MN County Probation Programs
Protecting the citizens of Sherburne County while also helping offenders readjust to the community are two initiatives the Sherburne County Probation Department is taking very seriously. Story in the Star News.
In August 2008 J. Hancuch started as the department’s director and ever since his first day, has gotten to work implementing changes to make everything run more smoothly and with greater success.
Before coming to Sherburne County, Hancuch was the director of the probation department in Isanti County for eight years, and prior to that he worked in the Anoka County Community Corrections Department as both a probations officer and supervisor.
Hancuch is a firm believer in using evidence-based practices whenever possible. Smarter sentencing to focus the most energies on those with the highest risk and needs comes first, he said. This means that supervising is based on validated risk assessments, and not just what the offender did.
“What their risks and needs are,” Hancuch said. “Who they are, not what they do.”
All probation department employees are also continuously trained and reinforced on what the evidence is saying and how to best work with offenders, he said.
“I think we’re making some headway,” Hancuch said.
Bringing awareness to the community
Teaching the community what exactly the probation department is, and what they do, has also always been a goal for Hancuch.With a newly and continuously revamped Web site — which is linked up through the county’s main site — Hancuch hopes to get valuable information out to residents and law enforcement.
For example, on www.co.sherburne.mn.us/ probation there’s a link titled “Sherburne County Probation Department Fugitives,” which shows photos of all the adults in the county who are currently on probation and have warrants for their arrests.
Aside from photos, there are also names, along with their birthdays, gender, physical descriptions and the type of offenses they have committed.
Hancuch said if anyone knows any of the people on the site, they should contact the Sherburne County Sheriff’s Office and/or the Sherburne County Probation Department.
Those listed with warrants are adult offenders only because of confidentiality laws involving minors.
The probation department Web site also has a secure link only accessible to law enforcement to better help keep the public safe.
By typing in a secure password, officers and deputies have access to a list of all of the high risk offenders in the Sherburne County Probation Department and Minnesota Department of Corrections.
Hancuch said this information helps law enforcement when they are patrolling their cities, as it gives them an idea of who is in the community and who to keep an eye on.
Increased monitoring
Six to eight months ago the probation department also took over monitoring offenders on conditional release supervision.Hancuch said it used to be that the offenders were supposed to be monitored, but no one really knew who was in charge, so the accountability wasn’t there.
Now, when an inmate gets out of prison and has something like a no-contact order or needs to get a urine analysis a certain number of times, the Sherburne County probation officers are there to monitor the person and make sure the stipulations are being met.
Alcoholics Anonymous orientation meetings
One month ago the department started an Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) orientation program.This program is designed for those offenders who are court ordered to attend AA meetings, Hancuch said.
In the past anonymity was a problem, as it put the AA facilitators in a tough spot having to verify who was coming to the meetings, Hancuch said, adding that many AA attendees outside of the court system do not want their identity known to everyone, and like that the program is anonymous.
In addition, it could sometimes be disruptive to the meetings when people who are court ordered to be there were just thrown into the mix of people choosing to be there, he said.
To help combat these difficulties, now the courts can order someone to take the eight-week orientation program.
This program is run by AA volunteers and goes through an overview and run down of the 12 steps.
This way, if a person continues on into regular AA meetings, he or she has already been briefed and has a better idea of what to expect.
From here offenders will also know how to get a sponsor and which meetings might work best for them if they wish to continue on.
Looking to the future
Continuing on in 2010, Hancuch said the probation department wants to work with the courts to try and work out a system to better protect victims of domestic abuse.No formal plans have been laid out yet to make this happen, but the department is in the process of learning how they can enhance the information given to the courts from the pre-trial bail evaluation process, while still being sensitive to the victims.
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