View Systems, Inc., a security and tele-data solutions provider, announced today that a series of purchase orders have been received from the New Jersey Department of Corrections for new ViewScan Concealed Weapons Detection Systems. The NJDOC has purchased ViewScans in the past for each of its correctional facilities. Press release from Marketwatch.

ViewScan is fast becoming the choice screening system across the country. It’s a computer-based system that can scan up to 1200 people per hour. As a person passes through the portal, a photograph is taken and stored on the laptop computer that comes with the unit. Threat objects are visually located on the computer screen and an audible alert can be set to sound. The ViewScan produces no harmful emissions so it’s safe for everyone.

ViewScan units are currently deployed in all Maryland and New Jersey correctional facilities, as well as in courthouses, banks, schools and other professional buildings across the country. ViewScan has been utilized on a rental basis by major banking firms to secure their shareholder meetings. It was also retained as part of the security measures for the Clinton Global Initiative five years in a row.

Gunther Than, CEO of View Systems, states, “We are delighted that the NJDOC has decided to continue to use the ViewScan systems for each of their facilities. This set of purchase orders is a testament to the reliability and functionality of the ViewScan unit.”

jchev New Jersey, Prison and Jail Security, Technology

Keeping one of the most dangerous contraband items — the small, and seemingly innocuous, cell phone — out of jails and prisons has become a 21st century nightmare for corrections officers. In jail, a cell phone “is a valuable commodity and they will go to any lengths to get them,” said Alfaro Ortiz, director of the Essex County Correctional Facility. “Much like drugs, it’s about five to 10 times the worth what somebody would just buy a phone on the street for.” Full story, with additional photos, available from The Star-Ledger.

John Shaffer, a consultant with ITT Defense and formerly the second in command of Pennsylvania’s Department of Corrections, said the problem is pervasive nationwide.

“It’s a hot topic among all corrections professionals,” Shaffer said. “There have been similar cases in New Jersey and around the country. Texas has the case of a death row inmate using a cell phone to call Sen. John Whitmire to threaten his family.”

On Thursday, Corrections Officer Joseph Mastriani was accused of running a 13-person operation in which Essex County Correctional Facility inmates “ordered out” for everything from cell phones to heroin. Prosecutors said Mastriani pocketed $1,000 some weeks, filling orders by using go-betweens on the street and point men in jail.

He pleaded not guilty to conspiracy and official misconduct Friday.

One of the alleged point men inside the jail was a suspect awaiting trial on murder charges, Wilbert Best.

The problem of inmates smuggling cell phones also was highlighted in June after state prison inmate Anthony Kidd was accused of using a cell phone to order a “hit” on his ex-girlfriend.

“They’re threatening witnesses, they’re doing gang activity, they’re running drug deals,” New Jersey Corrections Commissioner Gary Lanigan said last month at a roundtable meeting with reporters in Bridgeton. “It undermines the criminal justice system.”

A 2008 attorney general’s office investigation also highlighted the sprawling reach cell phones provide to inmates. A probe into the state’s highest-security prison showed Clarence Scott used a smuggled phone to dictate actions of a Paterson-based set of the Bloods street gang. He allegedly conducted business across New Jersey from his Trenton prison cell.

To address the problem, Lanigan is pushing federal legislation to jam cell phones at correctional facilities.

Then, he said, the inmate would have “a 4-ounce piece of garbage.”

Lanigan said technology to pinpoint cell phones is costly and requires additional training to use. Meanwhile, jamming technology should be cheaper, but is still not available.

In Pennsylvania, Shaffer worked with ITT to develop a technology called Cell Hound. Using a triangulation method, Cell Hound detects frequencies of all major cell phone brands.

Elsewhere, another type of hound — dogs — is being trained to track the scent of a lithium battery and find cell phones. That training can be expensive and difficult, Shaffer said.

Corrections departments are also using handheld devices, similar to metal detection wands, that look for phone components such as circuit boards.

“The downside is you have to be within several inches of the device to find it,” Shaffer said. Plus, it reacts to many devices inmates are allowed to possess, such as radios and televisions, creating false nuisance alarms.

Shaffer said a common ploy corrections officers use to smuggle cell phones is to pass through the metal detector, then say they forgot something in their car and walk through unchecked a second time. Others have put contraband between sandwiches in their lunch box, a place fellow officers are reluctant to search.

Corrections officials also said they have noticed an increase in cell phone smuggling over the past decade, as the phones became smaller and more commonplace.

Ortiz said he supports Lanigan’s initiative on cell jamming, but cautioned there is not a one-size-fits-all solution.

“With regard to jamming devices, nothing is perfect,” he said. “Whatever tech is out there we’re definitely interested in, but right now we haven’t found one specific solution to this problem.”

jchev Cell Phones, New Jersey

While re-entry and skill-building programs offered by the New Jersey Department of Corrections (NJDOC) at its 11 prisons are heavily used and generally viewed favorably by inmates, many anticipate a difficult return to society due to their underlying health conditions and concerns about finances and support systems. Story reported in the R&D Magazine.

To improve their chances for success in the community, a Rutgers researcher recommends that NJDOC adopt a policy of universal re-entry preparedness during each inmate’s mandatory minimum term and a reallocation of funding to increase skill-building capacity on-site rather than in ultimately more costly halfway house programs.

Rutgers Professor Nancy Wolff, director of the Center for Behavioral Health Services and Criminal Justice Research, reaches those conclusions in a new study, Re-entry Readiness of Men and Women Leaving New Jersey Prisons. “Approximately 10,000 men and women leave New Jersey prisons each year. Many of them return to jail and prison for parole violations or new convictions within days, months or years post-release,” Wolff observed. She added that the criminal justice system’s current emphasis to “stop the revolving prison door” is on re-entry preparedness, with special funding under the federal Second Chance Act set aside to improve re-entry services around the country.

“While re-entry-related funding is flowing into states, its target efficiency and ultimate effectiveness in terms of public safety depend on whether it goes to the right people in the right places and in the right ways,” Wolff explained. “For this, it is critical to know the population – its needs, strengths and resources.”

Wolff conducted a Re-entry Readiness Survey from June through August 2009 of 4,000 men and women in the state’s prisons due for release within 24 months. Among the findings:

• “A sizable minority” of soon-to-be-released respondents had chronic health and/or mental health problems or chronic pain that would require follow-up treatment.
• A majority would be released with drug-related convictions that will constrain their ability to receive cash assistance, food stamps and public housing.
• More than one-third had no one helping them find housing or a job.
• More than one-quarter reported their ability to manage money, work for a living, be a responsible adult and control drug or alcohol problems as fair or poor.

Despite these impediments to success upon release, many respondents viewed favorably and utilized NJDOC re-entry and skill-building programs:

• Nearly 70 percent reported receiving needed behavioral health services.
• Nearly 70 percent knew about the STARS (Successful Transition and Re-entry Series) program; 80 percent of STARS enrollees or graduates rated the experience good or higher and would encourage a peer to enroll.
• More than 80 percent admitted to social functioning skill programs rated instruction and materials good or higher.
• More than 87 percent of participants in educational and vocational programs rated instruction and materials good or higher.

To meet the twin goals of effectively preparing soon-to-be-released prisoners to “make good” and to protect the public, the department must re-examine how it spends limited funds dedicated to re-entry-related services, Wolff said. The report recommends that the skill-preparedness of inmates be maximized during their mandatory minimum terms.

Currently, NJDOC provides less than half the functioning, educational and vocational skill-building services needed by the soon-to-be-released population. To reduce recidivism and chances of compromising public safety, Wolff recommends creating a Re-entry Preparedness Checklist at all prisons that would measure key skills and resources expected upon release and monitor the progress of individual inmates toward these goals. Results would be posted on the department’s website.

She also advocates for increased funding and skill-building capacity within NJDOC to the scale of need of prisoners during their mandatory minimum sentence, and to establish re-entry preparedness standards to determine if an inmate is eligible for parole consideration upon completion of his or her mandatory minimum term.

The research also finds that by keeping more re-entry-related services on site, rather than outsourced to halfway houses that provide community-based residential treatment for a minority of released inmates, NJDOC can accrue considerable savings. The FY 2009 budget allocated about $61 million for residential services that support an average daily halfway house population of more than 2,600 people.

“While it is often argued that a community-based halfway house bed is cheaper than a prison bed, this is true only if the services provided by the halfway house could not be provided by the Corrections Department while the inmate was serving the mandatory minimum term,” Wolff said. “Adding off-site re-entry preparedness costs to the back end of a mandatory minimum sentence term adds $23,000 per year per inmate.”

Wolff added that reduced reliance on residential service providers will free up additional funds for on-site re-entry preparedness programming and pay for a Re-entry Preparedness Performance Monitoring System. She also called for a Community Service Vouchering program that will enable parolees to buy residential, vocational and treatment services as needed in the communities to which they are returning.

“Contracting for residential rehabilitation services has resulted in a concentration of services in such urban areas as Camden, Newark and Trenton,” Wolff said. “A vouchering system is consistent with community reinvestment strategies and goals to distribute service capacity more evenly across the state.”

jchev Inmate Programs, New Jersey, Re-Entry

Gov.-elect Chris Christie announced yesterday he will nominate Gary Lanigan, a former New York City prison official and current fiscal officer for the city’s transportation authority, as leader of the state’s prison system. News from The Star-Ledger.

If confirmed by the Senate, Lanigan, a financial guru, will replace George Hayman as commissioner of the $1.1 billion department responsible for about 25,600 inmates.

“Gary Lanigan has the experience, know-how and determination needed to effectively manage and focus our corrections’ system,” Christie said. “Gary will bring to the New Jersey Department of Corrections an understanding and care that is needed to not only protect the public, but ensure positive reintegration of those currently in the system.”

The department now operates 13 prisons after Riverfront State Prison in Camden was shut last year to make room for development.

Although the inmate population has dropped in recent years, state prisons hold about 400 more inmates than they were designed for, and another 5,000 inmates are held at other facilities such as county jails.The department has faced criticism since a May report from the State Commission of Investigation said it has failed to crack down on gang activity.

Lanigan has worked for several New York City agencies, always in a financial capacity. After leaving the Navy in 1975, he worked for the mayor at the Office of Management and Budget.

He served as assistant commissioner for financial affairs at the New York City Police Department before joining the city’s Department of Corrections in 1994. Lanigan rose to the position of first deputy commissioner in 1998, overseeing a $792 million budget and 12,400 uniformed and civilian employees. He joined New York City’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority in 2003 as the director of budgets and financial management, responsible for financial planning at the authority, which has an $11 billion budget and 70,000 employees.

The fourth cabinet member named by Christie, Lanigan lives on Staten Island and plans move to New Jersey after the school year is over, said Christie spokeswoman Maria Comella. All cabinet members are required to live in the state.

Hayman has applied to retire on April 1, according to Treasury spokesman Tom Vincz. He started his career at the department in 1983 as a social worker in New Jersey State Prison in Trenton, and became commissioner in 2006.

jchev New Jersey, Personnel Issues

N.J. prisons are teaching inmates job skills to avoid return to life of crime. Story reported by the NJ News.

Leaning back in a chair with his arms crossed, Javier Herrera watched his classmates practice fade haircuts with electric clippers as he described his big plans for a men’s salon in Newark. He’ll offer manicures and stylish haircuts but also provide masculine touches, maybe even a cigar lounge. “A lot of guys are going metro now,” he said. “It’s big.”

For Herrera, 28, opening the salon is not just a business plan, it’s also a lifestyle change. The last time he paid the bills, he did so by selling cocaine — which landed him at Garden State Youth Correctional Facility in Yardville for drug, weapons and resisting arrest offenses.

With more than three years to go until he’s eligible for parole, Herrera is working in the prison barbershop to earn his cosmetology license. “Hair’s always going to grow,” he said. “It’s something you can always make money off of.”

Prison workshops are more than a diversion from the monotony of life behind bars. They can give inmates a head start on one of their biggest and most important challenges: finding jobs after their release.

“That’s what’s going to decide whether you’re going to stay out there or come back in here,” Herrera said.

With 65 percent of New Jersey’s inmates back in jail within five years of their release, state officials are emphasizing job training because employment is a crucial indicator of whether former prisoners will return to a life of crime. The Department of Corrections is spending $26 million on prison education this year, and some legislators are pushing for more funding.
About one-fifth of the state’s inmates, 5,237 men and women, are enrolled in vocational classes, according to department statistics. Another 2,068 are on waiting lists.

But finding work is more difficult than ever, and the state has shed 101,400 private-sector jobs in the last year as it slogs through the recession. In November, just over half of the 13,257 ex-offenders who were under parole supervision and considered viable for employment had jobs.

And always, lurking in the background, is the lure of easy money from selling drugs, a job that doesn’t require a resume or a background check.

That’s what enticed Marquise Allen, 23, when he was released from prison in August of last year. Within a month, he was arrested on drug charges. “There weren’t any jobs calling me back,” he said. “At the end of the day, you gotta do what you gotta do.”

Extra-Curricular Activities
The section of Garden State prison for classrooms is reminiscent of a high school hallway, and colorful signs advertise classes like graphic arts, computers and electronics. Popular ones like Herrera’s cosmetology course can take a year to get into, inmates said.

On a recent weekday, David Fontanez, 29, was one of several students trimming classmates’ hair. “You learn everything. You learn how to curl, perm,” he said. “It’s important to learn something in here and take it out there.”

Fontanez has been locked up three years — his second stint in state prison, this time for burglary and drug possession — and has less than a year left before he can be paroled. “I’m trying not to be 40 and coming back in here,” he said.

Assemblywoman Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-Mercer) is leading efforts to pump millions of dollars into prison education through legislation intended to reduce recidivism. She says the state will save money in the long run by putting former inmates to work.

Although her bills would cost less than 1 percent of the department’s approximately $1 billion budget, Corrections says that’s cash the department doesn’t have right now. “We recognize that there is always room for improvement,” legislative liaison Michelle Hammel told an Assembly committee on Dec. 3. “We just simply do not have the money to do that.”

Inmates who worked or received training in prison are more likely to find a job when released, according to a 2008 study from the Urban Institute, a nonprofit organization in Washington, D.C.

Also, ex-offenders earning at least $10 an hour were half as likely to be re-incarcerated as those making less than $7 an hour, according to the same study, which was conducted in Illinois, Ohio and Texas.

Hunting For Work
There are about 25,500 state inmates in New Jersey, and 14,400 are released each year. Once they hit the streets, it can be a race against time to find them jobs.

“Most inmates come out wanting to do the right thing. When they obtain employment, they fulfill that hope,” said Parole Board Lt. Paul McIntyre, who oversees the agency’s employment efforts. “If after a few months they don’t find employment, that optimism they came out with starts to disappear.”

Without legal work, it becomes more likely an ex-offender will return to crime. “They don’t have any money,” said Vernon Long, who works with former inmates to find jobs. “And the first person that’s going to give them any money is someone they used to do crime with.”

Long runs Opportunities for All in Hamilton, one of 11 day-reporting centers for New Jersey’s parolees. His organization’s database lists 333 companies with job openings, mostly for entry-level positions at car washes, retail stores and factories unhurt by the recession. Long said big retailers like Target and Wal-Mart have programs for hiring ex-offenders, which can earn companies tax credits.

Still, the struggling economy has taken its toll. Some ex-offenders were trained to weatherize homes and then joined a union. But there wasn’t enough work to go around, and they remain unemployed.

Playing Catch-Up
State officials have claimed some success. About 1,500 inmates were enrolled in the Another Chance program, a partnership between several state agencies that provides ex-offenders with job coaches and other services. Officials said participants are 20 percent less likely to be re-arrested within six months of release.

“We’re working with people who don’t have the basic skills to have an interview,” said Wanda Moore, who oversees efforts at the state Attorney General’s Office to re-integrate ex-offenders. “We run up against some of the same problems that contributed to them being incarcerated in the first place.”

Drug sales remain lucrative, too. Anthony Versace, 23, sold LSD despite holding part-time jobs as a cook and ski-lift operator. “I could make what I could in a month in two hours,” said Versace, now an inmate at Garden State prison.

Lenny Ward, director of community programs for the state parole board, said low-level dealers usually can be convinced to give up drugs.

“That’s not exactly a glamorous job, worrying about whether you’re going to be shot or arrested,” he said. “If we can give them a taste of legitimate employment, then we can hook them.”

jchev Inmate Programs, New Jersey, Re-Entry

A crowd rallied in support of prison reform in front of the Statehouse today, cheering on Assemblywoman Bonnie Watson Coleman as she pushes her bills through the Legislature. Reported by New Jersey On-Line.

“We’re not asking for anyone to be given a free ride. But if you live and you breath, you have made mistakes,” she said. “If you don’t have a chance to correct those mistakes, you will continue to make them.”

Supporters waved signs reading “Support treatment not jail” and “Give people a second chance.”

A package of legislation would allow former inmates to receive financial help from state welfare programs, encourage the corrections system to place prisoners in facilities close to their families and seek ways to maintain bonds between incarcerated parents and their children.

One of the laws would require inmates to finish high school classes and receive vocational training.

The state would shed almost $5 million if one of the bills (A4197) is passed, according to estimates from the nonpartisan Office of Legislative Services. The bills are in danger of failing because lawmakers are hesitant to spend any money with the state’s deficit hitting $1 billion in the current budget year.

Watson Coleman (D-Mercer) said her legislation will save money down the line because more former inmates would be educated and working.

“These individuals will not need to worry about being on a whole realm of public support,” she said. “We’ll have people contributing as taxpayers.”

Assembly Speaker Joseph Roberts (D-Camden) did not post the bills for a vote today, but Watson Coleman said she’s working to get them on the calendar for the Jan. 7 session.

Roberts has said he supports the bills, saying it “looks to be a very smart approach to saving taxpayer dollars and helping give those released from our prisons a better chance at success.”

Arthur Townes, who helps former inmates find housing, jobs and rehabilitation programs, said people face “double jeopardy” when they commit a crime in New Jersey. After they’re convicted, he said, they’re penalized again by a myriad of state laws and regulations.

Watson Coleman’s bills could help change that, he said.

“It will give ex-offenders and people who slipped and went another way another chance,” he said. “It’s something we say they deserve, but the laws don’t support.”

Darryl Mikell Brooks, a former political candidate, said he supports the bills but doesn’t expect today’s rally to be effective.

“The people leading this don’t have the strength, don’t have the votes,” he said. “I hate to see people get all excited.”

jchev Corrections Reform, New Jersey

A sweeping bill package sponsored by six Assembly Democratic legislators to improve rehabilitation in New Jersey prisons and to save taxpayer dollars by cutting recidivism and giving released inmates an improved chance of success was advanced Monday by an Assembly panel. News from PolitickerNJ.

The package is sponsored by Assembly Majority Leader Bonnie Watson Coleman and Assembly members Albert Coutinho, Elease Evans, Mila M. Jasey, L. Grace Spencer and Cleopatra G. Tucker. It stems from a series of hearings on Watson Coleman hosted throughout New Jersey to hear from citizens and experts on how to cut into recidivism and save public money.

The bills were released by the Assembly Law and Public Safety Committee.

“The pervasive cycle of arrest, release and re-arrest is failed system that wastes lives and costs taxpayers dearly,” said Watson Coleman (D-Mercer). “Quite simply, it’s a disgraceful and destructive cycle that must come to an end for the good of all New Jersey taxpayers and those directly affected by our failed system. We’ve seen too much money unsuccessfully spent on programs that don’t work. These reforms are a long overdue step toward progress.”

“These reforms range from improving education and job training to enhancing family support to eliminating antiquated roadblocks to success for those released from prison,” said Coutinho (D-Essex). “These common sense steps will give people an opportunity to earn their second chance and ensure we spend public money wisely.”

“None of these bills would make it easier to serve sentences,” said Spencer (D-Essex). “What they would do is make serving that time more sensible and help ensure that after their time is served, prisoners re-enter society ready to be productive citizens. That will save lives and taxpayer dollars.”

“The simple fact is that of the thousands people released from New Jersey prisons each year, 65 percent of the adults and 37 percent of the juveniles will return within two years,” said Tucker (D-Essex). “That is unacceptable, and these bills aim to not only to improve lives and neighborhoods, but to save money.”

“Spending money time and time again on prisoners who come and go from our prison systems is, quite simply, a waste,” said Evans (D-Passaic). “We need to do better, not only for the wellbeing of the people whose lives are being lost in our prisons, but for taxpayers who need to know their money is spent smartly.”

“We simply cannot afford to continue the present system of spending money repeatedly on repeat offenders,” said Jasey (D-Essex). “The time has come to change our approach so that we can give people and our society a better chance at a better future.”

The “Women and Families Strengthening Act” (A-4197), which would:

• End the prohibition in state law against released prisoners from receiving cash assistance benefits provided under Work First New Jersey.
• Require the state to contract with the lowest bidder for inmate telephone services, prohibit the contractor from imposing surcharges on inmate calls and bar the state from accepting revenue in excess of the cost of operating inmate telephone services.
• Establish a commission to examine strategies for strengthening bonds between jailed parents and their children.
• Require an assistant corrections commissioner establish and monitor policies affecting incarcerated mothers and their children.
• Prohibit the state from housing female inmates in the same facility as male inmates, if it results in conditions more restrictive than the male inmates.
• Require the state to make every effort to assign an inmate to a facility close to where the inmate’s family resides.

A bill (A-4199) designed to address incarceration concerns, which would:

• Allow prisoners in a state or county jail to keep $25 of their monthly income earned for labor performed at the facility, up from $15.
• Require the state to semiannually submit all inmate complaints to the Department of the Public Advocate.
• Require the state to develop an in-service training program for corrections officers that must include mental health sensitivity.

A bill (A-4201) designed to address release concerns, which would:

• Establish a faith-based programs coordinator with the state Department of Corrections to compile and disseminate information about faith-based groups and programs, especially those that provide assistance and services to inmates re-entering society.
• Establish Mental Health Courts to facilitate voluntary treatment of defendants who have mental health illnesses.
• Create a Prisoner Re-entry Commission and require the collection of data on recidivism and a fiscal estimate or the potential cost of any legislation that increases prison sentences.
• Give prisoners a 90-day grace period on outstanding fines and other monetary penalties.
• A bill (A-4202) designed to address education and job training, which would:
• Require the state to create a mandatory workforce skills training and a mandatory education program in each state correctional facility.
• Require inmates to attain a high school equivalency certificate or high school diploma.
• Allow inmates and parolees to enter into agreements with institutions for education, training or other activities that, if successfully completed, could reduce parole terms.
• Establish a mandatory six-month period of post-release supervision for all state inmates.
• Allow a person who has been released from prison to obtain a court order that allows them to visit prisons, if they can show that such visits are likely to motivate and help rehabilitate other inmates.

“This is important unfinished business from the many hearings we held throughout New Jersey, during which we heard from thousands of people about how our system has failed people and cost us money,” Watson Coleman said. “A broad coalition of community organizations, faith leaders, law enforcement officials and ordinary citizens have lined up behind these ideas and will work to build support for these well-informed and carefully crafted bills that reflect a desire to improve lives and save money.”

jchev Corrections Reform, New Jersey

The national recession is taking its toll on what had been one of the fastest-growing areas of state government spending: prisons. Even though state corrections budgets have ballooned in the past two decades amid a surging U.S. prison population, at least 23 states slashed funding for prisons this year, according to a new survey by the nonpartisan Vera Institute of Justice, a research organization based in New York. Thirty-three states responded to the survey, paid for by The Pew Charitable Trusts.  This story is from the Pew publication, Stateline.Org.

A $1 billion cost-cutting plan announced last week by Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn (D) will translate into layoffs for more than a thousand state prison workers. In Oregon, a voter-approved plan to hand longer prison sentences to those who commit property crimes was delayed by state lawmakers who said they could not pay for it. Tennessee’s department of corrections has sought to save money by offering inmates less milk and meat in their daily meals. And in Kansas — which has received national attention in recent years for shifting resources from locking up prisoners to rehabilitating them — the state eliminated 85 percent of the slots in its substance-abuse treatment program for inmates, citing budget constraints.

Six states — Georgia, Idaho, Kansas, Montana, Nebraska and Washington — cut funding for corrections by more than 10 percent from last year’s levels, according to the study. Kansas saw the biggest recorded decrease, spending 22 percent less than it did last year.

Corrections is the fifth-largest area of state spending after Medicaid, secondary education, higher education and transportation. State spending on prisons has swelled as the nation’s jail and prison population has climbed to 2.3 million people, or about one in every 100 adults. But grim budget realities are forcing state lawmakers’ hand.

According to the Vera survey, many states are wringing savings from their correctional systems by trying to reduce the huge operational costs of running prisons — including by laying off workers, freezing their wages or cutting services to inmates. They also are exploring new ways to reduce recidivism and achieve long-term savings, in some cases easing sanctions on “technical violators” who break conditions of their parole and frequently are sent back to prison. Some states, including Colorado and Oregon, are allowing more prisoners to reduce their prison sentences through “earned-time credits” for good behavior and other forms of early release.

Some of the cost-cutting moves — using videoconferencing to avoid physically transporting inmates for court appearances, for example, and cutting back on inmates’ meal offerings — have targeted the basics of daily prison life and reaped relatively modest savings. But other changes will save tens of millions of dollars and have not come without political fights.

According to Stateline.org’s annual review of states’ legislative sessions, at least seven states — Colorado, Kansas, Michigan, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina and Washington — this year decided to close prisons. In some states, those plans touched off resistance among prison unions and in hard-hit communities anxious about losing even more jobs.   New York’s prison workers’ union earlier this year accused the administration of Gov. David Paterson (D) of creating “the most dangerous conditions ever” for correctional officers by closing 10 prisons and packing inmates into other facilities. In Michigan, which has the nation’s highest unemployment rate, Gov. Jennifer Granholm (D) is trying to avoid closing some prisons — and laying off prison guards — by accepting inmates from California’s teeming system. Some state officials have backed the idea of housing detainees from Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Early releases also have caused alarm, particularly in California, where a federal panel of three judges last week ordered the state to free more than 40,000 inmates — or about 27 percent of its prison population — within the next two years to ease dangerous overcrowding. Attorney General Jerry Brown (D), who is widely expected to run for governor next year, attacked the decision and could appeal it to the U.S. Supreme Court. The early release of thousands of inmates also is being considered in Illinois.   While some criminal justice advocates contend that early releases and other cost-cutting moves could endanger public safety, others say states have not gone far enough in cutting inmate numbers.

Some advocates say state lawmakers have avoided what they see as the “elephant in the room” — tough sentencing policies that have put many low-level offenders behind bars for longer and been a major factor behind the explosive growth in the nation’s prison population since the 1970s, when many of the laws were passed. The federal panel that ruled on California’s prison overcrowding cited sentencing laws as a factor behind the Golden State’s huge prison population.  While New York this year revised its drug sentencing laws to give judges more discretion to keep offenders out of jail, other high-profile sentencing changes in the states have been far more limited in their scope. Texas, for instance, eliminated life without parole for juveniles, a penalty that currently affects only seven inmates. New Mexico abolished capital punishment, but had only two men on death row when the bill was signed into law in March.

Washington state’s legislative session this year was “completely upside down in terms of criminal justice policy,” said state Rep. Roger Goodman (D), vice chair of the House Judiciary Committee. Goodman said lawmakers cut funding for the wrong programs — such as housing and other transitional services that can help ex-inmates stay out of trouble — and refused to make substantial changes to the sentencing policies that he said have put too many nonviolent and drug-addicted people in prison in the first place. Goodman explained lawmakers’ distaste for making sentencing changes this way: “There aren’t enough political points to be gained by taking this issue on. There are political points to be gained by attacking it.”

While broad changes to criminal sentencing laws remain a tough sell issue in many state capitols, corrections officials are pushing other, less controversial changes to reduce prison populations. Many states have made sick or dying inmates eligible for early parole. Other states, including Florida and Tennessee, have invested more heavily in drug treatment courts and community supervision programs in the hopes of keeping offenders from returning to prison.  “Changing sentences is a very difficult thing to do. And so we’ve gone around it,” Pennsylvania Corrections Secretary Jeffrey Beard said during an annual summit of state legislators in Philadelphia last month.

jakking Budgets, California, Colorado, Early Release, Economic Issues, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Kansas, Michigan, Montana, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Washington

Seeking to cut surging overtime expenses at the Salem County NJ Correctional Facility, officials have announced they will be hiring 21 new officers by the end of 2010.  Story from NJ.Com.

An effort to reverse a trend that saw $2.8 million spent in overtime pay last year, up from $2.64 million in 2007, the measure is being called the first major step in reducing not only the stress on employees, but on the taxpayers as well. In a joint statement from Salem County Sheriff Chuck Miller and Freeholder David Lindenmuth, chair of the county Public Safety Committee, they introduced a plan to take on 14 recruits this year and seven more by the following December. “Public safety is paramount and we aim to reduce the cost to the taxpayer without compromising safety,” said Miller. “Right now we have no relief built in. When someone takes off, it is going straight to overtime.”

Overall the county’s various departments and agencies doled out approximately $4.4 million to many of its estimated 480 employees last year, for working a total of 125,855 hours past their normal shifts. Jail staff accounted for 74,595 of those extra hours.

Warden Ray Skradzinski said the starting salary for the 21 new officers will be an estimated $31,000 annually. He said the jail’s current 100 officers take 12-hour shifts, though right now routinely work up to 16 hours.  “Certainly cutting back on overtime will affect some of their earning potential,” Skradzinski said. “When it comes down to the morale and the fatigue … it’s a balance from an administrative point of view we have to take.”

jakking NJ Salem County, Personnel Issues

The Washington, DC-based Justice Policy Institute cited New Jersey’s unique Regional Assessment Center (RAC) initiative as an example of a smart reentry policy designed to prevent parolees from unnecessary re-incarceration. RAC programs are operated by New Jersey-based Community Education Centers, Inc. (CEC) in collaboration with the New Jersey State Parole Board (NJSPB).

“The RAC program is the proverbial ‘win-win’ for New Jersey. The State avoids the costs of incarceration and technical parole violators receive the reentry services they need to lead productive lives. This report confirms what university-based research has told us for years–reentry programs work,” said Dr. Robert Mackey. The report states that community-based reentry programs are cost effective and improve public safety and cites New Jersey as one of “six states (that) are increasing the likelihood that people on probation or parole stay out of prison.”

“New Jersey has long focused on community corrections through the utilization of an assessment/treatment model as an effective alternative to incarceration. RAC is an important program to address the reentry needs of technical parole violators,” added Dr. Mackey.

The citation appears in “Pruning Prisons: How Cutting Corrections Can Save Money and Protect Public Safety,” an independent report released May 20, 2009 by the Justice Policy Institute. The report is available at the institute’s website, http://www.justicepolicy.org/index.htm.

The Regional Assessment Centers were developed as an investment in public safety, and a method to save taxpayer dollars by reducing the rate at which technical parole violators are returned to prison. Technical parole violators are parolees who have committed a technical violation of the conditions of their supervision, but have not been charged with a new crime or significantly threatened public safety. Most technical violations are consistent with a relapse in addiction and indicate intensified supervision and treatment as an appropriate response for public safety. The RACs hold technical parole violators to a 15- to 30-day lockdown period, while subjecting them to a clinical risk-needs assessment. The assessment helps the New Jersey State Parole Board make better-informed decisions as to whether the technical violator should continue on parole with intensified supervision and programming, or whether the individual should return to prison.

Source:  CEC press release.

jakking CEC, Community Corrections, New Jersey, Private Prisons, Re-Entry, Recidivism

Violent gangs are thriving behind New Jersey’s prison walls and the Department of Corrections isn’t doing enough to stop them, according to a report released today by the State Commission on Investigation.   Report from NJ.com.

Investigators said jails are like a “branch office” for gang members who are able to easily sell drugs, communicate by using smuggled cell phones and launder money with official inmate accounts. The report says that incarceration is not an obstacle to gang members, who are able to easily sell drugs, communicate using smuggled cell phones and launder money using official inmate accounts …

The SCI, a fact-finding agency that examines crime and corruption and which reports to the Legislature, recommended widespread changes within the Department of Corrections, including better oversight of inmate finances, reforming prison hiring practices and improving inspections to prevent smuggling …

Law enforcement efforts are succeeding in putting more gang members behind bars, the report said, but that has created new challenges for state prisons. “The growing influx of convicted gang members has transformed the prison system into a breeding ground for gang-related criminal activity at a level far more expansive than ever before,” the report said. Prison staff monitor inmate phone calls, read mail and receive some training on how to deal with gangs. But, the report said, it is not enough. “Those who manage and staff these institutions go to work every day in what amounts to a defensive holding action against worsening odds, and all too often, as they reach for practical tools to get the job done properly, they find the system lacking,” the report says …

According to the report, a top Corrections official believes up to half of all state prison inmates are involved with a gang, either by choice or through extortion. The SCI identified an East Coast chapter of the Bloods as the primary catalyst for criminal activity behind bars. During a November hearing, state investigators said the Bloods — which reportedly account for about half of all incarcerated gang members — exploit corrupt prison guards to smuggle drugs and other contraband. Shawn Williams, president of the National Alliance of Gang Investigators Association, said the biggest problem is the proliferation of cell phones, which allows inmates to circumvent monitored prison phones …

SCI Chairman Cary Edwards … said some problems can be tackled without more money, noting that the Department of Corrections’ investigative operations need fundamental restructuring. The division is responsible for both internal affairs and gang suppression, creating a toxic relationship with the guards needed for gathering basic intelligence, Edwards said. He also said police and prison officials need to do a better job sharing intelligence on gang activity.

jakking Data Sharing, Gangs (STGs), Inmate Telephones, New Jersey, Offender Information

New Jersey has a special program intended to divert low-risk parolees away from jail and back into society, according to NJ.com.

State Parole Board officials say it’s the first of its kind in the nation. “We have to take full credit for this one,” said Director of Community Programs Lenny Ward. “This is a New Jersey initiative.”

The idea is to take technical parole violators — people who haven’t committed a new crime but may have failed a drug test or missed a meeting — and house them for 15 to 30 days at secure facilities run by a private company, Community Education Centers, in Newark or Trenton. Officials hope the program, which can house 45 parole violators at a time, will help the state avoid $14 million in incarceration costs in the coming budget year. In New Jersey, the overwhelming majority of parolees returning to prison each year — about 85 percent of almost 3,000 — committed technical violations, not new crimes. Lowering that number would help take a bite out of prison overcrowding at a time when state prisons have about 5,500 more inmates than what they were designed for …

Jeff Mellow, professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York, said that [economics are] changing how people view minor parole violations. “There has been a shift across the country due to the high costs of incarcerations, prison overcrowding, and a new emphasis on rehabilitation that makes us rethink this whole notion of ‘zero tolerance,’” Mellow said. “Everyone is realizing that they can no longer incarcerate their way out of this problem.”

For several years, New Jersey has used a system of “graduated sanctions,” in which parole officers have more options than simply returning their offenders to prison. Parolees who have not committed a new crime can receive increased supervision, electronic monitoring or substance abuse treatment. As a result, the number of technical violators returning to prison dropped 37 percent from 2001 to 2008. The Residential Assessment Centers, which opened last summer, use the same concept …

That doesn’t mean the program is cheap. The state has already spent $4.51 million on it and is expected to fork over another $3.786 million in the budget year that begins July 1. But parole officials say that money will pay dividends, as more parolees receive the attention they need to get their lives back on track. “Every day that the person is not in county jail or in a state prison, New Jersey basically saves money,” Ward said.

jakking CEC, Community Corrections, Inmate Programs, New Jersey, Parole, Private Prisons

Members of the New Jersey administration appeared this week before the State Senate Budget Committee.  The NJ DOC was no exception, as reported by NJ.com.

Department of Corrections Commissioner George Hayman told the committee: “We are living through an era when each expenditure must be scrutinized and every efficiency realized.”

New Jersey’s inmate population continues to drop — from 22,908 in 2007 to a projected 21,715 next year — but the annual cost of housing inmates continues to rise, to $38,500 per inmate. Prisons remain over capacity, with 5,563 more inmates than the facilities were designed for.

The department is doing everything from buying milk and cereal in bulk to closing a prison, Riverfront State Prison in Camden, this year to save money, Hayman said.

Sen. Shirley Turner (D-Mercer County), asked about drug treatment and rehabilitation programs, which she said could help reduce the number of former convicts returning to prison.  Hayman said they were doing the best they could with limited resources.  “We treat as many as we can treat,” he said.

jakking Drug Treatment & Diversion, Economic Issues, New Jersey

The Passaic County NJ Jail is ending an arrangement with the Philadelphia Prison System to house inmates at its Paterson facility, according to the Evening Sun.

The Passaic County Sheriff’s Department, which oversees the jail, will not renew the deal when it expires May 31.   Sheriff’s department spokesman Bill Maer says the program raised about $3 million for Passaic County, with a per diem rate of $88 per prisoner. It was also meant to help alleviate overcrowding in Philly jails, which officials say has improved.  There were 200 Philadelphia inmates in Paterson at the height of the program. The last inmate was transferred out of New Jersey and back to a Philadelphia jail two weeks ago.

Maer says the agreement “has outlived its usefulness.”

jakking NJ Passaic County, New Jersey, Overcrowding, PA Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

A Newark-based program to make sure women who are released from prison don’t commit crimes again will be expanded to Mercer and Camden counties, New Jersey Parole Board officials said today reports the Newark Star-Ledger.

“It will help these women become vital, positive resources within their communities,” said State Parole Board Chairman Yolette C. Ross. Officials said women have unique needs, such as responsibilities for child care and histories of abuse, that require gender-specific programs …  Called the Women’s Reentry & Employment Partnership, the initiative is an extension of the Female Offender Reentry Group Effort, or FORGE, in Essex County. The partnership will work with currently existing training centers geared toward urban women in Trenton and Camden.

jakking Female Inmates, Inmate Programs, NJ Camden County, NJ Essex County, New Jersey, Re-Entry

“Community 101,” which just completed its inaugural class at the Edna Mahan Correctional Facility for Women in Clinton, N.J., is a 14-week skills-based, practice-focused course aimed to help prisoners prepare for their return to society, as reported by the Daily Targum:

Many of the programs help prisoners cope with different aspects of their lives that may have led them to the mistakes they made, Rutgers Center Director Dr. Nancy Wolff said. Focused skill-sets include better ways to deal with stress, balancing a budget and even how to be healthier …

The program’s initial success can be seen in one of Wolff’s star pupils, Cathy Xerri, who graduated from the first class and has remained active in working with Wolff for the next classes … Xerri now manages the community center in the correctional facility and meets with her peers to help them get readjusted to life outside the fences … “People need to understand that most prisoners are going to return to the community and we need to be productive members of that community,” Xerri said. “We need to bridge the gap to the people on the outside of the perception to the people on the inside … “I would have never foreseen myself coming to prison; it was a mistake, not my lifestyle,” Xerri said. “This program has been an eye-opener, and it’s something that I’d like to pass along.”

jakking Female Inmates, Inmate Programs, New Jersey, Re-Entry

The policy of strip-searching inmates held for minor offenses at the Burlington and Essex County NJ jails is unconstitutional, a federal judge has ruled.  As reported by the Philadelphia Inquirer:

More than 10,000 people arrested for minor crimes have been strip-searched at the facilities since 2003, a practice that could end up costing the counties millions of dollars, said Susan Chana Lask, a New York lawyer suing the jails.   “They just think the law stops at their doors, and they can do whatever they want,” Lask said. “I’m fighting it and winning it to make sure constitutional rights are not stripped away in prison.”

Similar lawsuits are pending against other county jails in New Jersey. The Camden County jail agreed in 2007 to pay $7.5 million to as many as 20,000 people strip-searched while held on minor charges …

Burlington County jail officials argued that their procedures for inmates held on such offenses amounted to a “visual observation” of their bodies, not the more intrusive strip-search required for serious offenders.  They said the inspection of the nude inmates was necessary to ensure they were not smuggling contraband, to identify gang members through tattoos, and to detect health issues, such as evidence of the MRSA virus. But District Judge Joseph Rodriguez said subjecting those arrested for minor violations to a strip search was unconstitutional unless there was “reasonable suspicion” they were carrying contraband …

J. Brooks DiDonato, an attorney for Burlington County, said he could not comment at length on the case.  “The county fully intends on appealing and defending the case vigorously,” he said.

jakking NJ Burlington County, NJ Essex County, New Jersey, Strip Searches

The Director of Corrections for Warren County NJ, Byron Foster, recently discussed a new program to help deal with those individuals with mental health issues that find themselves in jail or on the way to jail.

The five minute audio (which I cannot embed here unfortunately) can be found at Lehigh Valley Live.

jakking Mental Health Issues, NJ Warren County

Two Republican state representatives from Burlington County have urged Gov. Jon S. Corzine to halt the plan to close Riverfront State Prison in Camden [see earlier coverage].

Assemblywoman Dawn Marie Addiego and Assemblyman Scott Rudder said it was “foolhardy” and “unconscionable” for the state to “abandon one of its newest prison facilities.”   They argued that even though the state prison population has declined, statistics from the Office of Legislative Services show that the system is operating at 136 percent of capacity. That data also showed that 1,122 state inmates were being held in county jails at the end of 2008. The state should anticipate an increase in prisoners because the attorney general’s office reported filing almost 50 percent more criminal charges in 2008 than the previous year, they wrote in a letter Wednesday …

Corzine does not intend to change his plan, said spokesman Sean Darcy.  “Closing the prison makes government more efficient and paves the way for central redevelopment in Camden on the prime waterfront,” he said.

For more, see the Courier Post Online.

jakking NJ Camden County, New Jersey

Three weeks after an inmate escaped from a state-run dairy farm in Somerset County, the New Jersey Department of Corrections says it plans to end its practice of using prison labor at the facility.  The decision comes after local officials expressed concerns about prisoners working so close to schools and residential areas.

Skillman Farm, a 500-acre breeding farm on a rural stretch of Burnt Hill Road in Montgomery Township, is one of six dairy and crop farms run by AgriIndustries, a self-sustaining branch of the Department of Corrections that sells dairy and processed food products back to the department and other state agencies at cost-saving prices. Historically, the farm has been staffed by prisoners from the Garden State Youth Correctional Facility in Burlington County, who are bused in daily. The work is considered a perk for minimum-security prisoners who are nearing the end of their sentences … The farm work program has been a lucrative enterprise, saving the state about $1 million a year in food costs and offering a chance for prisoners to develop a work ethic before their release, AgriIndustries administrator Frank Papa said. Since the escape, however, Skillman Farm has been run by its civilian staff and the prisoners are not expected to return …

Montgomery Mayor Louise Wilson said the township has been urging the corrections department to end the prisoner work program at Skillman Farm. Though she conceded the farm has been a quiet neighbor for years, Wilson said the high-profile escape changed everything …

Papa said the breeding operation at the farm will likely be scaled back and the animals moved to other farms. The farm will continue to grow corn, alfalfa, wheat and rye used for feed and bedding for animals at other AgriIndustries farms that don’t have enough land. “We need the property,” Papa said.

jakking Food Services, Inmate Labor, New Jersey