It’s become a challenge for Health Care Services staff to remember life before the new Electronic Medical Record (EMR), which was up and running in the late fall. It’s hard to imagine that when an inmate patient transferred from one building to another, all of his/ her medical paperwork had to be collected and physically transported to his/her new facility. It’s hard to remember that when an inmate patient arrived to a new facility, if a nurse or doctor had questions about upcoming appointments or wanted to know what was going on health-wise with the inmate, he/she had to look through pages and pages of the paper record. It is mind boggling to think that the typical way for providers to leave updates and notes about inmate patients was to place post-it notes on the paper chart. Now if a provider gets a question about an inmate/patient regarding followup appointments at outside facilities, for example, he or she can access that information right at his or her computer. Things like resubmitting orders for medications are now a matter of a few keystrokes, whereas in the days of old, the ordering practitioner would have to write out an order and fax it to the pharmacy. Published on Corrections.com.

“This way of working is much more efficient, and a much better use of people’s time,” notes newly appointed Director of General Nursing Services Gordon Bouchard. “We’re not paying people to run between buildings tracking down paper,” he continues. “Docs used to have to hand write orders, a nurse would then have to transcribe the orders and fax them to the pharmacy, then wait for two days to match the order against what had come in,” he shares.

Bouchard provides an example of a patient who was sent to Rhode Island Hospital at 11 p.m. and within two to three hours was returned to Intake. The staff at Intake, in the pre-EMR days, would have no idea why he had been sent out. The patient’s record would still be at Intake while he was at the hospital. Now, facility health care staff can look up the EMR and have the information they need instantly.

Another advantage to the EMR pointed out by Pauline Marcussen, Interdepartmental Project Manager, is the ability of more than one user to access a patient’s record simultaneously. Pauline also applauds the fact that physicians can have Virtual Private Network (VPN) access to the EMR from home, meaning they don’t have to physically be here in order to look up information about an inmate/patient.

The EMR’s reporting features are also a plus. We can now run reports by diagnosis, building, or chronic condition, to give just a few examples. “Now we can see within an instant how many inmates had their vitals checked, how many have had a TB test within the past year, how many tested positive for a specific illness, and who is due for vaccines,” notes Marcussen. “This is something we would have had to find by manually going through all medical records.” In the past, staff would also have to look through paper records to determine when medications would expire. Now they can run a list of medication expirations and reorder accordingly.

Another thing that can now be easily tracked is volume in our clinics. We can track how many patients have been seen where and by what provider. This enables us to be more efficient in our allocation and scheduling of staff.

Correctional Officer Hospital II J.R. Perez is a super user of the EMR and has trained numerous new and current staff on how to utilize the many features of the software. “There was a definite learning curve,” Perez notes. “But it’s become so much easier.” Each member of the Health Care Services staff received 16 hours of training over four weeks when the software was first implemented. One of the many improvements Perez notes is the fact that nurses’ notes are now so much easier to read because they are typed into the computer and not hand scribbled in illegible hand writing.

There are about 140 authorized users of the system, with varying levels of access depending on their position and need. Each user has an in box where important information about patients is shared. “Things used to fall through the cracks, like lab work might not get transferred with a patient,” notes Perez. “Now everything gets documented.”

Another advantage over the old paper system is patient confidentiality, according to Marcussen. “We can limit access and I can easily track what a user is doing on the system, how they are using the information – so if there were to be any misuse, I would know about it and have documentation of it.” Access is also tied to position. Some users can only view information, some can write, and some can do both.

Processing new inmates has become much more streamlined thanks to the EMR. There is just one nurse doing the intake questionnaire, and it has become much easier to translate information to physicians and to chart. In the past, one chart would have to be stored on each inmate. Now the information about each inmate is all accessible on line.

We are one of the first states with a unified system to go with an EMR, meaning our jail and prisons are all on one complex and information is accessible between the jail and prisons. Since the vendor, NextGen, has designated Rhode Island as a “premiere site,” we are getting inquiries from many states considering implementing the technology. Staff from the Alabama DOC, for instance, visited the RIDOC on April 21st and 22nd, to see the program in action and pick the brains of our staff about how it’s working. Joseph Marocco, Associate Director for Health Care Services, figures he has received about 20 calls from different states and counties wanting to ask about our experience with the EMR in the past three months alone. Also in May, Pauline Marcussen was invited to provide an overview of the new technology to sheriffs and staff from jails across the country along with the Information Technology specialist from Portland, Oregon, at the American Jail Association’s annual meeting.

It’s been about six months since the RIDOC’s Health Care Services staff began using the EMR, and most can hardly remember how they did their work without it. “It’s getting better and better all the time,” says Marcussen, “because the information is becoming more and more complete.” It’s slightly more labor intensive for physicians to have the EMR, because they have more forms to complete and can’t just leave written notes on a chart, but few would argue that the additional time doesn’t have huge payoffs. Newly hired nurses go to about four hours of training with J.R. Perez because even if they come from a place that had an EMR, they need to learn the particulars of the RIDOC’s system.

For Pauline Marcussen and Joe Marocco, having the EMR in place is like a dream come true. They’ve been advocates for this type of technology for well over a decade. Like anything else in state government, it’s been a long time in coming, but they still sometimes have to pinch themselves to realize it’s indeed a reality. Like all major changes, there was resistance and griping at first, but you’d be hard pressed now to find a Health Care Services staff member who would say they would prefer to go back to things they way they used to be.

jchev Inmate Health Care, Rhode Island, Technology

Deep in rural Pennsylvania, some 300 miles from Providence, The Glen Mills Schools appears to offer much to troubled teenaged boys. The school’s glossy brochure depicts a lush, green campus with neat athletic fields, a football stadium and an Olympic-sized swimming pool. Vocational programs range from auto body repair and landscaping to dentistry and golf course management. News in the Providence Journal.

Glen Mills has so impressed Chief Family Court Judge Jeremiah S. Jeremiah Jr. that he recently referred a dozen delinquent boys there.

But state child welfare officials say no matter how good the school may be, troubled teens generally do better when they stay close to their families and communities. More than a decade ago, officials at the state Department of Children, Youth and Families concluded that juveniles with behavioral or emotional problems could be helped more cheaply, and with better results, closer to home.

Now, state child welfare officials and the Family Court’s highest judge are at odds over how best to treat juvenile delinquents in state care.

“If there’s nothing in the state, fine, we look outside of Rhode Island,” Patricia Martinez, director of the state Department of Children, Youth and Families, said. “The question is: What is [the child] going to get out of state that he’s not going to get in Rhode Island?”

Glen Mills has been recruiting juvenile offenders from Rhode Island at least since the late 1990s, when Jeremiah and then-director of the DCYF, Jay G. Lindgren Jr., climbed into a borrowed Department of Corrections van and drove 300 miles to visit the school.

“They toured us around, spent a lot of time talking with us,” Lindgren recalled. “It all looked very good.”

Back then, the courtship produced only a handful of enrollments for the school. The distance was a big reason, Lindgren said. Glen Mills is so remote, he said, it was hard for teenagers to maintain family and community ties. And keeping in touch with youths so far away is time consuming and expensive.

“Too often,” Lindgren said, “the kids were kind of out of sight, out of mind.”

Then, in late January of this year, Jeremiah suggested that Andrew J. Johnson, a lawyer and director of the Rhode Island Court Appointed Special Advocate’s office, visit Glen Mills to see what their program has to offer. Johnson flew to Philadelphia, at the school’s expense, where a school van drove him the 22 miles to the school in Concordville, Pa. He met with admissions officials, toured the campus and talked to students.

“It’s a remarkable place,” Johnson said after he returned. “Step on the campus and it’s like a prep school or a university … .”

Glen Mills houses up to 900 juvenile offenders, ages 14 to 18. The school does not admit fire setters, sex offenders or children who take psychotropic medication for behavioral or mental health problems. (The school is not licensed to provide mental health services.) Students live in unlocked, dormitory-style housing and move freely around the campus; behavior is managed through a system of “peer pressure” and “group confrontation,” a promotional booklet states.

Graduates with good grades can qualify for college scholarships of up to $3,000 per semester.

It costs Rhode Island about $134 per day to send one teenager to Glen Mills. (Last year, it sent seven.) That’s substantially less than the roughly $370 per diem cost of operating the state training school, a high-security facility with mandated staffing levels. It’s also about $20 to $80 per day less than three of the four residential programs — all of which are staffed with licensed mental health counselors — for delinquent boys in Rhode Island.

The DCYF also normally does not pay travel expenses for parents to visit their children in out-of-state facilities. But last year, Jeremiah ordered the DCYF to reimburse four family members who couldn’t afford the travel expense; the air fare cost the state just under $1,700.

Glen Mills will cover families’ travel expenses for an additional per diem cost of $20, though state officials here have not agreed to the higher rate.

The DCYF is required to visit juveniles placed out of state “at least once per month, or more frequently as needed” to ensure their safety and well-being. But since last December, neither DCYF staff nor anyone from the agency’s private contractor, which visits youths in out-of-state programs, has been monitoring the teenagers at Glen Mills.

“Obviously we should be doing this,” Jorge E. Garcia, the DCYF’s deputy director, said. However, he said, the policy covers only treatment facilities, not schools. And he acknowledged visits “will be another cost…”

In Rhode Island, as in other states, child welfare agencies have been trying to reduce their reliance on residential programs.

A 2003 report commissioned by former Gov. Lincoln Almond said that Rhode Island had become dependent on “expensive out-of-state” residential treatment programs at the expense of more effective –– and less costly –– community-based programs. Keeping children with families, whether biological, adopted or foster parents, is far preferable, the report said, than placing them in group homes, residential programs, or other institutions.

Their findings echoed a U.S. Surgeon General’s report released in 1999, which concluded that there was “weak evidence” that residential treatment programs helped improve the well-being of young people — and growing evidence that they actually do the opposite.

“All the research tells us that one of the drivers of delinquent behavior is association with delinquent peers,” Patrick McCarthy, president-elect of the Annie E. Casey Foundation, a private, nonprofit agency, said. “So the notion that the best way to respond to delinquency is to put the child with other children with delinquent behavior challenges everything we know about delinquent behavior.”

Nationally, the average rate of juvenile offenders living in publicly and privately operated facilities between 1997 and 2008 declined 26 percent, according to a report from the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Juvenile Delinquency Prevention. During that same period in Rhode Island, the rate fell 31 percent.

The population of Rhode Island juveniles in private and public residential facilities, including out-of-state programs, averaged 312 in 2007, the report said.

Rhode Island also is sending fewer juveniles out of state. The number of Rhode Island juveniles in out-of-state programs in fiscal 2009 averaged 108 per day, compared with 160 per day in fiscal 2008, according to the DCYF. The decline in out-of-state placements last year saved Rhode Island about $3.8 million.

Almost all of those juveniles, with the exception of those placed at Glen Mills, were diagnosed with complex behavioral or mental health conditions, Garcia said, and needed care not available in Rhode Island.

Efforts by child welfare agencies around the country to reduce their reliance on residential programs, coupled with a weak national economy, have heightened competition among private providers to fill beds.

Until last year, for example, Ocean Tides, which operates a residential treatment program for male juvenile offenders in Narragansett, had a three-year contract with the DCYF, which guaranteed a steady stream of revenue. If a bed was empty for a few nights it didn’t matter, because the state was still paying for it. (Jeremiah joked that he has referred so many teenage boys to Ocean Tides that the staff has dubbed him “Director of Admissions.”)

But last year, to save money, the DCYF switched to paying some of its providers per day, per bed.

Ocean Tides wound up with empty beds that nobody was paying for. So it closed some of its units and reduced its available beds from 65 to 57 beds, said Ocean Tides’ president, Brother Brendan Gerrity.

“You’ve got to make sure you keep the beds filled,” he said, “Right now, we have a waiting list with about seven boys on it.”

At Glen Mills, just under half of the beds are occupied by juveniles from Pennsylvania; the rest come from outside the state, said the school’s admissions coordinator, Andy Shirlow. Glen Mills’ enrollment in February was down to about 740 students, leaving 160 beds empty.

In February two admissions officers from the school came to Rhode Island at the request of Jeremiah. They interviewed more than a dozen teenage boys at the state training school for possible admission to Glen Mills.

The waiting lists at local programs, such as Ocean Tides, are one reason why Jeremiah says he turned to the school in Pennsylvania.

“If they don’t go to Glen Mills,” he said, “they stay at the training school.”

Jeremiah said the DCYF officials have a “Rhode Island mentality” that 300 miles is too far away to send these teenage boys. “Kids grow up and they go away to college, right?”

The Rhode Island Training School’s intake center is where teenagers who have run afoul of the law eat, sleep, and attend classes while the adults –– lawyers, judges, probation officers, case workers –– decide where they go next. Each week, admissions officers from residential providers from around the state, and sometimes beyond, visit the intake center to interview young offenders for their programs. They show the teenagers brochures with photographs of ocean surf and kids canoeing on pine-rimmed lakes. “Teaching minds, touching hearts, changing lives,” reads one brochure from Ocean Tides.

Of the 12 teenage boys Jeremiah referred to Glen Mills, only three teens (ages 14, 15 and 16) have been admitted to the Pennsylvania school, according to the DCYF. Glen Mills rejected four teens who were taking prescription medications. Of the five others, one was accepted into a local residential program, one is on home confinement awaiting trial and the two others have been sentenced to the training school until they turn 19.

Though the average length of stay in the intake center is 30 days, 70 percent of the juveniles leave within two weeks, most of them for home, the Training School’s acting superintendent, Kevin Aucoin, said.

Michael Gingras, a clinical social worker at the intake center, said some providers spend a half-hour or more talking with the juveniles at the intake center and showing them brochures.

“It’s not unusual for kids to get interviewed at lunchtime and say, ‘I want to go there!’ Gingras said. “Then they get interviewed [by someone again] at dinner time and say, ‘I want to go here!’ ”

jchev Juvenile Justice, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island

A federal program allowing illegal immigrant inmates to get out of prison if they agree to be deported was trumpeted by Rhode Island’s governor as a sensible way to save money in his cash-strapped state, which was already saddled with costs blamed on such prisoners.News from the Boston Herald.

After all, such early deportation programs have saved millions of dollars in states like Georgia and Arizona, resulting in thousands of illegal immigrants being sent home before they completed their sentences.

But a year and a half after Rhode Island signed up for the initiative, not one person has been deported early and the program hasn’t saved any money. That’s because of the relatively small population of illegal immigrants at the state prisons — called the Adult Correctional Institutions — and the strict criteria required of inmates to participate.

Regardless, state officials say the Rapid REPAT program, under the U.S. Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, remains sound public policy — even if it’s untested here.

Some advocates for immigrants’ rights say the lack of early deportations suggests the problem of illegal immigration has been exaggerated in the state by Gov. Don Carcieri and others.

“To the extent that it dispels myths about the ACI being overrun with undocumented immigrants, it’s a good thing,” said Steven Brown, executive director of the state branch of the American Civil Liberties Union.

Illegal immigrants accused of crimes are sometimes deported before trial in instances where they’re picked up by federal immigration authorities. Some local law enforcement agencies around the country are trying to speed the removal process by using fingerprint technology to check both the criminal background and immigration status of arrestees during the booking process.

Rapid REPAT, however, focuses on illegal immigrants already convicted and imprisoned. Proponents say it spares states the cost of incarcerating inmates who’d probably be deported anyway, allowing immigrant inmates to return to their home countries without completing their sentences.

To qualify, inmates must be nonviolent offenders who have received final deportation orders and who have exhausted or waived appeals of their criminal convictions and agree not to fight their removal. They cannot return to the United States after deportation. Inmates must volunteer to participate in the program.

“To us, if we identify one person, one criminal alien, and get him off the streets and out of the country, we’re happy,” said Todd Thurlow, assistant field officer for ICE’s Boston field office.

ICE touts major cost-savings in other states that use Rapid REPAT or similar programs.

In Georgia, the bureau says Rapid REPAT and a predecessor program had saved $204 million and removed 3,612 criminal aliens as of August 2009. And ICE says its Phoenix field office has removed nearly 2,700 people since 2005 under a program that authorizes the deportation of some foreign-born inmates who have served half their sentences.

But in Rhode Island, where suspected illegal immigrants account for fewer than 5 percent of the state’s roughly 3,700 inmates, the stringent criteria have winnowed the already narrow pool of potential participants. Patricia Coyne-Fague, chief legal counsel for the Department of Corrections, said she had identified only one inmate who satisfied the criteria, but the prisoner had either already completed his sentence or was about to.

Prisoners who are illegal immigrants are still being deported upon completing their sentences, just as they were before Rapid REPAT. And the number of participants would clearly be bigger if the criteria were broadened to include violent criminals like Marco Riz, an illegal immigrant from Guatemala sentenced last year to 30 years for rape.

“It’s not that it doesn’t work, and it’s not that we don’t have a system in place,” Coyne-Fague said. “We just haven’t had that person yet.”

U.S. immigration authorities signed the first Rapid REPAT deal with Puerto Rico in July 2008. Rhode Island signed on the following month, followed by Georgia. The program is modeled after similar efforts in New York and Arizona.

California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger last year proposed commuting the sentences of thousands of immigrants in state custody to save more than $180 million, though he has not released any inmates to the federal government for deportation. Oregon this month signed an agreement with ICE to remove some undocumented prisoners who are within six months of completing their sentences.

Rhode Island’s involvement was an outgrowth of Carcieri’s 2008 executive order cracking down on the state’s illegal immigrants, which the Pew Hispanic Center estimates at between 20,000 and 35,000.

At the time, he said the state could not “afford to bear the financial burden of providing housing and rehabilitative treatment to inmates who committed crimes while here illegally.”

His spokeswoman, Amy Kempe, said the administration remains committed to Rapid REPAT.

“If there are criminals residing in our prisons who are here in this country illegally … the state of Rhode Island should not be picking up the tab for their incarceration,” she said.

David Quiroa, president of the Guatemalan-American Alliance in Rhode Island, said he supports the concept of Rapid REPAT. But he thinks the governor’s crackdown sparked unnecessary fear and used illegal immigrants as a scapegoat for the state’s fiscal woes. He said it’s misleading to focus on the minority of illegal immigrants in the state who are imprisoned.

“I’m sure we have criminals, if you will, but I think the majority of the community are just trying to do their best for their families and are just trying to be part of the larger communities in a positive way,” he said.

jchev ICE, Rhode Island

Nine years on the job, Ashbel T. Wall, the Yale-educated intellectual who found his passion in the despondent world of captivity, is now the nation’s second-longest serving director of corrections. The Providence Journal has a long article on the Director of the Rhode Island Department of Corrections.

[Wall] might be the only one who lists his home address in the phone book.  Certainly you won’t find Arkansas’ Larry Norris, the country’s longest-reigning corrections director, with 15 years of service, advertising where an ex-con with a grudge might find him. “Absolutely not,” says Norris. “A.T.’s one brave soul. He marches to a different drummer, I guess” …

“Rhode Island’s a small place and if people want to find you they can,” Wall, who is 55, explains as he prepares to head off to work. “I am a public official and I’m not afraid. And I think that if I have an unlisted phone number and try to hide my address it sends a message that I’ve got something to fear. And as far as I’m concerned, I don’t.   I do make a lot of decisions that make people upset. And I have gotten some uncomfortable phone calls over the years and some unusual people have shown up around the house.” Like the boisterous crowd that once descended to advocate for more rights for prisoners. But, says Wall, “The police know where I live” …

Besides the overarching mission of protecting the public from criminals, Wall says his job includes demystifying a department that is now also striving to reduce crime by smoothing inmates’ transitions back into society through education and treatment programs … “I really have had a very good run,” he says of his years leading a department with 1,400 employees and a $201-million budget. “No successful escapes from secure facilities, no homicides, neither staff nor inmates. No intervention by the federal courts. And I really do have to give credit to the staff. There is always a certain measure of conflict — confrontation in the air within the department — but on the ground, people do a terrific job” …

Wall, who doesn’t smoke or drink alcohol or caffeinated beverages, deals with the stresses of the job … by satisfying a craving for Hershey’s mini chocolate bars. On a bad day, his staff says, he can devour dozens … Wall was a junior at Yale when he interned as a Connecticut probation officer. He found corrections work so exciting, so “vivid,” that he put his law degree on hold to accept a full-time position. Later he worked as an assistant district attorney in Manhattan and served as director of the Manhattan Community Service Sentencing Project before returning to Rhode Island to work for then-Governor DiPrete.

There is a great deal more to learn abour Director Wall in the article.

jakking Rhode Island

From a RI DOC Press Release:

In 2008, Rhode Island Department of Corrections Minimum Security inmates logged 59,188 hours of community service in response to requests from partner agencies around the state. “The Department makes every effort to engage all work-eligible inmates in assignments that will improve the quality of life for our state’s citizens and better prepare them for their eventual release,” notes Corrections Director A.T. Wall.

Minimum Security inmates helped with setup, cleanup, and assorted tasks at the following 2008 events around the state: the Rhode Island National Guard’s Air Show at Quonset Air Base, the Viet Nam Veterans’ Association’s Operation Stand Down at Cumberland’s Diamond Hill State Park, the Cranston Senior Center’s daily activities and Senior Games, The West Warwick Senior Center’s daily activities and special events, the Salvation Army’s holiday food basket project, and the Governor’s Bay Day.  Inmates earn up to $3/day, which gets deposited into their Inmate Account after unpaid court fees and fines are collected.

“The relationships we have with various non-profits and government agencies around the state to whom we provide inmate labor are a win/win for all parties,” says Director Wall. “Important projects can be completed at minimal cost and offenders learn and practice valuable skills in preparation for life n their home communities.”

jakking Inmate Labor, Rhode Island

Nearly four months have passed since Rhode Island became the first state to sign up for the RapidREPAT program, which allows certain nonviolent immigrants to get out of prison early on the condition they never return to the United States.   But the state has yet to finish creating a way to find such inmates in the prison system. And prison officials say the first deportations are months away.

The program also drew criticism from civil liberties groups who feared immigrants might not understand the rights they were giving up. “We believe that steps need to be taken to ensure that this truly is a voluntary program,” said Steven Brown, executive director of the Rhode Island affiliate of the American Civil Liberties Union.  But officials said it’s a logical cost-cutting approach to reducing the state’s illegal immigrant population. Still, fewer than 5 percent of the state’s inmate population, which is fewer than 4,000 prisoners, was expected to qualify.   “It’s someone who’s going to get deported anyway, so why don’t we deport them now rather than spending all this money on incarceration and then deporting them?” said Patricia Coyne-Fague, a lawyer for the state corrections department.

Rapid REPAT was modeled after similar programs in New York and Arizona, and federal officials said those initiatives have saved millions of dollars through early inmate release. In the past two years, about 2,600 immigrants in total were removed from both states, according to U.S. immigration officials.  Prison officials said it was not clear how many people would sign up or how much the cash-strapped state would save, since the program is voluntary.  Rhode Island’s participation in Rapid REPAT emerged from Gov. Don Carcieri’s effort to crack down on illegal immigration.  It followed an executive order in March that required state police and parole officers to identify illegal immigrants for deportation. It also mandated that the state’s government agencies and state contractors use a federal database to validate employees’ immigration status.

To participate in Rapid REPAT, an inmate must have been sentenced for certain nonviolent criminal offenses such as car theft, drunken driving, drug possession or attempted burglary. The inmates must also be eligible for parole and be facing a final order of deportation from an immigration judge.  An inmate who meets the criteria will be flagged by a new computer program. “Everything that we’re developing, we’re building from the ground up,” said corrections Director A.T. Wall. “Rhode Island doesn’t have this framework yet.”

More on this story at the AP.

jakking Federal Systems, ICE, Illegal Aliens, Rhode Island

• With the economy souring, ex-cons in Rhode Island are having a hard time re-entering the employment market.
• Blair County PA Jail will give inmates access to computers to save money on legal research.
• DeSoto County MS is considering the construction of a female-only unit to relieve pressure on the county jail.

jakking Female Inmates, MS De Soto County, Overcrowding, PA Blair County, Re-Entry, Rhode Island

At its annual awards dinner on November 15^th, 2008, the Association of State Correctional Administrators (ASCA) honored Ashbel T. (“A.T.”) Wall, Director of the Rhode Island Department of Corrections as the outstanding Director of Corrections for 2008. The award is presented annually to recognize the outstanding ASCA member and that member’s dedication and achievements.

A.T. Wall began his correctional career in the neighboring state of Connecticut as a probation counselor. Working his way through law school at Yale University, he later served as Assistant District Attorney in Manhattan, served as Director of the Manhattan Community Service Sentencing Project for the Vera Institute of Justice and a Policy Analyst on law enforcement for the Rhode Island Governor’s Office. He came to the Rhode Island Department of Corrections in 1987, serving in the role of Assistant Director for Policy and Development, and later was promoted to the position of Assistant Director of Administration before being appointed to the position of Director in 2000. Today, A.T. is the third longest tenured director in the country.

The Association of State Correctional Administrators (ASCA) is a national organization representing the Directors of Corrections for the 50 States, the Federal Bureau of Prisons, and four large urban jail systems.Members also include the Directors of the Correctional Service of Canada, the Administration of Corrections in Puerto Rico, Guam, Saipan, the Virgin Islands, and the Ministry of Corrections in Ontario Canada.

jakking ASCA, Rhode Island

The Bureau of Justice Statistics has just released the 2005 Census of Federal and State Correctional Facilities.  The document has a wealth of data across all States, including the numbers of privately-operated facilities.

The document can be accessed from the Basic Stats list at the top right sidebar.

jakking Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Federal Systems, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Private Prisons, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Wyoming

Rhode Island’s prison system has entered into an agreement with U.S. immigration authorities that would allow for the early release of illegal immigrants imprisoned for nonviolent offenses if they agree to be deported.

Under the deal between the state Department of Corrections and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, nonviolent inmates in the state prison could be released early if they have been ordered to leave the U.S. and agree not to return. Ex-prisoners caught re-entering the U.S. could be forced to serve the remainder of their state prison sentences and face new federal charges carrying additional 20-year sentences.  “Rhode Island cannot afford to repeatedly bear the financial burden of providing housing and rehabilitative treatment to inmates who committed crimes while here illegally,” Gov. Don Carcieri said in a written statement.

The deal is part of a federal program called Rapid Removal of Eligible Parolees Accepted for Transfer, or Rapid REPAT. U.S. immigration authorities signed the first Rapid REPAT deal with Puerto Rico in July. It is modeled off similar deportation systems in Arizona and New York …

The state prison system already shares prisoner information with immigration authorities, but the new system streamlines the parole and deportation process for inmates willing to leave the country, said Patricia Coyne-Fague, chief legal counsel for the Department of Corrections. She did not know how many inmates could be affected or whether the effort would save money.

More on the deal at the AP.

jakking Early Release, Federal Systems, ICE, Illegal Aliens, Rhode Island

• Plans for Northampton County PA’s new jail run from $102m to $138m.
• A new study shows that the jail in Floyd County IN needs expansion.
• Kenneth Walker has been appointed as Chair of the Rhode Island Parole Board.

jakking IN Floyd County, Overcrowding, PA Northampton County, Parole, Rhode Island

• Lisa Holley, Chair of the Rhode Island Parole Board, has been awarded the Ben Baer Award by the Association of Paroling Authorities International (APAI) [RIDOC press release]
• Two legislators have called for an audit of the Alaska DOC, citing “unhealthy and unsafe” conditions for inmates and officers.
• Kent County MI considers renewing jail improvement tax for another three years.

jakking Alaska, MI Kent County, Parole, Rhode Island

USA Today has an interesting article on the nationwide surge toward early release.

Lawmakers from California to Kentucky are trying to save money with a drastic and potentially dangerous budget-cutting proposal: releasing tens of thousands of convicts from prison, including drug addicts, thieves and even violent criminals.  Officials acknowledge that the idea carries risks, but they say they have no choice because of huge budget gaps brought on by the slumping economy. “If we don’t find a way to better manage the population at the state prison, we will be forced to spend money to expand the state’s prison system — money we don’t have,” said Jeff Neal, a spokesman for Rhode Island Gov. Don Carcieri.

At least eight states are considering freeing inmates or sending some convicts to rehabilitation programs instead of prison, according to an Associated Press analysis of legislative proposals. If adopted, the early release programs could save an estimated $450 million in California and Kentucky alone.

The movement is not without its severe critics of course.  For example, in California,

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger proposed saving $400 million by releasing more than 22,000 inmates who had less than 20 months remaining on their sentences. Violent and sex offenders would not be eligible. Laying off prison guards and making it more difficult to send parole violators back to state prison would account for part of the savings.  Law enforcement officials and Republican lawmakers immediately criticized Schwarzenegger’s proposal, which would apply to car thieves, forgers, drunken drivers and some drug dealers. Some would never serve prison time because the standard sentence for those crimes is 20 months or less. “To open the prison door and release prisoners back into communities is merely placing a state burden onto local governments and will ultimately jeopardize safety in communities,” said Fresno Police Chief Jerry Dyer, who could see 1,800 inmates released in his area.

 Thus is framed the debate right across America.  Read the full USAToday article for more examples.

jakking California, Early Release, Kentucky, Rhode Island

• Rhode Island to identify illegal immigrants held in corrections’ custody
• Texas COs get pay raise and bonus.
• Scotland’s prison service is in “crisis”; plans to delay early releases are themselves delayed
• The Tallahassee Democrat comes out swinging against the Florida House’s plans to end treatment programs in state prisons.
• State Advocate complains that Sauk County WI’s treatment of the mentally disabled “falls short” of what is required.

jakking Drug Treatment & Diversion, Florida, Illegal Aliens, Mental Health Issues, Overcrowding, Rhode Island, Scotland, Texas, WI Sauk County

The Rhode Island DOC is jumping on the early release bandwagon, it seems.

A packet of early-release proposals — aimed at reducing the state prison population by at least 211 inmates — is headed to the legislature, with advocates hoping the seriousness of the state’s financial situation and the possibility the state may soon hit a court-imposed inmate cap will make lawmakers more amenable this year to some of the proposals …

With some misgivings, the two dozen or so members of a working group wrestling with potential prison overcrowding endorsed the proposals yesterday after tweaking them in ways that significantly reduced both the potential savings and potential cut in inmate numbers …

Forced to scale back their expectations, state prison officials now hope and believe the package will result in the early release of 47 prisoners this year, and 211 next year for a projected net savings of $1.047 million, after hiring six additional probation and parole staffers and expanding prison rehabilitation programs to accommodate the anticipated increased demand.

See the article in The Providence Journal for more details.

jakking Overcrowding, Rhode Island