is simple, OK and I'm not asking anyone to forget the crime or the victims or stop holding people accountable. I'm just asking for us to look at what what's better? Is there something better? is there a better way to do this and I truly believe that there is and after enough time has passed we'd be willing to look at that person again whether that comes through those70% cases or a review after 15 years or both there will still be safeguards in place and a review won't be
release again but it's just a chance to see who they are today and not only for the worst thing that they did many years ago I spent so long working on this because I truly believe that accountability and redemption can coexist together. and we remember what someone did we can remember what someone did we can protect the public and still leave room for people to become better than the person that they once were. I'd like to leave you all with this and I just ask that you remember that you are all young once too.
Most of us would not want the rest of our lives defined by the worst decision or the worst moment that we ever had. and some people do terrible things and they absolutely have to be held accountable for them. but if we can truly change after many years have passed and they put in the work and they're no longer that person I believe that there should be a way to recognize that and that's all that I'm asking you to consider today. I I know that Brittany's here she kind of had a way to touch on different rehabilitations and programmings
and and the things that some of that money could be put back into and a little bit of statistics that she has but as far as I go that that's all I have in in my proposal I have the summary that's your 1st 2nd part's gonna be the full proposal with a lot more juice and then I took the liberty of just making up a draft of what legislative terms would look like and put it into an actual example bill for for you to look at
but I I thank you all so much for giving me the time to speak and and hearing me out and if
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
3:36:55
you have any questions I'm open to that as well. M
Speaker 244
3:37:01
Gilmore would you introduce yourself and who you represent my name is Frett Gilmore and I represent Jessse Lewishoo Love Corrections as well as breaking the to step on. I am from Sevier County, Arkansas and I am here today also speaking from lived experiences.
so as we're discussing I just want to say a little bit about what Jessse Lewis choose Love does. So Jessse Lewis was killed in Sandy Hook. whenever the Sandy Hook school shooting happened and his family does have roots here in arkansas. Instead of his mom getting angry and blaming everybody around for what happened to her son. She put that time, effort and money back into the figuring out why. So what person missed adam Lanza what person didn't ask him why?
what did he not have? So I think that one thing that we have to look at in Arkansas that we don't look at and that is the culture and I'm not saying that it is the color of your skin tone culture. culture is different no matter how many ways you look at it there's very many forms of culture it's not based on your skin color. so what we have and what we're operating on is we're supposed to have Arkansas Department of Corrections but right now that72% recidivism rate are people that were on probation and parole. they have not committed a new crime.
so therefore obviously Department of Corrections is not doing very well correcting people and we just have to be honest with ourselves with that but how do we do it we have people that we are asking questions of and today is very good and we're all very appreciative of it because we don't go to the dentist for a broken bone. so we're been at coming to people that have never had lived experience to ask them how do we fix something that they've never even been inside of. and I think that that's what we have to take and when we have to
look we have to look back at the culture of it and we have to start allowing these people to have voices at the table because we are invested a lot of money right now in policy and very little money in people. and if Arkansas wants to grow we have to start investing in the people of Arkansas. So in order how do we do that so prevention is cheaper than recovery I promise you that and that starts with our youth in Sevier County we operate a secondary program it's called YouMattter. that program is not funded by
any tax dollars currently and it has it has had some state supportive help but what we do is being in a small rural area without a whole lot of resources we give our juveniles a chance in the court system to learn from a different culture. So our judge gives them6 weeks. In6 weeks we teach them we go into the homes we figure out what environment they are because if we're working with somebody and then putting them back in the same environment that is not helping them at all. So we have to
actually go outside of our offices we have to go outside of the school hallways and we have to go into these kids and actually kind of understand where they're coming from, why are they hurting? because in my opinion there's no such thing as a bad kid. and I know a lot of people want to say well that's crazy but no if we're kids I say contaminating emotions become contained emotions. so when kids don't know how to emotionally express themselves, they blow up. with it's just like what
happened with adam Lanza whenever he went into Sandy Hook and opened fire on those students. That's major. we we don't have that major right now but we are looking at that we are looking at a lot of young kids in Arkansas right now that are carrying guns that are acting out and for all we know it's simply because they don't have anybody investing in them at home but we have not stopped to ask that question in the general assembly this past year I think the legislation DYS made a
statement about we were we we had a disconnect with our juveniles. and to my knowledge there was nothing proposed by the time that we gaveled out at the end of legislative session of how we reconnect with those juveniles and since then I think in Arkansas within the last and this is just a number that I'm throwing out there. So I'd say within the last 6 to 9 months at least 10 juveniles have probably been charged with violent crimes how many of those could have been prevented if we would have invested the money in the people.
and not the policy because Arkansas is very rural in a lot of areas. when you're investing in policy you're putting a blanket over the entire state that southern counties like myself and Sevier County we can't uphold that. We don't have those resources to support a policy that may be able to be supportive here so if we have to we have to take a step back we have to stop worrying about what the policy entails and understand that there are different levels that we need to look at and that is with each individual representative that's coming to the table that the people are
putting here in their place getting out in the communities of those districts that you serve and asking them what do they need because everybody's sitting in one room cannot tell us what one area needs and one to blanket the entire Arkansas so we missed that so when we asked how can we prevent overcrowding that's easy and that is investing in the people. We start in the juveniles. we give them working programs and working systems that
workurrently right now we are juvenile probation officer has on average3 to15 minutes with each child. No meaningful programs are going on in juvenile probation. there's nothing telling them that this may be the endgame. I can probably find about 250 people within the snap before I walked to my car here that would volunteer to sit with those men if they were allowed a day. They'd volunteer to go into those juvenile facilities and ask those kids do you see where I'm at today?
and what I could have been if I would have listened to the people that were speaking to me but whenever you speak over them they don't want to listen and that's where we're at right now. so I say that how do we stop the beds we have to start investing in our juvenile justice system. and we have to understand that not every not every community has the same resources to link together. Y'all ready to take questions?
Speaker 249
3:43:36
Yes. enator Blake Johnson Miss Parsons what do you do in the real world I'm an insurance agent so the only you know there's got to be motivation to put this kind of work into something
Speaker 236
3:44:08
I think it's the love that I have for my family members that are incarcerated right now and I never knew I don't come from I don't live in a rural area. I've been privileged my whole life and I really never knew it was this bad. so going in the last two years and seeing your family members struggle and hurt and your loved
ones tell you what it's like it just it made me feel like I need to do something. I felt called to it. I felt like God told me like this is what you need to do you need to work on this you need to and so far he's given me
Speaker 237
3:44:56
all the tools I need to you know, put the effort and research and data and you know it's it's all come together and I didn't know the first thing about politics. I don't still don't know a lot
but I I you know, went through the channels and asked a lot of people and you know, I just feel blessed to be able to be in front of you guys today to at least
Speaker 240
3:45:20
present it and get it started because I want I want to be able to help. I want to be
Speaker 249
3:45:26
able to make a difference well from the review I looked at your stuff and it it looks pretty detailed and been a lot of work done on it and appreciate you sharing that. Yes sir and passion that you have for what you'
miss is it Miss Gilmore so you talked about a lot about programming this thing's not gonna be solved by government and a lot of what's happening it don't matter if it's3 minutes it's the family and whatever we can do to support the families of the state
and have two person families that's what a lot of changes happen since the5 you want to the twoperson household family structure is is going to solve a lot of this where no matter what we do as a government can't solve the you said 24 you
know there's 24 hours in a day and3 minutes government there's no programming no matter what we spend can replace what they can get to family and the faith and you know whatever whatever we do has to be centered around so appreciate both of you coming. So we currently have two programs that do kind of
Speaker 244
3:47:16
encapsulate the families. one is familycentered treatment with DHS we are under we are in the second year above $11 million pilot program and that is where you have the family centered treatment service workers that are going in and getting a snapshot of what the entire family looks like and what the entire family needs we I know of two families that have had success stories where the cho whenever they went into family center treatment services the child was
truant in school and not attending and probably not going to graduate on time and the mom was an active drug addiction the mom went through the residential substance abuse treatment center at Sevier County Jail while the daughter went through the familyenter treatment you matterter program and now they're both doing good. The daughter did graduate on time. The mom has two years clean time and the daughter is going to college. So that that program that DHS already offers is something that is already started but it will take
money in the next general assembly to be put back into that program we'll have to be funded and then we had $18 million that was in Arkansas better dadds which was a program that was actually going into our county jails and our prison system that we're teaching some of these young men how to be dads because if you never had something then you can't be that and if we we do realize that Arkansas suffers from not enough twofamily households so that program was cut and I would just say that we should in this upcoming general assembly we should look
at what we need to do to bring that back because I do think that there was some success being done with that there and I do know that the Southern Baptist association was kind of matching those programs to kind of offset that and and push that through and there were also training those men to go in to be able to do that and that was cut but I think if we review it we can find the money to put it back because that's where it's going to have to be done at. p re s ent ative Tosh you're gonna be the last question
Representative Dwight Tosh
Unverified
3:49:21
thank you Mr Cha I'm over here thank y'all for being here today and I appreciate your comments concerning juveniles and you know as a legislative body what we need to be doing to be able to address those issues I'm just curious
I know we we we passed legislation you know that has a directly dealt with some of the issues that you brought up I'm not sure that you're familiar with that legislation and maybe you are are you familiar with a
988 which dealt with the juvenile sentencing factors are you have you been able to research that and look at that and see the impact that that would have hopefully a positive impact for the juveniles and also Act692 which that bill was the extended juvenile jurisdiction have you had an opportunity to review that and take a look at that particular piece of legislation as it relates to the concerns that you brought before us today
Speaker 244
3:50:23
have reviewed the first one and I and I think that that would be good going into it. I am not familiar with the second bill that you you
Representative Dwight Tosh
Unverified
3:50:36
stated with the juvenile changes.'ll give you that if you want to jot it
down and look it up it's at c t 692 or 2023 started out as Senate Bill406 it's extended juvenile jurisdiction it just expands the circumstances in which extended juvenile jurisdiction be can can
be sought for certain juvenile offenses which you kind of alluded to a while ago affects whether some young offenders remain within a juvenile rehabilitative framework our move into an adult system so that I thought of that statue when as I was listening to your discussion I wanted to make sure you was aware of it in the event you're not it gives you you can look it up and see see if we how that applies and see if there's something we need to do to make that even
a better piece of legislation if you feel like it's not where it needs to be now so I appreciate your time thank you for listening and just
Speaker 244
3:51:38
you explained that maybe I wasn't clear in my explanation. I was more so saying like I'm from a very very rural community where most of our kids that are getting in trouble in juvenile court are getting in trouble for truancy and maybe they busted out a glass window or some stuff like that and whenever we're looking
at those coming into Alexander or even going to Clarksville those kids are coming from Pulaski or coming from Fortsmith that kind of have more they they might have stoleen a car or they might have did something a little bit more serious than what those kids did and we were noticing that our kids were learning new tricks at juvenile and bringing them back to a little rural county that already was having a had a weak system so that is what I was meaning by that not so much as if it was juvenile or adult ok well that helps explain it then so I still think you should look
Representative Dwight Tosh
Unverified
3:52:27
at that statute I think it might be
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
3:52:31
of interest to you thank you sir thank
you thank y'all for being here today thank you for your testimony I am looking to bring several of the reentry folks up at the same time uherry Williams you that says reentrying the name so I'm assuming y'all reentry Paul Chapman is that reentry? partially
the let me move on down Michael jo ni son is that reentry do we need
another chair if y'all would go ahead while we're getting another chair start on the left
my right and introduce yourselves and who you represent Alan Winkler's cityity of faith and
you're with one of these others we're a reentry facility I don't see you on the agenda is why I'm asking
Speaker 271
3:53:53
you witherry that's what I wanted to make sure I'merrie's boss kerry
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
3:53:58
Williams director of specialciervis at City offaith. OK.
Speaker 273
3:54:02
I'm Paul Chapman. I'm the executive director at Restore Hope and this is Janet Kemp ja ne t sorry with restore hope also
Speaker 276
3:54:15
ok And I am Michael Johnnyson. I am the executive director of compassion and action reentry which is a faithbas organization y'all decide who's
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
3:54:24
going to start and tell us what you
want us to hear that will help us reduce prison beds in Arkansas
Speaker 266
3:54:35
I believe do we have theowerPoint that we prepared is it up or do you guys have copies of
Speaker 279
3:54:51
it? we're good either way right cool so thank you for letting us come
Carrie Williams
Unverified
3:55:01
and speak. so real quickly C of faith we've been in existence
for45 years we've been in Arkansas for30 years. we operate the only federal reentry center in Arkansas we have other locations in Louisiana as well asery's department which works with district and circuit courts what we're presenting today is we've we've done this very successfully in the federal framework for a long time we have partners in several states that are excuse me doing this at the state level with excellence recidivism in the teens versus ours in the not teens and so we we just kind of want
to walk through this as it's working in other states maybe we can do some research there. it's working in our facility. We we have a 92% success rate meaning people successfully get out of our program and we have very few people that are coming back so just kind of hang with us there a second. So Arkansas's already making the investment in prisons you know we're spending450 million dollars a year in ADC all these figures were collected from government websites roughly75 a day per person, per offender in our programs and over 16 almost
$17,000 people incarcerated including a family member of mine so the whole idea is we're already investing in these individuals but we're not investing on the back end we're we're putting them in prison but we're giving them no programs on the back end so when a person gets out of prison or when you're in prison if we've all ever seen Shawshank redemption and whenever rooks gets out he doesn't know how to exist and what happens to Brooks it ends poorly for him and we want to stop that from happening and so when you're in prison it's structured there's supervision, there's routine you have
services everything you need is met for you including your clothing and then you get out major environment change sensory overload if you've ever watched someone come out of prison it is and they see a smartphone for the first time it it is it's a sight to behold they they they go through what's called post incarceration syndrome very similar to ptSd when they get on to the community they then have to navigate and figure out employment, housing transportation, family finances
technology. I mean everything we do today I mean this this is fancy this is technology this this would blow their minds so after release so the bureau of justice statistics released a study in 2018. They followed400,000 offenders across30 states and they found that within 3 years68% of those individuals went back or were rearrested after six years, almost 80% after 9 years 83%. so how does Arkansas stack up with that? so we're depending upon whose study you're looking
at I think we range between45 and57% recidivism. my own brother did time and went back two more times so uh've seen it myself and he released me when I was 20 uh50% are are reincarcerated uh62% of those people who are reincarcerated are individuals who are on parole violations and and they're only there because they didn't get a a job or get a driver's license or you know, pay some fines. these aren't major offenses these aren't new these aren't robbing someone or or or capital offenses
so this is this is what the federal government model looks like it is a structured environment there's supervision there's accountability everything we do is a facial recognition I believe as as Mary Beth said earlier our electronic monitoring it is it is a cellphone we have an app we have a phone we have an ankle monitor we have all kinds of really cool toys that these individuals callerry and it brings back their humanity whenever we see somebody with an ankle monitor, we immediately think they're a murder. They probably just didn't pay their taxes. and so we want to human ize them we want them to be able
to go into the community and get jobs that any of us would have and our individuals do have jobs that any one of us have there's constant drug and alcohol testing like I said electronic monitoring there's activity we we we let them go into the community and volunteer we do thousands of hours a year in our host cities a volunteer work we want to give back we wanna make these tax liabilities taxpayers we're gonna make them good citizens and then we excuse me we help them with employment I think I've got some statistics in here it talks
about an employed offender and they're likely to recidivate we also meet their their basic needs such as food and clothing. We do employment counseling we have employment connections. We hosted a job fair last week in LittleRock and had over450 people show up looking for jobs didn't know if they're offenders we didn't ask if you need a job, let's get you a job. let's make our city and our state stronger. they do one on one case management there's mental health treatment cognitive behavioral substance use life skills financial training we rebuild their community ties a lot of our individuals
will go back to these rural counties we service all75 counties in Arkansas. If you can think of an offender you they probably came through our program if they were on the federal side we helped them figure out transition housing we we have supervised activities with their families can come in we do family reunification we did a trunk retreat last year invited all the offenders' kids to come in so they could see mom and dadd in a in in a costume because that's something they haven't seen in a long time so what is the what is the evidence show? so a person who transitions through a community correction center or
residential reentry center or whatever we want to call it only about 24% of those people will recidivate meaning76% of those will not reoffend within three years if they have a direct release and so again this is nationwide52% of those people will recidivate and I use my brother as a prime example. He released to me I was twenty0, he was 23 he released to me it's a terrible plan so what is let's talk about employment full time employment so
of the oh gosh several several 1000 people in resident federal reentry fac facilities throughout the country ty2% of those individuals are working. if we look at people who were direct release only about33 to40%. so let's talk about what that means in tax dollars so assuming you make minimum wage in Arkansas you are contributing about $151,600 in state and local sales tax federally you're contributing about $1700 in taxes
a the cost for a nonworking post conviction offender costs the state of Arkansas roughly $2500 to5,000 dollars in in our government supplied services so tax liability taxpayer so let's look at what other states are doing the states that that are really excelling at this so number one I believe is Virginia Virginia has their recidivism I think around 17% oregon is let's see
they've had33cent reduction in total arrest achieved in their countyle reentry initiatives ohio is right around 20% and I believeerry and I have made great connections with some individuals in Ohio who who have built these programs and and are just so excited and so willing to come share with Arkansas what they've done for the last 40 years and and it's and it's working so let's look at the Ohio model specifically so they spend about $87.7 million a year
in their reentry facilities that is not counting their prisons that is two separate programs they're they're halfway houses they're rede they're reentry facilities same thing and then they have these communitybas correctional facilities orcbCfs those act as a diversion program. those are the two primary things that they're funding as well as a to end homelessness in Ohio all of those things are coming out of that 8 $7 million. So Arkansas is about a little over3 million people. Ohio has 284% more than that
they have about45,000 offenders we have 20,000 that's a that's a difference of 135%. so you can see proportionately we have a lot of people locked up in comparison to states that that are that are doing better than us. uharkansas so our recidivism right somewherewhere between45 and57% over three years. Ohio is down to somewhere around 1718,22%. so what they're doing is they are licensing these private or nonprofit community residential providers
they're contracting beds and services and the and these ser these organizations are providing treatment electronic monitoring employment housing and so this is kind of what I would envision this looks like and and I didn't come up with this this is what we've been doing for45 years this is what the bureau of Prisons has been doing for about66 years the person's in prison then we do an R andR risks and needs assessment they go by tons of different names. I think I heard that OA mentioned earlier it is the gold standard I know personally the gentleman that created it and the team that
that he assembled to do it it is a wonderful wonderful assessment and the thing that Ohio does when you get incarcerated when you go through pretrial you have an assessment that assessment travels with you through your entire time you were in the system. so everyone knows what happened in 2005. what do we need to work on in 26. So from there that dictates where you go. are you a person that needs to stay locked up forever or are you a person who maybe made a mistake when you were eight and we need to try to fix your life now before you go back into the system like my brother did several times
so you would do maybe tier one 90 days in a in a reentry facility. Tier two you get expanded privileges you're still there you're still serving your time. you just get to go home on weekend you get to I don't know go to church go to Walmart tier three we send you home on home confinement. How about we practice what release looks like and in tier four we hand off back to probation and parole they're actively involved the whole time within then that person goes on to probation and parole. I've rented to several state offenders in my own real estate venture and that was
rough that was rough they were these individuals were not prepared to be in the community all right so here's an example tier one you you live at the residential center you have a complete assessment you develop a case plan we figure out what do you need? do you need mental health? Do you need career counseling? you know we get doctors lawyers politicians anybody you can think of we've had them and not all of them need the same thing with people with no education so we're going to start a different path for them than the individual who who has a plumbing certificate
in the community we be begin our employment search we work with work we work with different employers like I said we had uh40 employers in central Arkansas come and help450 people in central Arkansas found work last week and so we had these great and wonderful connections with with employers who believe in second chances they've all read the book Untapped Talent highly recommend you all read it. and then we build a transportation plan we're fortunate in LittleRock to have a a really good bus system in our rural areas we don't have that Arkansas is a rural state and so we have to figure out
what does that look like how are you going to get a to B when they get out of post release they're not going to have a facility taking them around how about we train them to figure out their own transportation later on then we do programming like I said life skills financial relapse prevention and then we do that permanent transition into housing family connections education and stable employment ment like we saw a second ago stable employment will lead to a lower recidivism rate. He sorry tier two you get to go and we can pass the social passes we're working with your family we're we're bringing the
family back in if you think about a soldier that returns to war they've been gone for 18 months. momms had to be mom and dad the whole time.rison system's the exact same way except you're not you're not volunteering to fight for our country. so it's a little bit harder transition when you left your son was5 you come back they're a teenager they don't know who you are we've got to fix that we've got to repair that and then they get to have expanded activities they get a little bit more independence and the whole time they have GPS monitoring on them and and I don't think I heard the figure earlier from Mrhutchinson
about electronic monitoring it doesn't cost so much it is it is it is a very very low price to do electronic monitoring and so then speaking of electronic monitoring we put you out on home confinement you you you get tired of us. We call and wake you up constantly you have to take selfies and prove that you are where you are. Our cellphones are tracking us we use that exact same technology to make sure our residents are where they're supposed to be we're accountable to the entire state of Arkansas and the state of Louisiana and making sure that we are keeping these men and women accountable. we go
see them they come see us we do drug testing they do programming twice monthly we're gonna go out and see them we're just we're gonna go see them at work these like I said these electronic monitoring devices it it's amazing what they can do and then tier tier four we're handing them back off to probation and parole. we're putting them back in the community we're making them responsible citizens and they they now go out and and live their lives so couple key things and this
is why we think that the federal side of this has been so successful I believe in our current reentry program the facility has to provide transportation man I don't know if y'all have looked at gas prices lately that's a tall order to swallow. Insurance on a facility vehicle like this is astronomical. and these individuals were not doing them a service by us always hauling them around they need to learn how to drive again we need to make that available we need to make sure that we are allowing them to have
cell phones we allow our guys to have cell phones how else how else do you get a job? how else do you connect with your kids? You walk up and down our dorms and you will see men and women every single night Facetiming with their kids just think about that not seeing your kids and now you have the ability to do that from your palm. it's amazing it's so life touching to get to see that and then what if they're out in in traffic and they have an emergency they're due back at4 p.m. They hit6:30 in the afternoon if you've ever done6:30 in the afternoon it's it's awful
you're gonna be late you need to call the facility from your handsfree device and let them know I'm coming I promise I'll be there and we can look them up on GPS. and then they have the responsibility to be to be citizens we've trained them we we've made them prepared to reenter our society and start their independence. The other thing is a medical theureau ofrisons does offer free medical to the individuals with the idea that that we we assist them in getting their own insurance
whenever they get out and so by the time they hit our home confinement they're completely self sufficient in their insurance and their medical and then so we we coordinate all that care we make sure that they make these appointments these doctor's appointments these mental health appointments if they need help planning how to get somewhere we helped them install the bus app we help them map routes we hold their hand until they no longer need to hold our hand. so this is what it would look like for Arkansas we would take you would contract with facilities and and
ask them to do this continuum of care you take 100 beds and this is just simple ma take 100 beds times 90 days in in the facility we can flip these beds every every6 months I believe I heard earlier the dollar figure50 dollars a day I think in reality you're probably a lot closer to60,65 a day to fund a program in today's economic situation still a lot cheaper than75 and you can turn these beds twice minimum twice in one year versus a prison bed that's gonna stay
full for the entire year sorison bed costs $27,000 a year, these beds would cost significantly less I mean maybe $8000 a year just free math when they go home confinement you reduce the rate we're we're we're we're stepping down the ORA has so much proven science that that makes sense and so in closing kind of what we're looking at the BOP state of Ohio, state of Virginia, state of oregon countless countless other states are doing this they're contracting with
providers to offer this. I think I heard someone say the experts in the room, well these are your experts in the room these are the right ones to ask to do this and then you would we we need to implement an R andR an assessment that travels with the person we all agree from system to system to system. this is the thing we use this is our gold standard. this is how we know how this person transitions. so we go from incarceration to structured transition community responsibility handed off to probation and parole and then eventually community independence. that's all
Erry Williams
Unverified
4:11:42
Who's next I'll just again thank you for allowing us to be here. My name iserry Williams and I worked with Arkansas Community Corrections for 28 years and I retired from the state of Arkansas in 2022. so you heard a little bit about the reentry programs that was currently created I was privileged to be part of Act 1190 in2015 and at that point we were trying to you know project the whole state forward and how do we move reentry and
then it just kind of got smothered we tried to model the state reenter programs after city of faith, um, because they do give the individuals real reentry freedom. They come to us they're put on a monitor and then they go to work they can drive a car, they can take their kids to the movies and they are still considered inmates and part of the label that Arkansas was still putting in the restrictions and I hate to hear that Miss Garrett's getting out of that because she is one of the best ones that we had licensed in 2018 was there is a lot of restrictions
on the facilities and the individuals just feel like they're going from incarceration to like a work release. there's still technically incarcerated. they can't go to Walmart, you know they can't they can't go out with evenings with their families. I'm not sure what monitoring system the state of Arkansasas still uses but we did transition from the ankle device to a mobile and an app. we also provide hundreds of online courses that are available we've contracted with some of the state local courts
and jurisdictions for postre release and some prerelea to be on the monitor they can continue to work and be at home. so he mentioned a little bit about an R&R that was one of the big things that I have always been a proponent of is to have an assessment from day one whether you want it day one of incarceration or day one of arrest and that needs to follow that individual through a reentry program to their transition out whether it's directly home, whether it's home confinement, whether it's to a transitional house and the community and we have tons of resources and you're going to
hear some of the great ones here with Paul and his team and then the other one is the I heard you talk about some legislation to structure these license transitional houses with Nar or whatever audit tool you choose to use, there definitely needs to be some. we closed down several transitional houses while I was with the state just because they weren't providing what they said they were providing on their application so we may lose some
beds and you may say how is that going to save Arkansas but you're going to have more credentials and you're going to have better beds because some of the ones that we have now actually are doing more damage than good the individuals get an application apply they don't really know where they're going they're going to the first house that accepts them. So what are they getting when they get there? so that's two of the big things that I see was yes we need an assessment that's going to follow an individual and we need the licensed reentry and transitional facilities to be a little bit more accountable
Speaker 273
4:14:57
we have a higher quality thank you thank you Mr Chairman I'm Paul Chapman I'm with Restore Hope we started about 10 years ago I was the missions pastor atellowship Bible Church. We had a wonderful relationship with corrections and foster care and about 10 years ago we were having a real problem with the number of Arkansans that we had in prison. We had
finished a about a fouryear run of double digit increase in the number of of folks that we incarcerated and the number of children in foster care was about the same growth curve and so we were we were dealing with those twin crises and at fellowship we had invested a lot in in both child welfare and imprisoned over a number of years and and had many of our members and some staff directly engaged in partnerships to try to help recidivism but it became apparent
that in about 2015 that we were not going to be able to regardless of how much money or effort we could put at it how that we were not going to be able to grow a program or a series of programs large enough to deal with the issues so we we took a step back we started working with the governor's office at that time on an idea called collective impact could we come up with a model and a set of tools that included technology to provide to communities so that community could actually partner together
and be really aware of what was going on both at a community level across several different factors and at an individual level that needs access or is engaged in multiple different siloed organizations or agencies and so it took us several years and we and we built the first one of those models in Fortsmith, Arkansas. and and now it's in just over 20 counties in Arkansas and we're trying to work to get it
across the state using that collaborative model these tools provided to communities to be able to help them help their own citizens in the last 12 months as of this morning there were4,67 Arkansans that were in crisis multiple areas of crisis who needed help and just over 1100 of them as of this morning had moved out of crisis and on to full time work we call that kind of crisis to career that's what these local alliances will
organize to do is to try to provide the services and to realize which services are actually needed as Alan said earlier that's an individual journey depending upon the assessment and the situation that each person's in but this help is in every one of our communities or it's close to it in our smaller communities we just need to be able to coordinate our actions and then find out through our efforts so what what happened to the individual and what's happening
in our communities and so we have a collaborative case management software calledhopeub that provides all of that intelligence it's also hippourpacopa compliant that allows multiple on average 10 different agency providers whether they'd be nonprofit or or agency state or local government personnel to be able to talk on behalf of one person to try to help them get out of the trouble they're in and move on so with all that as preface I
wanted to come here today and suggest to you that one of the things that we found through our data gathering over the years is that district courts are very very important I think in being able to both find people who are on their way to catching a felony and possible incarceration at the state but also the number of people that are getting out of prison returning to the community that have outstanding issues in district court is very very large. it's the majority that we can find so
far it's above50%. so district courts are where we're prosecuting a lot of our misdemeanor crimes in Arkansas if you get a speeding ticket and you don't show up and you don't pay you'll get a failure to appear and a failure to pay and in about30 days after getting one of those then we will suspend your driver's license to issue a warrant for your arrest. the number of people that are
are living lives that that need some engagement or or pretty large that4,607 people that we've served in the last 12 months ourkansans about30% of them have an outstanding district court issue which means that district court working with district court judges is a place that we can find people who are on their way to getting in much more severe trouble harming themselves and possibly their family and maybe some others
and then requiring interventions that are a lot more expensive like putting their kids into foster care and them inside of one of our facilities and and either both of those act making someone award of the state makes it much more complex than when we're trying to if you're a child to go on and and and grow into an adult or when you're coming back into the community which makes folks in our in our persons do
so we have partnered with the attorney general a few years ago and and a few district court judges to be able to run some programs which we have data on and we'd love to share with you and with any of you that are that are interested we can have a meeting and show you the dashboards and answer any of your questions and do any follow ups but I will tell you that the coordination of all the different actors that are needed or required to be involved in someone's life who's in multiple
areas of crisis is something that does yield good. if we take a child into foster care in Arkansas with the goal of placing that child back with the guardian taken from them were only successful43% of the time but as of this morning when the dashboard updated of everyone that had a foster care case that has been closed now and that was had a support team that reunification rate was73%
so43 to73% with another just over 16% placed with relative and the fact that I'm able to tell you that today we have statistics outcome statistics on people in Arkansas is is really something given where we were 10 years ago where we might wait for a quarterly report or an annual report to try to figure out at a large level what what was really going on so that we can tell what's going on is a big deal and if we can actually measure it then we can start to attempt to manage it
to try things and see if it's working or not.umber 2 is I want I want to get back to the the district court and I want Janet to share with you what she is doing she's overseeing both the district court program that we call the smart justice programme and the 1033 reentry pilot program which is almost a year in action and both of those things have have displayed one is we need
the coordination and number 2 is district courts we have to be engaged in a district court provides a great opportunity to try to divert someone to get them and to help some will accept that help and then that's it for them they're on they've got their clear legally they're helping address their issues they're getting employment and we don't need any more interventions as a state right for those that don't we need to inside a prison we need to be able to actually partner together and find out
what what's outstanding and what do those judges want and demand from those individuals and we can do that before they're released janet good afternoon thank you
Speaker 296
4:23:20
for having me. if it's OK, I'd like to start with the work that we are doing in the district courts under themart justice initiative.mind us who you are and who you represent. Sure Janet Camp, I'm with reststore Hope. I'm the director of judicial services. you should have a handout in your packet that just briefly identifies the various points across both of these initiatives excuse me just a second exhibit C3
thank you senator Clark so when we look at the need for prison bed space we look at the sequential interstep model which is a national recognized model and how we can intervene in different points along somebody's involvement in the criminal justice system to make the biggest impact and so for both of the initiatives that I'm going to talk about today we see ourselves on both the front end of that with the district court work and on the back end of that with governor Sanders 1033 reentry program within themart justice arena we
are working with a small group of pilot courts around the state that are implementing these services within their court and it is very it is more simple than maybe I can describe it. We place a case manager within the district court that can help an individual that comes before the court that has an identified need across any of the 13 social determinants of health to get access or connection to existing resources in their community so the navigator is working in those courts know about the existing resources in their
community. um, oftentimes there are resources that may not be available in their exact county but we can partner with an adjacent county or virtually partner we do that quite often with mental health counseling and some of the more desert areas of the state but that navigator works to connect individuals with with a provider as a coordinator works with a provider across all of those social determinants of health that you see listed there on the front page it's a a very
straightforward eligibility criteria for this program so it's not nearly as cumbersome as some of the others court programs that you may see we ask that they are an adult that they voluntarily agree to participate in case management services and that they have been referred by one of the judicial partners whether that is the judge or the prosecuting attorney. Across those, I have a couple of statistics that I could point out to you but I I would also echo Paul we'd love to actually get into the dashboards with you and show more of these ind deth. This funding as Paul mentioned comes
from attorney general Griffin so this has been about a twoyear pilot program we have so far served536 participants of those536 participants,449 have actively engaged in case management meaning they have continued to engage throughout that initial six month voluntary commitment. so 84% of those have engaged at employment or at intake their employment rates have been about39.8%urrent employment rates are right at60%
and employment retention rates are right around 90%. so we are able to help individuals get connected with employment and then you'll see the number at the top of your other handout that's averaging about7,300 dollars a year annually for an individual's income increase within their household is how it's calculated. so we consider that on the preventative side of that sequential intercept model within a preventative measure I'll shift over to the
governor's 1033 reentry initiative which is on the tail end of the the model this is in the first year of this pilot program and so far we've served 97 individuals that have come through the work that we are doing it is a collaborative effort across many state agencies and the University of Arkansas pulaski Tech. we are using the Hopeub software to collaborate and communicate about these participants that are going through these individuals are housed at the department of Corrections central Arkansas Community Correction Center just
right here in LittleRock. they initially come into our program we on board them sign all of the required consent so that we can onboard all of this partner agencies on average we have about 16 active agencies that are all engaged with the work of these 97 men that are that are going through this work it it extends into five cohorts. So within one cohort there are 20 gentlemen. they are in class and receiving case management services for tel weeks and then there's a graduation ceremony
that is put on by Pulaski Tech to acknowledge the different credentials that they obtain. They obtain a credential with OSHA certification, they obtain a a credential for a future fit course that is offered through Pulaski Tech and their career readiness cert certification but the goal in all of that is all of the state agencies breaking down those silos so that we can work together to address the needs of the participants so we have partnerships with Department of Health, the Department of Education, the department of finance and
Administration who has been remarkable and they really have been a remarkable partnership to address the outstanding driver's license issues that plague both themart justice participants and the 1033 participants. I I would be remiss to to leave out our district court judges that are helping us along the way with those driver's license issues that come into play we have partnerships with Department of commerce department of Corrections and community corrections obviously. within that and so I'm hesitant to give you too much
data about this information because it is a relatively new program but we are seeing remarkable outcomes for those individuals who engage in prerelea planning prior to their release from the department of Corrections and the correlation between the offender violation scores that they are receiving three months postre release from the department. so I will give you a couple of these. there are a couple of groups that we are not at that three month post release mark. for cohort one and two which averaged a release date of
February 18,2026. 9ty2% of those have obtained employment and of the well we'll get to OvG cohort3 and4, the average release date was May16,2026. their employment is around the same58% cohortive and6 average release date was July17th of 2026 and their employment rate is 98%. across all of these the those that have engaged in prerelea planning and ongoing case
management engagement with our primary providers in working in the communities that they are paroling out to we see a substantial decrease in the number of OVG points that they are acquiring. So75.6% lower for those who have participated in pre-release assessments amongst those that have not if you're not familiar with OVG points, I can give you just a rundown but I would love to come back and have our partners from the department ofrections explain that in more detail
because there are a variables across what points um, can accumulate based on the severity of a violation but but for anyone that has ever acquired a OVG point across these groups. we're looking at34 of those individuals that have been released. their average OVG point is3% or I'm sorry3 points those that did not are averaging el points which is a substantial difference across across
those and then if if we actually get down into the the dashboard data for you you would see that those that have acquired OBG points are often the result of additional felony offenses so those that are not engaged in prerelea planning and case management are then going on to commit additional criminal offenses upon release and while they're on parole. part of the components for both of these initiatives is we operate a service within restore hopepe called legal resolution and each
month we help individuals across all initiatives so through the 100 Families initiative that you may be familiar with themart justice initiative and with the 1033 initiative we are working with the department of finance and Administration and their driver services division to assess and review individuals driver's license and then we go into to work with those individual courts and mitigate outstanding issues just in the month of September our team was able to review3 90 driver's license suspensions and of those we were able to
help 86 people reinstate their driver's license by meeting the criteria that are identified by driver services we also do a few other things within legal resolution which I can just briefly mention but we also provide assistance with record sealing. so in the month of September we assisted with 11 petitions to seal and then of those on the 1033 reentry work we were able to help those gentlemen coming out of the department of Corrections. so 20 gentlemen
coming out of the department of corrections that still had outstanding warrants and holds 1el of those we were able to help get the cases resolved one way or another. that may be by virtual appearance and have a disposition that may be a nll pros and dismissal of the case or it could could be the resolution of an outstanding warrant by service. OK Mr. Johnson thank you very good
Speaker 276
4:33:03
my name is Michael Johnningson good afternoon chairman and members of the committee I am the executive director of compassion and action reentry we are a faithbased organization and we do apply the holistic approach which is complete clear complete care all inclusive service and addressing the entire persons issues and needs
thank you for allowing me the opportunity to speak with you today about two issues I come to find that there are really3 issues now that affect individuals families, communities and public safety across Arkansas reentry and recidivism and reducing beds in the Arkansas department of Correction. When I was asked to speak about the subject I wanted to make sure I approached it with
accurate Arkansas specific information though as stated later the addendum was the big picture. it's reducing bed space in our prison system. I believe we are still on the right track because to accomplish the big picture reentry and the reduction of recidivism is what will make the big picture attainable. because this conversation is bigger than statistics a whole lot of numbers have already been given. I don't want to repeat
the same numbers that has already for the sake of time but behind every statistic is a person behind that person is a family and it's already been noted that behind those families are our communities so today I want to talk about what the numbers tell us and what I have seen on the ground through compassion and action reentry and why I believe Arkansas needs to continue strengthening and connecting
between incarceration supervision treatment and communitybased reentry. let me begin by making an important distinction reentry and recidivism are related but they are not the same thing Reentry is the process of returning to the community where recidivism does the measuring of those reentering every person
I believe when we start talking about reducing bed space I believe every person that has a charge of a violent charge number one I don't believe that every charge is a violent charge. I'll give you an example young man, young woman trying to support the habit goes into the store they steal something to support that habit they run away.
a simple theft turns because they ran into a robbery charge. robber's considered a a a violent charge there are other instances that charges does not necessarily mean that they are violent but when they be when they appear before the parole board this is what they see the violent charge I'm saying this because there are people that actually have those type of charges that are
considered violent that doesn't make that person violent I don't believe. I believe that person does just as the ladies before me spoke of what they do when they're trying to support their addiction. addiction is addiction is stronger than most people really take a closer look at but now I want to go a step further we've got to talk about those numbers now what does those numbers tell us? that's what's important
those numbers should get our attention and in getting our attention they should cause us to ask a more important question what happens between the prison gate and the point where someone either succeeds or comes back to prison because release is not the end of the process in many ways it's the beginning. here's the challenge Arkansas has a large community
supervision population as of december31st,2024 I've noticed no one mentioned this so I'll give you these numbers we have a approximately according to the report of AdC70,000859 people across the supervision categories including parole, probation, specialty courts suspended imposition of sentence and other supervisional statutes that is a tremendous
number of people living in our community under some form of correction supervision and that means reentry is not a small issue it's a statewide issue it's an employment issue it's a housing issue it's a behavioral health issue it's a family issue it's public safety issue and it is an economic issue. Arkansas already recognizes the community's supervision is supposed to do
more than simply monitor people. The AdC says that community supervision services mission includes public safety reststitution and rehabilitating people into productive members of our communityunity supervision officers address risk and needs through referrals to counseling and programming drug testing enforcement and supervision conditions that is important because it means the
state recognizes that accountability and rehabilitation have to work together Arkansas's own research gives us some insights through the data that is already presented that same research found that those certain groups the younger group 18 to24 are more likely to reoffend at the same time the analysis found that education attainment and release offense were not
statistically associated with recidivism in that particular model what that tells me is that we cannot look at reentry through only one lens there's no single reason that every person succeeds just as there's no single reason that every person fails people come home with different histories different risk, different strengths, different families, different educational backgrounds different employment
histories and behavioral health needs that means our response cannot be one size fits all supervision is important but supervision cannot do everything I want to be clear about something I have a tremendous respect for the men and women who work in corrections and community supervision this is not about blaming probation officer's parole officers or correction facilities in fact the AdC has
recognized that community supervision involves case load managementreatment for referrals programming and local resource development but an officer cannot be everything to everybody a supervision officer cannot be a therapist cannot be an employer a housing provider and mentor transportation provider a pastor a family counselor or a case manager. The question
should not be what can the government do by itself. The question should be how can government and the community work together to give people a realistic opportunity to succeed while maintaining account ability and protecting public safetyhavial health deserves a serious place in this conversation compassion and action has been working with men and women through the prison that comes
out or not going through the prison system per se but compassion and action has worked with every court from district circuit and federal court level 95% of the people that are in compassion and action were court ordered through one of those courts and it's because they have seen the results of the people that they court order into compassionate action
now the ADc already recognizes mental health. In fact they have given us some some some numbers that say that they have already diagnosed72% of women with dag with with with mental health issues55% of men incarcerated with mental health issues that's a serious issue when you start looking at reducing bed space. there are people that incarceration is not
gonna ever assist because of their mental health needs and their mental health issues yes we need accountability but we also need access to the services that make successful accountability possible this is where compassion and action comes in I am not here today to suggest that compassion action can solve all Arkansas reentry problems there are other like modellos out there no single organization
can solve all Arkansas reentry problems. I am here to tell you what we are seeing on the ground and to offer compassion and action as one example of the type of community partnership that can complement the state's work to date of those who complete compassion and action we have a 96% success rate that's meaning only a4% people have reentered the prison system
that's doing work because of what we do with the holistic approach the whole person the mind the soul and the body because if you have one person in the addiction problem they still messed up in the head we have to deal with the whole person in order to deal with the whole issue and this is why compassion and action has been successful in turning men and
women out into the communities where they are working everyday they have a relationship with God. they are actually in church places that they never even ventured they'd ever be. I had two men that were college grads a few years ago one was on the dean's list at Shorter College. These are the things that help people realize as has already been said they have purpose they believe that
incarceration was only a chapter of the book not the entire book of their life because they have learned that they get to write the next chapter but they get to write the next chapter by applying the goals that they would like to accomplish in their lives. This is where we walk with them to help them accomplish their goals not the goals of compassion and action other than the principles that we apply compassion and action as stated is a faithbas program and as the
person comes home we make sure that they have employment. I have job partners that will hire them because as already been said people are not just gonna quickly hire you over a person who has no record so I go out and knock on doors and provide them with people that will work that will work when they're there that will be there when they're supposed to be there and they don't have to look for them when they're there because they learn how to go the
extra mile don't just blend in like a tree in the forest and do what everybody else is doing they are taught how to give an under this day's work for Ho day's pay. now we know that some of these people they may need education they may need help developing life skills. They may need mentoring, they may need help rebuilding family relationships they may need transportation they may need housing resources they may need behavioral help
and substance use services and they may need someone who will walk with them long enough for those pieces to come together we want people to return to society prepared to live responsibly work and contribute and remain connected to their communities a holistic approach does not mean that the same approach is for everyone. one of the things I believe strongly is that we cannot use again one size fits all even in that area because
every person has different needs one individual may need assistance with employment literacy that's one of the things that need to be back into the prison system can't read or write how they expected to get parole if that's on their purpose to be released that they have to get a Gedd while they're there. that's never gonna happen. We have to make it realistic because at
some point I did do literacy at to Barbaber Ester unit but it was lost funding I teach two days a week at the barbaraceste unit life skills teach them about another program that we lost which was better days. these men were eating it up because as has already been said if you didn't have a father in your home, how you gonna know the importance of what of how a father develops
that child how the balance works and these men were proud to know that they had a big role in the child's life now is so the conversation happening here is not separate from what Arkansas has already identified as important it is as important of the in the same conversation we need the community at the table if we are serious about reducing recidivism organizations that are actually working with returning citizens
need a meaningful place also at the table in order to realistically reduce bed space in our Arkansas prisons that includes faithbas organizations nonprofits or employershaal help providers educators housing providers families and it includes people with lived experience. I do have lived experience this is something that lets everybody know that it is all
possible when you make a decision to allow God in your life to control your life and allow him to be everything that you say you want to become but you're not going to be it without even David said it created me a clean heart because you can't create it in your own self a clean heart. Only God can do that so what I am asking the committee to consider I would respectfully ask that Arkansas continues to look at
reentry as an ongoing rather than a single event look at what happens before release. look at the transition from incarceration to supervision look at what happens during the first month in a community look at employment housing transportation behavioral health substance use treatment mentoring and look at the community organizations already doing the work. in closing members of the committee
I began by saying that these are more than statistics I want to end with this as well when we talk about49.6% threeyear recidivism rate we're talking about thousands of individuals we're talking about thousands of human beings. we're talking about mothers and fathers, sons and daughters, brothers and sisters and neighbors potential employees, business owners mentors, parents, productive members of our
community the goal of reentry should not simply be to release someone the gold should be to give that person a realistic opportunity to successfully remain in the community while maintaining accountability and protecting public safety compassion and action is committed to being a part of that effort we are not asking the state to believe that one program can solve a statewide problem. We are asking for partnership where
I ask him for collaboration let's not just talk about reentry. let's build it. that's all I have Thank
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
4:51:33
you thank y'all for being here the uhpresentative Tos thank you excuse me thank you
Representative Dwight Tosh
Unverified
4:51:39
Mr Chair I just want to make a I'll be brief just a couple of points that one I'm I'm heard the district courtsment quite a bit and I think y'all alluded to that I guess you're
familiar with the bill that we passed during the last session the post post postpone of judgment I I know you're familiar with that. I just want to say something briefly at this point and I really appreciate all the testimony we've heard today the so many people have said at that table and I've heard a lot and I just heard you say that you know behind every statistic is a is a personbi
every person is a family and then you listed who these individuals that were incarcerated that it being neighbors and the mothers fathers brothers sisters the list goes on but I'll tell you one thing and I guess it bothered me a little bit that I've not heard any discussion about today at all and that's the victims and you know as you said those incarcerated behind every
statistic is a person will pine ever statistic that has become a victim is also a person and behind that person is also a family and as legislators and as former law enforcement officers and you know the courts we're constantly hearing from victims and victims families that we've not addressed that I just wanna put this out here we've not addressed the fact that you know sometimes their boy is not heard
and and and I'm not saying I know y'all are here and you've done a great job today ever presenter has and it's really been interesting but somewhere along the way the victim's boys I hadn't heard that anybody for them today myself and so I guess I just kind of want to speak up for them a little bit and let make sure that we never lose sight that somebody was the victim of a crime and and we always need to remember that and we hear that
from the victims I know I do and other legislators do and the judicial system does as as to why that individual being released from prison after the the horrific crime that they committed against a loved one or you know whether it be the victim or the victim's family so I just thought I'd mention that and since I hadn't heard anything today and thank you all for indulging me to listen to what I had to say Mr Chairman, thank you I just want
to make that brief comment thank you senatorimmon thank
Representative Keith Brooks
Unverified
4:54:39
being here. to me it's apparent based on the numbers that everybody shared that reentry proper reentry works and we need to make sure that we and we need to make sure that we have proper reentry that that has been made very clear to me and and Mr Chair I would like to ask a bill or if we could get a list of all of the reentry facilities in the state that are receiving public
funding I would like to see that and we'll get
Representative Keith Brooks
Unverified
4:55:07
you very much and and what what the work that y'all do I truly believe it saves lives it doesn't just keep people out of prison it keeps potentially another innocent person from being victimized. So thank you all for the work that you do. Miss Williams, I do want to ask you about the electronic monitoring sir just a little bit more detail about that so I know the
technology that we have available today is vastly different than it was even 10 years ago. you mentioned ankle monitors and now they're just using cellphones or cellphonelike devices what is to keep them from just leaving the cellphone at home or the device at home and then going out and wreaking havoc. Yes sir and we get that question a lot and
Erry Williams
Unverified
4:55:51
when I started with City offaith, I started as a case manager and then transitioned into this as to what we could do to help give
back to the courts to help relieve some of the jail overcrowding and cityity of faith transitioned from the ankle monitor traditional like you heard Mary Beth say that she had left a scar on her leg to a mobile device. It is just like the cellphone that you and I carry around, it can be locked down it is 100% facial recognition always on GPS and we have a dashboard that we could present to anybody to show that we have around the clock supervision. so they don't know as far as leaving it at home, they don't know when they're
going to get a checkin. If they don't respond to that check in the phone won't stop number one if they haven't responded within5 minutes of the first alert, then it goes to the call center. The call center will call them, try to make contact then it goes to the next level through a cultry. so we haven't had that if they leave their phone they can't turn it off they can't turn it down and they can't turn off their tracking, they can't access the internet on it so it's good for both sides whether you've got domestic violence offenders or
you've got sex offenders it can be locked down to where it's just they can call or text their case manager and that's all they can do and yeah we're right now in seven courts that they're using as pre and post release they're putting the individual on the monitor. The individual is paying for it. Now if it's a highri even if they set $250,000 bond and an individual comes up with $25,000. somebodybody's going to want to know why they're in the community. So one of the conditions they're making in
Pope County is they're going to be on this electronic monitor. Like I said the individual's paying for it and if they're highris we have a connect which is aluetooth device that we can also connect to the individual it's a lot smaller it's about the size of a smartwatch and they get out of Bluetooth range from the mobile then it goes off. The call center's alerted and then the next person in the call tree is also alerted. we do have an app for the lowris individuals that they can download for the ones that live in our we have 120 bed residential facility in
LittleRock that you're all welcome to come visit and those individuals have their own phone and they have an app always on GPS if they try to take it off their phone we're notified if they try to turn their location off we're notified. I mean from everything and our case managers can monitor everything that they do from the dashboard and from an app a supervis or app that they have on their phone so they can be out in the field or they can be you know on lunch break and they're going to get an alert that this individual is out of the zones. We set restrictions down just the same
way with with every tool that we use. we do have the victim notification option. so if you do have a victim of a domestic or a sexual offense, then they can be as well alerted when that individual gets within their space or gets out of a space that they're not allowed to be at so it can work a geo fence kind of like a geo fence around
Speaker 309
4:58:58
a certain area that they if so if they enter that area then an alert goes off and notifies the call center or the yes sir or
Erry Williams
Unverified
4:59:07
whoever we wants to be in the call tree. It could go to 911 if it's a domestic or a sexual offense. it could go straight to 911 so that they can send officers to their location and anybody that's on you know that's supervising has access to the dashboard so so they
Representative Keith Brooks
Unverified
4:59:23
get dinged and and then they have to it's facial recognition so then they have to prove where they are and if it does not recognize them then
Erry Williams
Unverified
4:59:36
it'll say no match and the call center calls
them, contacts them and says this is a no match you need to retake your photos so if it's dark like they get an alert say at 11 o'clock at night because the their work history and it doesn't recognize them because they're in a dark room they'll it will keep going off until they retake it to where it identifies them as the individual. OK
Speaker 68
4:59:57
and everybody that's under your supervision, you have a dashboard that you can see real time at all times where they are yes
Erry Williams
Unverified
5:00:04
sir and we have 88 not mistaken on home confinement right now across the
state of Arkansas that are using the mobile device. they are still considered inmates because they haven't been released from their BOP time to probation so they once they meet that eligibility date, they go live at their home. they go to work every day, they drive, they they go to the grocery store you know they have to have a pass which they put in on the smartphone. and that gives the case manager permission to approve it if it's not reentryfoed like somebody said think it was Marybeth got to go to her kid's graduation, kindergarten
graduation with the use of this ankle monitor and we've had several been able to walk their daughters you know, across the homecoming field as homecoming queen with this
Speaker 309
5:00:51
technology better to do that with a cellphone than a ankle
Erry Williams
Unverified
5:00:54
monitor and everybody takes selfies so yes sir it's been very successful and then we have the portable alcohol monitoring that is also facial recognition. it's always on GPS tracking we use it a lot in one of the district courts for DUIs they're put on this some up to a
year some up to6 months and it's random as well. They get alert, they got to stop, they they gotta open the app and it has to identify them they blow it also records it and sends it to the case manager or the probation officer with the district court. I guess the last question is
Representative Keith Brooks
Unverified
5:01:29
what's going to prevent them from forgetting to charge their phone is that just like a missed check in or forgetting to charge their device we can the
Erry Williams
Unverified
5:01:36
system can run just about every report you want but you can do like a case manager can pull up a map
of everybody on their caseload and anybody in reddit's gonna tell you that they're either one out of zone or two their battery's low and then the call center will call them and tell them they need to plug their phone. If it gets below
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
5:01:59
20% thank you chair thank y'all for being here thank you for your testimony and thank you for what you do
we're we're gonna we have at least one more that represents reentry facilities Jim Bell is there
anybody else that on the agenda that represents reentry I'm
sorry OK I've got Jim Bell and anikaixxon andir ok I don't OK you're came to speak from the public we don't have you on the agenda so we'll get to you
if we can I've got Jim
Bell and Anikaixxon. if y'all could introduce yourselves turn your mics on introduce yourself and who you represent
Speaker 321
5:03:02
you I'm annikaixxon representing Shebid as the founder and executive director and I'm Jim Bell I'm
Speaker 323
5:03:09
on the board of directors at theoolf Street Foundation and I own what's called hidden Creek reentry facility.
Speaker 321
5:03:22
first I can go first Shebe understands that the legislator is looking at the bigger question of how Arkansas can reduce the number of prison beds it needs in the future we believe one important part of that conversation is what happens after someone leaves prison. If women return home without stable housing employment transportation life skills and a support system the
transition becomes much harder. Shebi works in that space helping women prepare for release rebuilding their lives and becoming stable productive members of their community. We are not saying reentry alone solves the prison bed issue. we're saying that if Arkansas wants fewer people returning to incarceration successful community reentry has to be a part of the infrastructure According to AdC apartment excuse me Arkansas Department of Correction as of September 1st
there were approximately 1,347 women incarcerated when we go back to the statistics from 2010 to2024 that's an increase of42.2% so how would she beed understanding a part of this conversation we're understanding that the larger conversation before the house and Senate committee is not simply about reentry the larger question is how can Arkansas reduce the number of prison beds it needs in the future while creating safer
communities and better outcomes for individuals returning home. We believe that the question requires looking beyond what happens inside the correctional facility and paying closer attention to what happens before during and after a woman returns to the community Sheil focuses on just that transition. Our position is if a woman is going to return to Arkansas communities. we need to build a better job preparing her to succeed once she gets home where does she bill fit into
this? Our work includes reentry preparation and empowerment, employment and career readiness financial literacy and money management, housing stability and independent slash shared housing opportunities, transportation support life skills and decision making mentoring and positive support systems family and personal stability connection to community resources and continued encouragement and accountability after release. Our less reststar program is
designed to help women begin thinking beyond just getting out of prison or completing their basic sentence we want them to think what does my life look like when I get home. and what am I going to do differently this time. Our message to Arkansas policymakers if Arkansas wants to reduce the number of prison beds it needs over time we believe the state must invest in the things that may help people stay out of prison after they return home. this means just practical
questions for the women we're working with. where does she live How will she get to work? How will she support herself? does she have an identification card in the documents she needs does she have employment skills? does she understand how to manage a paycheck a bank account, transportation and household expenses does she have positive people around her? Does she have somewhere safe to go? who is going to help her when she encounters the first major
obstacle after her release. those questions may sound simple but they can determine whether a person's successfully transitions back into community or eventually becomes a part of the cycle that brings them back into the criminal system. She bills roe is not to replace the state She bill does not suggest that nonprofit organizations can solve Arkansas prison bed issues by themselves. we do believe that this requires a partnership among corrections courts policymaker law
enforcement, employers, housing providers, behavioral health and social service organizations, family, faith, communities and communitybas organizations but nonprofit can provide something government systems often cannot provide as effectively the consistent personal communitybas relationships that continue after a woman walks out of the prison gate. That relationship matters and we have seen that with Shebe. what we would like policymakers to consider as
Arkansas discusses the future prison bed it needs we encourage policymakers to also examine the infrastructure necessary to make successful reentry possible. This includes investments in prerelea preparation communitybas reentry organizations that can help women before and after release, transitional and stable housing for women returning to the community, loyment and workforce partnerships willing to provide legitimate opportunities to
justiceim impacted individuals transportation solutions particularly for individuals returning to communities where public transportation is limited because we do have to think the state that we're in. life skills and financial literacy programming that prepares individuals for the practical responsibility of independent living, postrelea mentoring in the accountability rather than ending support the day the individual leaves the facility. Measurement of alkons including employment, housing stability and successful
completion of reentry programs and return to incarceration. How does this bigger picture look? Shevie believes that the conversation should should not simply be how many prison beds do we need we should also ask what would Arkansas have to build in our community so that fewer beds are needed in the future that is what organizations like SheBuild have a role. We are willing to be a part of the conversation, not because we believe we have every answer but because we are working directly with the women we are trying to restart their
lives we see the challenge up close we also see the potential and we believe Arkansas has the opportunity to build a stronger bridge between incarceration and successful community living. Shebi wants to help build that bridge our goal is simplepare women to return equip women to rebuild support women to remain stable and to help create communities where a successful reentry is possible. I've also had an opportunity to work with part of our partnership is
Girlscouts. I'm not sure how many of us have thought about the age between 13 and 16 last year I had an opportunity to meet five of these future leaders who had they had been angry, they had been fighting so if they made one more bad choice they were going to go to the juvenile facility and so part of our partnerships with situations such as that is looking at answering the
question OK how do we stop that before they end up going to McPhersonrison or our other female facilities so thank you for this opportunity and I opened the floor to any questions yes several
Speaker 323
5:10:45
years ago I want to say about 18 years ago I got involved in the volunteer business atrisons as before I became the owner of hidden Creek or before I got on the board of Wall Street. and what I noticed in the original volunteer work the
biggest problem that I kept seeing is that people in prison kept paroling out to small town Arkansas to live with her mother Now we all know the result The only people that they knew in small town Arkansas was their criminal friends they're alcoholic friends their addict friends and a few relatives so they kept getting the same thing they got before which is they ended up back in prison so
I was on the board of directors of a place called uuapa House in Hot Springs. We were the largest substance abuse of fealty assu facility in the state and we started getting involved with trying to help people coming out of prison and I realized that some of the biggest things that we could do is try to number one get these people a job ber 2 without transportation they were doomed and I kept seeing all these people today that keep leaving the
prison system with no transportation I think it's a $100 check they don't have a driver's license they don't have an Id they don't have a social security card and they don't have a birth certificate. now their chances are pretty slim. so here we are down at hidden Creek with the reentry facility we do all of those things I just mentioned they don't leave there without birth certificate Id social security card and an automobile
if they leave without an automobile we know they're probably going to fail because they don't have transportation so what happens in the reentry facilities the way it's done here is that every month we are basically saving their paycheck until they get out so when they get out and I want to say30 days before they get out we start trying to help them find an automobile and it's sitting out there in the parking lot so that when they graduate
they can get in their car and drive off now remember the rules of re entry require the reentry people the inmates for 21 days to come to our facility and get acclimated and that's driver's license birth certificates you name it then on the 22nd day we put them to work we've had such great success with the employers that finding the job is easy. I keep hearing people say all these poor
inmates can't get a job that's erroneous and we have employers say please send us more people because one they're gonna get there every day we take them we're gonna bring them back every day they're drug tested twice a week they can't have a cellphone they can't drive so they're dependable employees, many of which get get raises before they leave our facility now keep in mind our recidivism rate the last time it was checked is 23%.
which is a little better than half the the recidivism rate for the Adc as a whole I think I think what I see happening and I wish we could change is that there's some policies that an example there the Adc requires our people to pay cash for an automobile to leave our facility and we said why do that? let me tell you the answer well because if if if they get a
loan from a bank and they go back to prison, the bank's gonna get mad and blame our program and I said folks I was a banker for40 years that's not the way it works. A bank makes his decision whether he's going to loan somebody money and if he loans one of our inmate's money to buy a car and it goes back they're not going to bring blame us or the system because we suggest that those same inmates pay
about50% down so it does two things it saves some of their money which they need when they move out and it helps them establish credit so we're trying to get them started on what I call a normal lifestyle which involves credit some money in your pocket transportation now while they're at our facility they go to church they go to AA meetings they go to NA meetings. I'm gonna read you some of the things that go with what we do We have GEd assistance for those
who don't have a GED. they get a wage certificate they get parenting and budgeting classes those are required anger management classes intensive outpatient drug counseling mental health treatment, PTSd trauma shorter college enrollment for those that are interested after 21 days, each of them have a job now unfortunately all those things
are not available in the prison system as we know it so since this reentry program when it was designed it is for people that are 18 months from getting out anyway so you can look on a computer and it'll tell you500 names of people that should get out in 18 months Now that does not mean those500 people are gonna leave but that's where the the test should start somebody ought to get on a
computer and say out of these500 people, which ones would make logical clients for this program because two things happen one they get out of prison right then and come to a to a reentry facility and the rules are that if they stay with us six months the last 12 months of their sentence goes away so we save the state $26,000 per inmate so if somebody were to go on the computer and pick inmates that fit that program for one month
they could fill up every reentry facility in no time. There are only 27 beds right now in in reentry there would be 1000 they ought to be all over the state. any I have friends that say show me how to do this and I'll open one in Jonesboro. I'll open one in Fayetteville 50 beds,60 bed units the key is the correction system are you guys have got to make it where people that do that get paid for what they do
as of yesterday our facility had 9 empty beds that's inexcusable shouldn't happen. we only get paid if the beds are filled so the the system has got to work in order for people to do what we do so the logic from my standpoint I mean I'm looking at it as I'm a real estate investor I own a building now a real estate investor who owns a building is responsible for getting people to come to him and pay rent
we can't all we can do is look at the corrections people and say please fill the beds and please send us our money every month Logically if you want people to do what we do if we have60 beds they ought to send the check at the first of the month for60,000 dollars. that's $1000 an inmate. It costs 2200 to keep an inmate in the AdC. 1000 vsus2200.
it ought to be everybody's job in the ADC is get these people out of here get them into reentry and save the state money. Once that happens it eliminates again one year of this person's sentence if he succeeds for six months which we make them do do some of them fail you betcha but not very many and what happens is the employers talk about this program works please send us more people that's the way this program
should work this should be set up in various places where there has to be a need for employment if you don't have that you should not do this program it's for places like I'm gonna say Jonesboro Fort Smith where there's plenty of employment available and employers will come after these folks number one there is what's called a federal tax credit they get400 dollars a month for six months to hire our people.
that's one of my biggest selling points to employers and I've had some of them say well send me 10 of those guys I get $24,000 gift you got it and most people don't even know that exist so there's all kinds of angles to this if if the system were just improved a little bit. there are people that should and would be doing this in various towns across the state and our recidivism rate would do this and our need for bids would go down because remember whoever does this owns
the real estate I own the building the state doesn't have a penny in it whereas if you're building a a building wherever it is you're going to spend about $200,000 a bid to do it ours is zero and there are people that I know that would do this if the system was set up where inmates will come and they will get a check it's all they got Representative Tosh
Representative Dwight Tosh
Unverified
5:20:53
thank you Mr chairir. you said something there Miss T do you think
these employers are hiring these inmates out of your program because they think they're really the most qualified person for the job or they're doing it for the $10,400 tax credit credit because you said that was your best selling point as far as getting these inmates out into the workforce and and that was your quote not mine when you said that's that's my best selling point so
help me to understand are they are the employers doing it for the credit or they are they doing it for another
Speaker 323
5:21:32
reason? Well it depends. I have some that don't even get the tax credit I use that in the beginning because when this first started we did not know how to go get employers to hire folks so we use that as the first thing that was the debate and when we saw it worked we continued to use it but I have employers that they don't mess with that they just want the people so it's a mixture so some of them actually take the the
Representative Dwight Tosh
Unverified
5:21:58
inmates and and don't don't file for the400 dollars tax on my tax credit is you you said that's correct what would you say the percentage of those employers were I I don't know that and I've never
Speaker 323
5:22:08
questioned that and therefore I'd be guessing I don't know I understand well for instance an example is my church fellowship who started this in the first place they're hiring four of our employees we're a church. they don't have any tax write off they're hiring the people because they know they're going to be there they've interviewed
them, they decide who they want and they're hiring them no tax
Representative Dwight Tosh
Unverified
5:22:34
credit involved OK and I'm glad you explained that because that concerned me a little bit because I could kind of picture two individuals applying for that same job and one of them was coming out of the correctional facilities and the other one had a you know abided by society's rules and not ever done anything wrong and then the employer because they were getting a400 dollars tax credit they chose the inmate or the person had been in the correctional facility and the
person had done everything that they were supposed to do in life obeying the parents and staying out of trouble they got left behind so I just wanted to make sure we weren't creating unlevel playing field and that's why I asked the question how many of them are actually taking them because they feel like the the qualified person for the job or they're doing it in for the tax break and you answered the question thank you Representative Beatty thank you
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
5:23:27
Mr chairir. Jim always a pleasure to to see you
and to hear about the work that you're doing doing there. my question is how how's working now how are your beds are you at capacity or are things working better than they were. I know that that there's always room for improvement but just the current status on your operations there well they did for a while
Speaker 323
5:23:49
after you and some folks came out there they filled the beds but as of yesterday we had 9 empty beds and and what's
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
5:23:57
your total capacity is the total so we
have51 people as of yesterday yeah51 in there now so we got 9 beds because I know someone at DOC's listening to this so we'll see if we can get those 9 filled but I do appreciate what you do. I see the value in in that program so appreciate that while I was out of the room I heard some of the conversation I I think it may have beenen Simon that had requested any of the funding for these these different groups
that have spoken today so I'm gonna request to the chair that again putting all this work back on staff but that that each of these folks that have testified today that if they receive any state funding the total amount of that funding and from what program and what agency administers those funds that go to these groups I would like that for the next meeting as well and then just one question
for Miss Dixon the program that that you presented to us how many folks do you have in that program and how is your agency funded or your your group
Speaker 321
5:25:17
funded? So participants we average about 27 per month. Iniially so its average about 10 per month and so we are grantbased along with financial contributions from the community are are those folks that are
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
5:25:30
are justice involved are and I don't use that word that often but I figured that was the vernacular
for the room are those justice involved folks or are those folks that you're you're giving job training and and those type of skill sets too or are these mostly folks that have been involved with with the incarceration they are
Speaker 321
5:25:52
just as impacted that are coming from McPhersonrison along with Pulasi County because our organization is within pulaski and Salene County thank you very much thank y'all both for being
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
5:26:03
here from a math standpoint something I wanna
Speaker 323
5:26:08
make clear that I probably didn't explain right now we get about $800 a month per inmate and for the last several years we said please inflation's what it is that's where it started 14 years ago. It hadn't changed and we should give us a couple of 100 bucks a month just to cover gas increases nobodybody's done a thing it's just sit there still 800 a month so if anybody can help on that that again is a necessity to
make these programs work it has to be where you can at least make things profitable or people go'm not going to do this and considering the amount of money saved compared to what it costs to be in the AdC it ought to be simple a simple mathematical conclusion $1000 versus 2200 RepresentativemcCollough thank you Mr
Representative Tippi McCullough
Unverified
5:27:03
Chair. thank you both for being here today. Jim, you mentioned something about mental health resources
and I'm not sure we talked much about this today but do you receive anyone that already has some type of mental health treatment plan that that gets out and comes to you guys and if the if they do do you allow in your facility for them to take if there's medication involved do you do you allow that or do you know how that works in any of the other
Speaker 323
5:27:29
facilities can't answer that one I know that people do come to the facility that have medication yes and we have counselors there for mental health
Speaker 346
5:27:40
OK and they're allowed to take their medication? OK all right
Senator Terry Rice
Unverified
5:27:52
thank you ent us thank you I had already hit my button Mr Bele touched on one thing I was going to point out in my 18 years down here as a business person I assured myself I don't ever be in business with the government. and it's because what Mr bell
just pointed out you can have a large investment on the best program in the world in politics change and you said it 14 years they have not had an increase and look at what's happened just recently with inflation gra after program after program now the programs don't work I'm for getting rid of them or changing them. but I worked on assisted living trying to help them that was a priority of administration back years ago
it's failed by the wayside and they're struggling and then we have youth services that did some critical things for you in trouble and and they got funding didn't get increased and cut and all so what I'm saying this far is this legislature and the people that are watching this live stream and ones that go back and watch it after that if we're not serious about funding a program we just you just put the patch on a bad tire
and it's not gonna hold you've you've got to step up and say we're gonna change this and and we've got to make the department of Corrections work with it where the program will work sometimes I'm not I'm I've tried to be supportive department of corrections sometimes I don't know if they want to help they're struggling to do every day but these programs have to be funded and and then have to have the
outcomes to keep them going it's gonna take money and it's gonna take the long term commitment and we can only do that about two years at a time or four year executive branch commitment and and then sometimes it changes and businesses can't change their models like that if it's not a short payout amm I right Mr. bele? Um-hum that is correct. thank you. thank you
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
5:30:17
we concur withent rice I don't I have always felt like much of what we do ought to be indexed to inflation I guess if it were indexed to inflation every year we would be trying to figure out how we're going to pay for what we'd already decided to do and not be able to come up with fun new programs
but the I appreciate you giving me something to sink my teeth into you said we could have you think up to 1000 reentry beds and
Speaker 323
5:30:47
we've got two a little over 200. keep in mind every time you have a reentry bed that eliminates the need for two AdC beds you know why5 months5 months two inmates two with two months left over so you have an inmate that comes in for5 months he graduates you put another one in so you're taking two inmates per bed per year with two months left over and there's that many that would be
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
5:31:18
eligible you said in my in mind
you said that you you keep in mind you're n short right now so so is that because we don't have people eligible I'm gonna try to stay out of
that way that that's impossible about its you know a lot a lot more
than I do about what the eligibility is for being released into a reentry system how many people do we have
approximately eligible to be released until a reentry facility with there's no statistic that I've
Speaker 332
5:31:52
seen that would tell me that but what I do know typically in order
Speaker 323
5:31:57
to leave the the system and go to reentry they want them to be a level one or a class one inmate makes senseok I know that in one prison that I know of that happens to have some AA meetings there are several one sitting there that fit
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
5:32:20
not here so there are numbers more than 9 on the computer on that that should be a should be eligible and you but obviously you think there's 1000 eligible if you think we could have 800 more beds well
Speaker 323
5:32:36
every month about500 people parole out of the system maybe600 and they're as has been pointed out earlier they
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
5:32:43
have a much better outcome if they go
through a reentry then if they go straight out so
so if we've only got 200 beds then we can't possibly be handling the50 or600 per month that that are leaving anyway right if we got ahead of things and and had them because you know we've heard a lot about the the great things that people are doing but the question was how do
we reduce beds and so you're telling me that we've got5 to600 people paroling out of the
system and so if the if the reentry program is5 months 5 months that is3000 people over a five month period because it would take5 months for them to go through the program so we don't have just 1000 available we got3,000 3000 are leaving the system in five months if we go with600 times5 months we got3,000 leaving the system that would do better
in a reentry program would be cheaper had they been in a reentry program Am I am they would do better they would be cheaper and we've got 200 beds
and and and I'm sounding critical and I'm not trying to be cur I'm
just saying you know the light bulb going off and saying duh this would would seem to make lots of sense and now I was confused earlier when the gentleman said that their
cost was65 to75 dollars where I know
you've been getting 27 which you say is not enough but but let's say it was4045 versus 80 that's a tremendous savings at the same time in money even if we
were giving you50% more we'd still be saving about50% of course. right so so reentry facilities make lots of sense and that we should
be doing a lot more of it
and and you think that the potential is out there for
Speaker 330
5:34:59
obviously back back in 2 potential I've been talking about prisoners
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
5:35:02
now I'm not talking about the potential of people to actually do it and do a good job you mean the these
Speaker 323
5:35:11
people like you and like yes they're people like me that from in a real estate investment standpoint we do this you know back years ago you know he's gone jeremyhutchinson had what's called Act 1190. the number one item on actct
1190 was that we need4,000 reentry beds it never happened that was4,000 that was back in 2014 and there was a panel that worked on that for months and they had a list of fi5 things number one 4000 reentry beds and they started with500 and it shrunk to 200 because they won't fill the beds and they won't pay any extra money so people said I give up well maybe we can help
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
5:35:56
with that miss uhixxon you turned your
light on so you had comment on that
Speaker 321
5:36:02
and then we're going toucker OKok the female reentry there are more beds needed. There are women
Speaker 325
5:36:06
that are sitting in prison because there are not enough beds good to know Senator Tucker thank thank you
Senator Clarke Tucker
Unverified
5:36:20
you were just discussing with Mr Bell I can't see someone lean up to my mic but I've had that conversation with the department of Corrections. I know Mr. Bell has numerous times
about how many people are eligible for these reentry facilities and the the person at at the department who answers that question will tell explain to you why there are not eligible inmates for these reentry facilities. In his defense, he's not the one deciding those criteria. Other people are. maybe it's the legislature maybe it's the board oforrections maybe it's it's somebody else but it's it's not him but I'll give you an example The309 program which you may be familiar with if someone's in
the309 program they're not eligible for a reentry facility for those of y'all who aren't familiar with the309 program is when you're essentially performing manual labor at a county jail. so someone at some point in time made a decision that it's more beneficial to an inmate who's going to be released from prison and back into society to do manual labor at a county jail rather than go through substance abuse and mental health treatment and job training at a reentry program. I don't think that's the smart I I don't think that's the right policy decision personally. Now I'm sure our sheriffs
like having those folks do that work at their facilities but you know there's there's other issues there and that I'm just I'm just using that as one example. The overarching point is I think it's going to be our job, Mr Chair as a legislative body to work with the department and the board oforrections to change those criteria to make sure that we are getting folks into these reentry facilities before they're reintroduced into society because whether it's3,500 a year or6,000 a year
that we are releasing from prison they're getting out right they're getting out so you know some folks aren't eligible for a ranch facility based on the type of crime they committed. Now tell me how much sense that makes. they're getting out one way or another they're getting out. So do we want them to be prepared when they get back out or do we want them to walk out stone cold unprepared. I think these are some of the important conversations that as a legislative body we need to be having because if you're getting
out, you should have a transition period where you're equipped to have a chance to succeed once you are released. That's my opinion. would y'all agree? right well one
Speaker 323
5:38:43
of the one of the comments that I've had and I understand this the people in corrections will say the the last thing we want to do is send somebody to you that tries to escape the system fails all rights could fail I understand that so I can picture looking at a computer and trying
to decide from a computer who's eligible and who isn't. Well I can't do that. I mean I've done it with them so mean I can do it but that's that's a subjective thing you can say this guy thinks good but this one's not and we have different reasons because I've done it with them so you could you've got to either narrow the criteria that says we're being too selective or eventually somebody is probably gonna say I'm getting out of here but I understand that but like I
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
5:39:35
said no one that we're releasing600 a month the
fact that they may escape a month early that would not
be my my biggest concern somebody's gonna be there a long time but again I don't wanna make a lot of that but but I am making a lot of that because the people are coming back out one way or the other and we'd like to keep them out once they get out for their
good for the state's good for their family's good and
Senator Clarke Tucker
Unverified
5:40:10
for their community's good Mr Chair if I may briefly I think it's preferable as a state for us
to have multiple options and I've invited a gentleman to testify at one of these future meetings who administers a residential reentry facility in the state of Alabama where they've had great success. and so maybe there are some folks who are flat risk. Well it I think it should be a minority. I think the majority should be in facilities like hidden Creek but we we could have a state-owned residential
facility where there you know we can account for flight risk folks and but make sure they're still having the same opportunities that substance abuse mental healthal job training and those sorts of things so that they they still have a chance of success when they get out and I think that's another important conversation for us to have. thank
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
5:40:56
youpresentative beatty thank you Mr chairir I I just kind of want to address 11 area I do think that we're we're talking about that population that would qualify and and those
are within 18 months of of of their of terming out I I would say that I think Department of Corrections they're doing a better job of making certain that these beds are filled compared to the way they were previously looking at this I think these guys have stepped up to the plate we we've asked every time that they see me they tell me how many folks they have in your facility and and tell me why they're there are vacancies so I think they're looking
harder at that but also I also think part of that recidivism rate that that hidden Creek has had is probably also a little bit of credit attributable to DOC with the folks they send there they're sending you they're sending folks out that they know or they have good faith will be successful in the program so again it's a team process and I think we have buy in from corrections. I I I think they're
actively looking at it it fill in those beds but I agree with Senator Tucker,20607 beds in the state it started off as a temporary program it's still a temporary program is my understanding it needs to be permanent needs some expansion and I think the restrictions that we placed on them of who would be eligible for these facilities in this program may be a little onerous so we probably need to look at that and give them a little more flexibility and in the end
the you know, again I've said my my concern is not so much about saving money but it's providing for capacity for the folks that need to be in the system and doing that the most efficient way and I think the reentry program is a very efficient way and something that that we could work with but I I do want to give a shout out to corrections. They they're doing so much better and they're actively looking to see how they can you know their their pool of of
qualifying inmates that they can get those into the program and I I think they see the value in that so a shout out there for what they are doing but I think Senator Tucker's correct we need to expand those programs and and reduce some of the some of the restrictions that we have on folks that could go into that program well again from
Speaker 323
5:43:36
the standpoint we don't want people escaping either we appreciate the idea of we're trying to help you not get those people I just
think broadening the the scope is the key and again I can't tell you how to do it but it's should
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
5:43:53
you it's easy enough to say it these are the folks that are going to get out in 18 months and then then start looking and and and a lot of times if you want to find a way to exclude someone that's easy I mean it's easy you can find a reason disciplinary or something in there to exclude them but I I think there's more willingness and an openness to try to place people in this program because it benefits both the the inmate
and the system so and I appreciate what you do there at hidden Creek Representative beatty I don't didn't
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
5:44:26
mean for any of my comments to be critical of corrections or anyone because I don't know how much acent Tucker pointed out as a former uorum Court member and being familiar with Act309 prisoners had no idea until he testified that they that they were not eligible for reentry well that's so I don't know how much of this
is our fault how much of this we've
put rules in place but laws in place that they can't get around and that's why
we're spending the long hours is to find out what what needs to be changed and I also appreciate you pointing out and I don't know
how much the reentry folks are meeting together to talk about things like best practices that's what in hardware and lumber flooring we call best practices the things that all any hardware dealer any lumber dealer any flooring dealer would make sense regardless of the
rule urban small large because one of the things that you have brought out some others brought out some great things earlier but is transportation when I think of Arkansans I think of rural I don't think of Little rockck I don't think of northwest Arkansas I I I I think of Dewitt where my family's from and or dwit if you're from there and and
Malvern and Prattsville and so and you know when I ran into a a 16 year old and I'd never thought about it because I lived next door to my family's business I got up and walked to work but it but he caught me one time because I was a state senator was at a some function and wanted to know if I could help him get a job and I and he's he was30 miles from a job and he couldn't
drive and if he could drive he didn't have anything to drive and I and it caused me to think even more you know if you're in rural
Arkansas and so we have we have some of us here have helped deal with helping inmates get barriers out of the way when they come out but who have all kinds of fines and other things that they can't get a lic ense but they could if we've helped them with the license but we haven't necessarily helped with the car and
so you brought out something really good there and something you've come up with that I don't know everybody else is doing or not but it would certainly like I said if you if you're going to be functioning in society and you're gonna make it to a job
because that's one as I would also helps representative Tos out with we're not keeping anybody else from getting a job when they hire because I'm telling you right now we're all hiring warm bo d ies the so we're not in an economy where your you're keeping somebody else from a job we need people to work and400 dollars tax credit or no400 dollars tax credit you convinced me somebody will show up every day and and as you had told me before be
there for4 or5 months then you know they're just gonna be there for30 days that's
a different thing but they're they're gonna show up for a while and maybe stay after they get out after they're released I'm interested if they can do anything I've
got to do I'm interested so and I think I speak for all employers Missixon and we'll
Speaker 321
5:47:46
end with you regarding the transportation even in LittleRock or Pulaski County if you're doing a port job where it's going to be higher pay the bus the public
transportation doesn't go out that way. my male public transportation doesn't go out that way where the jobs are paying more
Speaker 325
5:48:04
so we think about the larger area having more accessibility but it's not always
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
5:48:11
the case. so Mrjonathan earlier mentioned the three things we can add to the three things transportation mind soul body but but transportation so thank y'all for being here thank you for testifying thank you for
what you do and we are going to go to doctorctor Denise Rifkes and Marlene Dowe Henson. OK see
hand they tell me hand out C1 and C2 correspond to their presentation if you make sure your mics
are on and introduce yourselves for the record and
Speaker 382
5:49:17
you go good afternoon I'm doctorctor Deniseivpkeys. thank you for taking the time to listen to us today I am a native of Arkansas and of the Chickamauga nation I am a chemist
a pharmacist and a pharmaceutical scientist I worked at UAMs I worked on the pNT committee I also worked at Arkansas Children's Hospital which is relative to some of the things I'm gonna say we're here today fighting for the children and senior citizens because when the middle generation is removed from the family the family is destroyed as a lifelong problem solver, I believe that working together we
have an incredible opportunity to create a better world Before I fully understood our native heritage governor Hutchinson asked that those of us who moved away from Arkansas to work, please come back and help us and I answered that call 10 years ago My purpose today is to explain what everyone may already know but may not understand why Once we know the why then we understand what to do
first we must recognize the incredible heritage of the people who were always here and those who married them primarily including the English, Scots, Irish, Welsh, German and African. we are special people they forged a path forward that ultimately led to this great United States of America in fact their belief in manifest destiny brought the world forward but they also believed that if something bad happened to you it was your own fault
and that's a cultural belief that is still widely held it wasn't nice. it wasn't easy but they forged us as incredible innovators that said you can imagine that there was some fallout. The VA has now identified the damage not only was it physical trauma witness of atrocity drugs and alcohol infectious disease
which produces antibodies against the brain. Each of these is identified at the VA as causing a head injury. It damages this little part of your brain right here at the base of your skull. I found these listed in the internet while I was searching for our ancestors and I found that some of them were also lead miners. that means that the following can be added to the list
of head injuries heavy metals and you can add malnutrition because if you do not have all the nutrients you need you cannot make epinephrine. you cannot tell by looking at a person that that that they may have experienced a head injury and that they treated themselves with drugs and alcohol because they needed to take care of their physical problem there's one very important root
cause to consider. many of those convicted as criminals in our prisons have in fact experienced head injuries whether caused by falling off a bicycle playing football, being assaulted or other unfortunate circumstances to mention a few as a process expert I can professionally state the obvious the current reform process does not work. as a process expert I can inform
you that the number one reason for process failure is that the process does not account for the characteristics of the inputs In this case, a key factor in the input is all the unidentified medical conditions of the socal criminals not saying they all have it but a lot of them do ladies and gentlemen all must one do all in one must simply do is search the internet
and it's impar many of these problems are heritable. Here are just a few examples. etal alcohol syndrome methamphetamine addiction from the 1960s meth epidemic. their parents did the math and they were born during that period failed anatomical development of the jaw around the back of the from the the jaw around to the back
of the head affecting the brain stem and cerebellum lack of metabolic enzymes by certain blood lines gender and ages to get rid of certain drugs and so their level goes sky high for longer. antigen antibody reactions against the brain both from infectious disease and hemolysis caused by Rh and other inherited antigens. you've already been shown in two years ago
that70% of those in foster care have fetal alcohohol syndrome and that50% of the recidivism is due to fetal alcohol syndrome. it's easy to see where the other50% might originate what is happening with this process is that the police prisons and social workers are expected in part to solve a medical problem. it has not been diagnosed while there may be a belief that there is no answer to this
medical problem I can safely say that there is a path forward for some of these people and that Arkansas absolutely has the talent to lead the world in our neuromuscular system organs and decisions the neuro in our neuromuscular decision are autonomic organs and our decisions are all controlled by the same part of the brain we all know that sight
hearing ar ar t problems can come and go and then one day they just go and never come back Why would we believe that the decision making part of the a like to recognize and noting that the decision part of the
brain also is one that steals and runs away. I'd like to recognize our research colleagues at UAMs and the VA for their expertise and remind everyone that each community has an accessible professional with knowledge of drug metabolism. you can always ask your pharmacist I'd like to thank my incredible teachers and mentors many of who are already gone but who actually delivered you
Together we can take all the pieces that we already have and configure innovative path forward that If we only accept that the ancestors were wrong about one thing everything is not always your own fault and I will leave a don't let your judgment
Speaker 389
5:57:20
Thank you Miss Hinton I'm Marlenealal Henson. I'm a very overly educated redneck that grew up three miles on a cattle farm from the football stadium. I've been gone for45 years so my hands are not directly engaged in all the acts that Arkansas has changed over the years. I'd like to say I'm a citizen but I'm a registered lobbyist you can find the ethics department with my with my all my ethics things up to date but I'm coming to you more as a
consultant of governmental affairs I believe that the state can only fix a state problem. and there's a very clear defined rules about separation of church and state. and I don't want to see this state get sued and lose one penny. it doesn't have to lose. so my first recommendation would be that we go back to the understanding of what we can do as a state and what we can't now working in the bureautic system
for the last 20 years. I was a first grade school teacher for a long time before I went back to school so I recognized layers that have to be in place in order for government to succeed and I have come up with a recommendation for recidivism boardard. this board would be sanctioned by the state and there would be real skin in the game from all the people sitting on the board that would demand accountability for their success. such as probation and parole.
I'm not picking on those guys. it's a horrible job. and as a vocational expert recognized in seven states I can tell you it's not one people are lining up to take. you know that but that also said though it's an honorable job. and those guys don't get enough credit. but there does need to be some accountability directly attached to their job performance on a quarterly basis for them to be held accountable for the future success with a lack of recidivism so
I have created the people that I think would fit on this board. I'll start with just discussing with you the very broad picture of what causes recidivism 73 % of all crimes in Arkansas that are directly attributed to recidivism come from property crimes the other part is41.3% of homicide. those people are not going anywhere. you can't you can't avoid recidivism you can avoid
recidivism with that particular entity because they're not going to get out 2, unemployment is obviously the first factor and some vocational expert I can tell you if you don't have a job you don't have dignity. you don't have anything to work towards to try to become a better person. Then from there homelessness if you get out you don't have resources and you're homeless. guess what3 hots and a cot still work. so people are going to go back to that mindset
I will also go to the concept of the fact that we as citizens first of all you guys don't get paid enough. I can tell you my patience today has been either long but I take phone calls because they still work unfortunately the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results so while considering the fact that we need to revisit how we avoid recidivism, how we stop crime to begin with I think that's already working in our favor
with the crime rate down. but now how do we avoid recidivism? and the first problem this is my observation and I'll be glad to give you a personal example but you've heard so much today I don't want to go there The disconnect from family while they're in prison. it's hard if you want to go see your child in prison. you have to go through a background check if you want to speak to your child in prison you have to get online and fill out a background check now you can write letters as long as you got the right
address but I will remind you that the Arkansas Department of Commerce excuse me oforrections has changed their address three times in the last four months. so if you're the average parent out there just trying to stay in communication with your child via letter. then you're you're not going to be able to do that because there's no way for the inmate to be able to send the information back to the family that their address is changed. We have that big of a disconnect between the inmate and the department oforrection. The other part I would recommend is I noticed and I watched I did my little bit of due diligence
from the last meeting you had lots of prosecutors, sheriffs some judges people just wanting more bets more money because those people run for office based off of those statistics they're just trying to do their job and so they want to cut deals they want to get them convicted, they want to put them in prison because that's their instant solution so in my idea of this recidivism board I want to see a judge that thinks we need more beds put on
that recidivism some support. I wanna see BOp person on that board because they all have real skin in the game. I want to see an Arkansas DOC person there. you can forgive me later Mister Chairman, but I'd like to see you sit there because it's a tough job and the only way for us to fix this is to address it and own what we don't do right and then sit out to make it right
I'd like to see two family members from current inmates included in the sport because you're going to get direct relative information. right there I'd like to see when property insurance commissioner we heard from a really smart insurance agent earlier. she totally understands that with property crimes comes higher insurance rates. whether it's car, auto, home, whatever. so she gets it I'd also like to see us include an at largege legislative member. now I know you guys just don't
have enough to do I get it but in this case we've got to hear from more people of the citizens that vote. and then the state has to fix the state problem. with
Speaker 90
6:03:40
that said I'm done questions from the committee Not seen any I
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
6:03:53
appreciate y'all being here up up the senator tucker I just I just want to say y'all
Senator Clarke Tucker
Unverified
6:04:01
have been here all day and you have exhibited quite a bit of patience and we are grateful for that and we appreciate your
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
6:04:11
testimony very much thank you thank you sir the yes I appreciate you know everybody that's on the end of the agenda I did not purposefully I did pull a couple of people out of order I did not put people in here in any order other than the way they signed up so if you're at the end it's because you were one of the last ones to let us
know that you that you wanted to be here it's not because I purposely put you there don't think you did don't
worry it's not too but thank you for being here thank you for
what you had to say it was very well put we're going to go to Sarah Moore and Kaleem Nazine which I think I can pronounce because I heard it last month
And don't be dismayed at the few people sitting here there are lots of people watching and it's being recorded so trust me you will be hurt Hand out C4 and C6 are related to these would you please from one end or or the other start and introduce yourselves and who you represent turn your mic on please it'll turn green there you go
Speaker 402
6:06:31
name iserretha Lowe a sister of an incarcerated person. OK. Sarah Moore, cofounder and executive
Speaker 405
6:06:40
director of the Arkansas justice Reform coalition supreme better known as King supreme.
Speaker 407
6:06:46
I have I'm the founder of the roots Foundation and I'm the president of my Brother's Keeper. and who's gonna start
Speaker 403
6:06:59
OK I guess I'll start once again my name is Colleem Nazine and you all should have a printout of some information that we provided so I won't just go through that information I just kind of speak from speak from the heart on what I wanna share what were I asking for or you know being considered for us to bring to attention you know elderly pale or individuals who have served significant amount of time
because we think that this would be a a perfect way to reduce some of the the press and population to open up some of the bids when we look at when we look at overcrowding staffing and the high recidivism within the prison system. I remember when I first came tori and it was like one staff member to 10re0 incarcerated individuals and this caused
this was a overcrowding problem but it also was a staffing issue which and I think the three combined kind of lead to recidivism when you just think about the harshness of the conditions of prisons and things of that nature now however when when you look at the the individuals that had their long term time in the system they to me they were mentors I remember when I first came to prison and having been there for
about a year I remember talking to several individuals about you know kind of asking them how much time have had they done in I remember one guy told me 20 years and I thought this was a a loan a long time but after years of me doing being incarcerated I became that old guy and the younger guys come in and ask me you know how long I had then and I was able to say I've been here 20 years
and I got out after serving 28 years and 11 months of incarceration the reason I I kind of run up that that that story is I came in prison in 1990 and I didn't get out until 2018 and when I first came to prison it was 9 prisons in Arkansas and when I left there was 20 prisons
in Arkansas ix residential s centers in Arkansas into two federal prisons in Arkansas so I make the point that we can't basically you know incarcerate ourselves out of the problem because the problem just by locking people up isn't going to solve the problem. However, if we look at some of the people that were mentors to me in myself being a mentor to others and we start you know targeting some of these people who have a
low level of recidivism when we when we think about people who are in the category that I classify as being elder they have a low recidivism rate there have a low dysonary history in the prison system and they basically have aged out of criminality so these are some of the things I would like to share with you as far as an Arkansas prison now hold more than 2000 people who are60 years or older and
holds3,000 people who are55 years and older so I think if we start looking at these individuals who have a low recidivism rate and start releasing then we can alleviate some of the overcrowding within our prison system when we look at some of the apparatus that we already have in place like like me parole home detention releases and medical executive
clemency we are receiving a failing grade as a state with all three of these mechanisms because it really they're there but they are not being properly utilized so I would like to say this to him in closing I would like to say that we are basically recycling our failures but we're not embracing our successes in 2012 and what I what I classify as a success here in Arkansas the legislative
body in 2017 pass legislation atc of539 which allowed people like me to come home after serving long term sentences and it was a juvenile bill in 2012 the United States Supreme Court said it was unconstitutional to give a juvenile a mandatory life without parole sentence I fill up under that category after serving 28 years and 11 months of incarceration I was allowed to come home. it didn't take me
28 years and 11 months to realize that I want to be free that I I had the propensity to come out in the world and be a productive citizen since I've been home these are some of the things that I did I have I work as as as of now I work for decarcerate as the codirector I I'm a part of a national organization called the Campaign for the first sentences of youth. I went to college when I
got out I went to a state and graduated with associate's degree in uhgy control and I just do a lot of different work in my community now sometimes when we talk about elderly parole when we talk about apparatuses to relieve the pressure off of our prison system we try to cherry pick who should be eligible and who should not be eligible where I
would just like to say this here if we weren cherry picking like we don't want people who have committed a serious offenses then I would be in that category and I wouldn't be here today However, you know since I wasn't a cherry picked to get out of prison then you know what I'm saying I was allowed to come out be a productive citizen, be be be someone that has voted every voting cycle so
one of the people that I said was my mentors was this woman's here brother and I would like to for her to introduce
Speaker 409
6:14:02
guy and thank you for allowing me to share also as mentioned my name is Teretha Lowe and I am the sister of Charles Henry Houston that's been incarcerated for50 years and have a clean record this last time he made the clemency
board all five voted unanimously and naturally it it hurt him so and it hurt us because he was denied and and so he he is he went in prison when he was 26. he's what74 now he's three years younger than me and so you know I would go down and visit him and he's he's had a change of heart and don't condone what he's done and don't
take it for granted you know that other the victims and things and you know that was involved I don't take that for granted and I I pray that you know they have a heart you know to forgive you know and and so anyway I you know been he will have a place to stay he will stay with my husband and I and we do have an extra car. I heard so much about transportation and things of
that nature and he is in good health that he will be able to work if it's nothing but a janitorial deal because he wants to work and and and and so by him being with us we we will be able to take him to the well he will be able to drive once you know we get all the other things that he needs to these different places and he's a changed man and I just would love for him to have another
chance my mother died in 2008 and she her harsh desire was to see her son released from prison. I had a brother that died at Commons last year and they both knew you know they both could see each other talk with each other so now he's there you know alone and like I say I'm not condoning anything but I I you know I believe fi0 years is a long time especially when no one
was killed or you know and everything we everybody deserve a another chance there's no one here that has not done things and I'm I'm not trying to you know put a guilt trip on anybody I just would love to see my brother free one more time and and to live he's changed he's changed and he's received Jesus in his life and my husband and I we will make sure you know helping encour continuing to encourage
him to live the right kind of life and it would be a lot it would be a blessing as well for he has a daughter that was 2 months old when he went to prison and so now she's fi0 and so it'll be a blessing you got grandchildren great grandchildren and I just thank you all for your time Moore
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
6:17:29
I hate to follow that I appreciate you sharing that's that's a a touching and an awful situation I have some slides that I I wanna to present to you today I'm with Arkansas Justice Reform coalition I think kind of like some of the introductions that happened earlier I think it's important to also level set I know we talked about whether or not folks are in reentry we do a lot of data analytics and and and awareness around he's arrested and incarcerated but we also do direct services. Our organization in a year touch
es the lives of over 1000 people resourcing them and getting them directly or services we had a clinic last week and one day we sell30 records for individuals to get second chances and when we had conversations last week I'm gonna try to keep to just one particular topic on my slides but this is such a vast conversation I'm so thankful that we're taking the time to have thorough thorough discussions but really our policy decisions are a huge
driver of this and some of the things will take you know no financial outlay you know limited or some might be quite substantial and so I do want to go ahead and put a pen in the and and bring up that we did talk about the emergencyowers Act and that that's no longer been in place and that was letting out around 2600 people yearly that's something that could really relieve and let folks go home just a little bit early and I also you know, want to bring up what what was mentioned earlier in regard to309. I
mean309's every 90 days they are able to go home with a piece of paper when they're approved and they go home for an entire weekend and then they come back and they return themselves to a county jail. so these are individuals too that are the best classification have done everything they're supposed to do and really could be a home being productive with their families so with all that said what I I've taken the time to focus on today is to look think about the70 million dollars that
we have that was reallocated, I apologize I'm going to try to figure
Speaker 413
6:19:41
out how to work these slides. Sorry oh did that work ok sorry now I got a got
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
6:19:48
a little crazy there Oh gosh, sorry ok now I know how to do it I think maybe so I'm gonna start with with the summary and then how do I get to the summary? so reducing incarceration actually has the ability to create a stronger and safer Arkansas by recognizing you know the health
crisis and this was talked about by other folks about the drivers of our top new entry a lot of times being around drugs and theft and mental health funding diversions and alternative community supports and investing in evidencebased interventions and supports and then also want to touch on recognizing pretrial and its role and the incarceration journey that leads from jails to prisons you know for reentry programs if you look at the research that's out there for every dollar that gets invested into reentry and
studies show a multifold return on our investment as well versus just incarceration anywhere from $2 to41 dollars with antiviolence teams that are out there like ureviolence and really want to recognize in pretrial that even a few days in jail has a the ability to disrupt people's lives they lose their jobs they lose their housing, they lose their children and there's a high likelihood of reoffense because of that. so how did I arrive at that? Well the the state has been talking we talked about ax
earlier but the state has been doing lots of study and had many task forcece from the 2023 recidivism report it states itself for formally incarcerated individuals the probability of reoffending is the highest within the first year of release. they found that past incarceration increases the probability of future incarceration and then you know goes on to talk about programming especially for those with a history of drug use and prior incarceration and then recidivism and incarceration adversely impact
families, the economy, our communities and crime as well as delinquency rates and in depth look at Arkansas's carsorro population or recidivism rates of formerly incarcerated individuals as you know warranted and that the implementation of intervention strategies should really be something to be looked at. There is also additional study that was done in 24 with a reduction recidivism task force and you know in particular too they really recognized that since 2014 admissions for violent
crimes in Arkansas had actually been decreasing but we were seeing drug offenses that were actually increasing and that you know investing in resources in areas that impact behavior change for our supervised population is a huge opportunity for sustainability and increased public safety efficiency. OK, now I've messed it up again. I apologize. oh gosh, here we go there we go. so this is a bit of an eye chart but one of the things that I I wanted to kind of brainstorm is I really just been thinking a
lot about and I know a lot of people across the state have been having conversations about the70 million dollars that had been allocated towards the Franklin County prison. I think when that's reallocated it was stated that it could be used for beds or it could be used to tackle recidivism and so I wanted to just throw out you know fa a few things out there we talked and I'll I'll go into this in detail, 'll just point out a few of these you know peer recovery specialists have been mentioned you know we have the ability of70 million dollars that 875 individuals could be
hired across the state for that we talked and heard from other reentry folks today that talked about the need for supports to be able to keep stability for individuals for healthcare and education and job training we could do rantries supervision supports you know3000 dollars just to get somebody started coming out of prison that could help
Sarah Moore
Unverified
6:23:28
23, 333 individuals with70 million dollars. this thing doesn't like me apologize there we go
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
6:23:42
So diving deeper into this whenever you look at the council of state governments recidivism reduction task forcece report and they talk about investing resources in areas that impact behavior change for the supervised population and so you heard from people that do provide this level of service. one of the biggest things when you're talking about residential evidencepa treatment and recovery supports is that these are areas that all have incredibly unstable funding source s they have a variety of ways
that they oftentimes are delivering these services and so one of the things that I wanted to put forward for consideration of what programs could look like that the state looked at putting together a grant fund is that there are programs out there today that are delivering for about5600 annually for a bed versus AdC you know obviously is at 27,000 and that their recidivism when you go to treatment programs when you look at across the nation it's
anywhere from 20 to23% versus our current at ADC and so you know one of the considerations that I really want to to be weighing on you is thinking about how we potentially look at doing a state grant fund potentially piloting it with $22 million to add50 residential beds across the se5 counties that would allow for3,750 new residential beds why do I say that because every day I work with individuals and you heard today that we struggle to be able
to find appropriate adequate places for individuals that are either trying to come back into the community and we're struggling to get an address that can be approved someone that you know wants to keep out of additional court involvement and arrest but cannot find those beds and so I just want that to be something that we might consider because oftentimes you're hearing it's through philanthro p y you know federal grants or you know unstable funding sources and we've talked about
this gap earlier that exists for these types of beds. I also for the second thing for consideration today and I'm going to go quick on these happy to follow up given the the hour we're at today is to explore state funding structures to expand and enact diversion courts statewide and explore the language of the current statutes to allow for a wider judicial discretion for participant entry. this is a response to the findings and the recidivism cohort released from 23 that said the results suggests that
programming andha interventions you know are needed to address this part of our population. This could look like a statewide fund where counties can opt in Texas has done an often program for like court reminders and so I kind of thought about it modeled after that when I talk with some of our judges across the state they're best functioning drug courts really look like capping participants at about40 individuals with a team that includes probation officer, a counselor and a peer support that comes out to about 22,000
$0. these are going to be approximate numbers so please don't get me down to the dime that also too they sometimes are getting people on insurance or might have to dip into funds to be able to get people additional stabilizing needs and so I put5,000 dollars additional for participants knowing some of the things they run into we know that drug court programs to reduce overall rearrest and reconviction rates by roughly38 to50% compared to our traditional probation or incarceration and so really it's
a question for us to sit with of of the people that are entering Arkansas prisons for drug offenses you know how many you know could be safely diverted to these evidence-based community treatments instead and then on the considerations for the statute you know there are instance s people can be a first time offender and be considered a dealer and can end up with present time on the very first time they're not eligible for getting diverted into other programs actually just said goodbye to a gentleman who has3
kids who had been a long haul trucker that got into a jam a couple of years ago got first time got into the the drug trade to kind of make make ends to meet had fentanyly felony is not serving time away from his three kids that he was supporting. first time offender the other thing too is past violent charges are not allowed to divert over to specialty courts as well and so considerations for capping like a lookb back period of maybe5 years or 10 years in the past to be able to
have them for consideration or looking at opening up that language that it can be for a judicial discretion and then the third thing to consider is the reports also talked about reducing recidivism by supporting reentry success and we've heard a lot of that today. I know you guys have spent a lot of time on this I cannot drive home and and you probably believe this too how much ier recovery specialists do incredible work across our
state. They save lives we have an incredible program in the state of Arkansas so often I talk to peers and they actually struggle to get employment in their field once they're certified because there are not enough jobs for them. so there's an opportunity to create a jobs program where people who have a fell in past to put them as part of reentry teams and hospitals ambulance teams alternative response, antiviolence teams and you know this could look
like you know,80,000 dollars a year you know at $20 million you could put 250 peers across the state I know that we could use them in northwest Arkansas I know you know in the south southern parts of the state they could use those folks And then I'd like to move on to pretrial services and again I know I'm putting a lot of information forward and kind of jumping quickly due to the time but I bring up pretrial because this really again is really the the front door of this revolving door that happens
into the criminal legal system and folks kind of getting jammed up. oncece people are in a local county jail and they're too poor to pa to buy their freedom this causes many things you know they people lose ties to their community, they lose their houses they end up with longer prison and jail sentences and then they're very vulnerable to overdose whenever they do actually leave their incarceration setting. One of the things that started to percolate across the state are these pretrial service
programs they've been a department of justice best practice since the late 90s. they are teams that help the courts make informed bail decisions they ensure realistic options are put forward and they do needs assessments to understand what the client's needs are for that release. there's some information about s successful programs that happen to across the country these really just look like case managers peer
specialists and a supervisor that repair these really prepare these release reports and work I know in Washington County we're currently looking at the possibility that we're going to be employing this in early 2027 and ours looks something like maybe a half a million dollars a year investment but we're looking at being able to potentially release 200+ people from county jail and so again because the longer someone stays the higher likelihood of reoffense trying to close that
front door but we also understand that every county doesn't look the same and their financials and so that this could be a hardship to afford for many counties in the state and so looking at the possibility of thinking of the70 million dollars and whether or not there could be a grant fund that was established of 17 or $18 million again that counties could opt in to do a trial program to see if they want to look at this as a possible race to help with the overcrowding but also to be a
solution for not sending more folks towards prison. I went
Sarah Moore
Unverified
6:32:09
very quickly through those. I really appreciate your time today and really happy to
Speaker 407
6:32:24
again and who you represent yes sir my name isella Sadiqsupreme that is M E L A dashs Idq my last name issupreme I'm better
known to the world asingsupreme and one can feel free to google me. I travel across the United States and I helped renovate low income communities that's my that's my job haven't been too long come back from Greenville, Mississippi where our partner with the mayor Eric Simmons to put forward some ordinances to begin to grow that community and that led me back up here to where everything started for me here in Arkansas so I'm a problem solution minded
individual but before I bring you the solution to the problem I want to speak about some individuals that help to shape and mold my mind. So understand that I bring about I bring in about $250,000 a year on average I do sales I talk and so these tools were taught to me on the inside by individuals who would served20 and30 years I came to the Arkansas department of Corrections at nine years old
born homeless literally raised in the struggle mentality which a lot of individuals that sit in prison today they struggle with the struggle mentality. They come from broken homes. I was raised in the delta the poorest part of the United States of America in Sondheimer, Louisiana and so when I meet brother Naimm over at the Vorner unit in ive barracks and he's telling me about the law and the need to understand the law because the law controls your life and I
meet brother Corery Harris who tells me hey young man it's ok not to act out in a physical manner simply because you like that color over that color I meet individuals like DeMmarcoRayna who tells me hey it's ok to be smart just be yourself. You ain't got to fit in with the rest of these crazy people and then Ill go over to the comments unit and I meet the Houston brothers who teach me about working out and how working out physically helps you mentally prepare yourself for the outside
and so I come out here and the only thing that's on my mind is some shape form or fashion fixing what is and so some genius little boy that's born homeless doesn't go through the things that I had to go through I think about what is the problem and so I traveled all across as far as I could travel and two things always stuck out to me poverty and ignorance ignorance meaning un a wa re because in 19 years old
if someone would have told me hey if you go up to El Dorado and rob those people you're going to spend 14 years of your life in prison. I promise you I would not have done that I mean that's logical right? but think about it in places like the delta and all these rural areas where individuals grow up in a struggle mentality and they see your mom smoking weed and you see your dad selling crack and you see your other dad selling milk and your other dad because mom got3 daddies for you he's selling fentanyl and so the only thing that
you're being programmed with is the struggle mentality. there's no one around you to give you the positive influences to say hey you need to come to these senate judiciary meeting so you can understand the law controls your life. You need to understand to put on a suit and a tie when you go places so people would receive you better than what you wear in your clothes the way that you wear them. but we're talking about emptying the bed space, right? that's the problem so here's a solution you got poverty
and ignorance so let's start with the poverty side. I told you guys when I sat down I'm the founder of the oost Foundation what is the roosoundation? The rootsoundationbos up all the property that we can residential properties commercial properties we fix up communities from the ground up has every knack is cold connected to it so anybody need a job you just sign this list so we'll make sure that hourly you are making some money so that way you won't be in survival mode and you sign
5 on 1c3 to it so that way you can get the government funding if need be or you could say you know what reg not populist the people rule so how about I take myself out there and utilize direct marketing tactics to raise fund like Susan G Coleman or the breast cancerwareness realizing that you can do the same exact thing so now the problem of being poor impoverished you can do away with that so places like
in Osceola in northeast Arkansas where you have the highest electric electricity bill in Arkansas and possibly the United States. I don't know but the people there they're living in survival mode. they don't they're making on average $22,000 a year maybe where does that take care of a family? nowhere and so these same individuals they're the ones that's going to get hired by the prisons because we're talking about the the the guards bringing everything in I've been here all day and so you're talking to a woman or a man
that's used to making $22,000 a year and you expect them logically speaking to go to these places to work because they're forced to nobody really wants to work at a prison, let's be honest and so they are forced to work at these places where they meet all of these hands ome young men with a whole lot of money and they say hey, I'm going to give you3,500 dollars just to do this so once again I go back to
Speaker 420
6:38:15
the struggle mentality because if you have things set in place for those people they won't be intrigued by the numbers that inmates are throwing out
Speaker 407
6:38:26
pay them more money they put their lives on the line every day just to go serve child in the superxxx but you
Speaker 420
6:38:33
want to keep people out of the prison. what you take people like Mr Charles Houston like DeMarcoRayner and you put them out here on the streets of society where they're going to do the same thing that I'm doing because they don't wants that taught me they're going to go into the communities and say hey this is the problem this is how we solve
Speaker 407
6:38:57
it and all of the young men that's around them they're gonna look at them like theyog's and
Speaker 420
6:39:03
unkx and they're gonna listen to everything that these men have to say how do I know I
Speaker 407
6:39:12
bear witness they treat me like that right today and so you have to ask yourselves really do we want to solve the problem if you desire to solve the problem give the individuals more jobs which you can do utilizing decarcerating
their beautiful platform. all beautiful platform they were missing here today and you connect them to to vessels other501c3s it's cleaning up the neighborhood or something so
Speaker 420
6:39:35
a person can literally just come out and pick up tra sh We came off ho squad it's a hole in your hand and you're hitting the ground all day and it's a guy on a horse with a gun so you don't want to go to no job and nobody standing over you telling you what to do
Speaker 407
6:39:51
but you'll go out there and pick up trash until you figure out hey this is what I want to do with my life.
you got plenty of trash from northeast Arkansas all the way to southeast Arkansas so there's plenty of work for those guys to do how many houses need to be fixed up? Well, I know in prison they got weeding they got plumbing, they got electrical work so let's buy up the properties and put them to work there and you know what
Speaker 420
6:40:18
while we buying up the properties let's put the guys in it and don't just rent it to them make it available rent to own so now they have a sense of pride and they can actually
build a family we can fight against section 8 that's happened to send people to the
Speaker 407
6:40:38
prison system but I'm gonna end with that and I thank y'all so much for allowing us to come here and to speak to you guys and not truly hope that this go around individuals actually are inspired by the words that we're saying to bring the necessary change to Arkansas that's needed you guys have the power you could throw money anywhere
that you want to the word is proper word is allocate so you can allocate the dollars wherever that you like however if you are not allocating those dollars to prevention then you're gonna be focused on recidivism get the parents's life
Speaker 420
6:41:15
first get their lives right so that way they can lead in God their children in the way that they should go that's what the books say because if not yeah they gonna be repeating that cycle in the prison
industrial complex is gonna make a whole lot of
Speaker 407
6:41:35
money if we don't do something about it so what's more important? Saving the community or making money for the prison industrial complex I leave
Speaker 409
6:41:48
sir yes ma'am ok well I I'd just like to say that you know people came and they said you know they'd never been on drugs or alcohol and I'm a living witness that that a person can be delivered without going through some of
them have to go through but I was instantly delivered from drugs and alcohol many years ago there were times when I used to didn't know that I exist in the world I was so hung out and strung out yet in my tongue cut out of my mouth hanging on a mere piece of meat but you know it's because of the grace of God that I can sit here to say that you know people we cannot say that once a
drug added or wants an alcoholic is always a drug addict or alcoholic because that's not so because I I know for a fact that God delivers and he changed people and so I believe that a lot of people in prison not just my brother but other senior citizens and and some young people you know deserve a second chance another chance in at society to be an asset to society rather than
a liability for instance myself now I I write plays I produce plays and I've written a book if God can use me what about you and it got down to the women's unit in iceville when they used to be there and I have received23 letters from the chaplain from a ladies that wrote and thanked me for being you know open and and sharing with them about how they can you know make it in this world
and years ago when I used to go to the prison after I got saved there was only 200 some people of women in the pine bluff unit and then they moved them to a tucker it was more and then they moved on to Newport and so I was certified religious what is CR certified religiouss assistance and I will go down there every other week just to talk and listen to the ladies and encourage them to do right and
and I truly believe that a lot of people have gotten out because of people going in letting them know that there's a better way of life thank you Search tucker Thank you Mr Chair.
Speaker 50
6:44:25
I want to say just once more which I said to the last group,
Senator Clarke Tucker
Unverified
6:44:30
thank you all so much for your patience today. I mean it was a long day y'all stuck it out to the end and you deserve to be commended for that we appreciate you all at it a lot of important
points to this discussion so thank you and and thank you for your testimony too. I, miss moreore. I just wanna there was a lot from all of you and it was all great. and you've identified some some concerns and you ' ve also proposed some solutions which which we want all of that right? Miss Moron there's a couple of data points and from your presentation that I think bear repeating just for the sake of the membership and and one is that an estimated72% of prison
admissions over the past 10 years involve people who were revoked for supervision. it's really obviously we want to prevent crime on the front end that that that is a goal for us as a society but the fact that such a a huge percentage of prison admissions are from people on supervision parole or probation if we did a better job with reentry would that not have a huge
impact on the demand for prison beds
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
6:45:49
in our state a tremendous impact absolutely having supervision set up in a way where it's an individualized success plan for every individual where there's a champion that's wanting to incentivize people to do their best in connecting them and removing barriers is how that should work. It's unfortunate that I can tell you story after story where that's not what happens and that unfortunately
the way that things are set up oftentimes is for trip hazards for people to have lack of clarity at what they're supposed to be doing and especially when they face tremendous hurdles with poverty and having a criminal background you know getting knocked down because you know they can't stand in employment, can't get that bed that they need to at a recovery place when it's a
Sarah Moore
Unverified
6:46:38
part of their requirements for staying out of prison thank you the second point that
Senator Clarke Tucker
Unverified
6:46:48
I think bears emphasis is what we are reincarcerating people for and as you mentioned over the course of the last 10 years, reincarceration for violent offenses has gone down.reincarceration for drug offenses has gone up. I think it's important for the members of the legislature to know that as as fact it's not a theory it's fact and it's it wasn't in your presentation but I also happen to know and you know these numbers you know vary a little bit year
to year so it could be off a tiny bit the but the point is about 16% of violent reported violent crime in Arkansas was committed by people on supervision and yet somewhere in the65% or70% range of people being admitted into prison or people on supervision which means there's a whole lot of people on supervision who are being admitted into prison for reasons other than having committed a violent crime. so it's the you know the the two points together are if we do
a better job about reentry and reducing recidivism then we're we're reducing crime preventing future victims all goals that we want and also reducing the demand for capacity for prison beds but at the same time it's on us as we're the board of directors for the state of Arkansas right and the the prison beds that we have are a resource and it's on us to make sure that we are using that in the smartest way that we can. And when we're incarcerating people for drug
offenses and we have 2500 people waiting in the county jail for state backup you know county jail backup waiting for a state bed and people are getting out you know who I'm repeating myself but but the point is we need to be smart about it. The resource needs to be used for violent offenders, not for drug offenders and do you have any thoughts about this? Thank you Senator Tucker one of
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
6:48:47
the things that I think especially again as a family
member who has people that you know struggle with having their their health needs met is that you know we've said in the state we've declared that these are health crises and I wouldn't put someone in prison for diabetes or cancer but folks that are struggling with drug and alcohol and their mental health we are filling up our gels and our prisonss with people who are sick. we've also sat on taskforce. I have for a number of years for mental health and yet we've really struggle to deliver meaningful
solutions that divert individuals that really need care and healing and restoration which you'll never get in a jail or prison setting. we will always struggle with that and it's incredibly costly in the human numbers but also financially it's devastating to localities and to the state budgets thank you very much thank you for being here uhenator Simon thank
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
6:49:46
you Mr chair and thank you all for your powerful
Representative Keith Brooks
Unverified
6:49:55
testimonies for us here today and like Senator Tucker is more a couple of things jumped out a couple of numbers jumped out to me out of your thing that do need a repeating the first of all in the the first year on the recidivist50% of the crimes happen within the first year before they go back in. so I just can't help but wonder what it would look like if instead of just putting them out there if they had spent that first year in a good reentry
program, how much money that would have saved the state for the last year of their sentence had they been in a reentry program as opposed to out on the streets just trying to get by how much that would save not only on the front end but also say things in the future from not having to reincarcerate them. So I think that does need to be a point of emphasis that we focus on. the70 million dollars that you mentioned something does have to be done with that that is that's been
reallocated for re recidivism reduction. you gave us lots of options thereick any that you like yeah so the first thing and match the first thing that pops in my mind whenever we start throwing about throwing out big numbers like that and and options is is that a one time expense because
Speaker 316
6:51:12
we're gonna have to continue to fund that and that's a problem Sure no and I think
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
6:51:18
that's a very fair question and that's why on some of those you know I picked something that really is a smaller pilot to figure out but as I have done
this work for a number of years now I've talked to people all over the nation in regard to programs where you pilot them but if you find that they are successful and that they are delivering on solutions you ultimately want to fund them and they are a part of your entire budget because you know they work and they make sense. I think it's that tradeoff I hear we just have the70 million but we also have you know almost se was it700 million that we spend on prison
I mean so you know we're talking about you know the Franklin County prison would cost us something north of70 million a year to operate and so you know that those are the tradeoffs is if we're thinking about this is a one time allocation but we potentially are talking about ongoing operations and maintenance of millions of dollars if we add beds what does the tradeoff look like in the budget when we do these instead oftentimes I think they're a they're a lesser return I think when I looked at the entry dollars right to to about6,000 dollars a year versus
you know 27,000 for an AdC bed you know that's a cost
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
6:52:41
savings that we'll realize very good points thank you again thank you for being here. thank you for your testimony you've added a dimension I think to the discussion and the I think it would be remiss not because y'all are here as we're getting to the almost to the end the for me since I'm leading this parade not to say that I think
that we can see we can look at it numbers in other states and see that there's much that we can do to improve that being said I don't want to paint this rosy picture either it was alluded to early on as that I I love the success stories
but there is one thing that always has to happen in a success story and that's the person
if you know one of the gentlemen with the reentry ministry talked about his brother I've got a good friend grew up together who's been in and out of prison and I have to say sadly that I don't know if any of these things would have changed anything about him going back. I would hope that I'm wrong and I'm because I believe in episode but it it comes back to you you know you come by a lot of individuals would
succeed if they had to help
I agree others until they make that decision just worked with to drug and alcohol people I I haven't been involved personally but
I've worked with team Challenge over the years and others and the the person has to reach that point where they decide that they want to change and that they want to do better and and every program in the world won't help if if they don't have that
and so love to hear all the wonderful stories about people who have changed their lives for whatever reason and with whatever help but I don't want us to kid ourselves that will that will change everybody or that everybody that has has gone to prison and even that everybody that we think has changed has changed I'm a preacher's kid and the a lot of times we want to believe people have changed and
sometimes they have and sometimes they haven't and and that's something we have to remember that the people
in charge have to be very careful of and because whether you're the first victim or the next victim people society don't look very don't look very well on people who allow some to victimize again and so they have to be
more careful sometimes when we're involved in the situation personally
and we just know that nothing's gonna happen it's not so easy for the person making the decision because they would have to live with it's easier for them to make the decision to leave people in always than it is to let people out and so we we need to keep that in mind because like I said you've added a dimension to the discussion that I like and I think we should really
look at especially as people age but I think there's some questions still unanswered in science and society some I know people just men let me just take it there menn are not as aggressive as
we get older we're not as I would agree with that we're not as likely to offend we're not as likely to get involved in road rage and all kinds of things but
we still have to be careful and so like I said I and I just I've seen this
just because I'm leading the parade and I don't want everybody think we just think that that that everybody's gonna be able to be helped and that everybody's going to do better because as we do these things we're gonna have failures and those failures will be publicized and so we we've got to be really careful that we we do the very best that as we vet and
remember that in every case is aspresentative Dosh Tosh pointed out in every case if somebody's serving time and serving time because they should be it's because there was a victim and it may have just been a retail store owner like me who gets angry because every time you look around you wonder what got got picked up and carried out. that's not that's lots easier to forgive than a loved one who really got
hurt and we need to remember those things that there is both sides because as somebody pointed out earlier today the first thing is that we protect society that's the first thing that's one of the things government is called to do is protect society Second we want
to protect the people are employees who we hope we've heard differently today so but that we
but most of them that are working in prisons are safe
and then third we want to come back to what y'all have talked about and many others have talked about is we're looking at not just that individual we're looking at their family we're looking at the community they come
from their parents their kids and how they're all affected and so but we have to look at that third we have to look at we have to look at protecting society first. and then we have to come back to what we've learned because we've learned things over the years we've learned that
incarceration isn't necessarily the best answer in lots of situations and continued incarceration is not but we still have to go back to number one and protect society until we
figure out how to do the other and thankfully we've got these people coming forth with ministries and other things I don't care whether you like religion don't like religion like I said all I cares what works is that is changed
lives so thank y'all for being here and I think we've got one
Agenda
A. Call to Order
B. Consideration to Approve August 12, 2026, Meeting Minutes [Exhibit B]
C. Overview of Proposed Housing Policy Initiatives [Exhibit C] - Duke McLarty, Executive Director, Groundwork Arkansas
D. Presentation on Memphis Fire Code Changes in the International Code Council and International Residential Code [Exhibit D] - John Zeanah, Principal, Interval
E. Presentation on Housing Policy Changes in Other States and Localities [Exhibit E] - Tushar Kansasl, Senior Officer, Housing Policy, Pew Charitable Trusts
F. Presentation on Deregulation and Housing Policy [Exhibit F1-F2] - Kileen Lindgren, Senior State Policy Manager, Pacific Legal Foundation
G. Other Business
H. Adjournment
Documents
Speakers
Senator Alan Clark
Unverified
Representative Jon S. Eubanks
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Representative Carol Dalby
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Speaker 14
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Senator Terry Rice
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Senator Clarke Tucker
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Representative Dwight Tosh
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Speaker 28
Representative Keith Brooks
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Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
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Senator Tyler Dees
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Representative Tippi McCullough
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Representative Tara Shephard
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Representative Jessie McGruder
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Senator Mark Johnson
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Senator Breanne Davis
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Carrie Williams
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Erry Williams
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Sarah Moore
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