Governor announces $7.4 million for prisons

The Sentinel-Record/Beth Bright Sheriff's welcome: Gov. Asa Hutchinson, left, listens as Garland County Sheriff Mike McCormick welcomes members of the Arkansas Sheriffs' Association to Hot Springs Monday at the Arlington Resort Hotel & Spa. Hutchinson was the speaker at the luncheon.
The Sentinel-Record/Beth Bright Sheriff's welcome: Gov. Asa Hutchinson, left, listens as Garland County Sheriff Mike McCormick welcomes members of the Arkansas Sheriffs' Association to Hot Springs Monday at the Arlington Resort Hotel & Spa. Hutchinson was the speaker at the luncheon.

Gov. Asa Hutchinson announced to the Arkansas Sheriffs' Association Monday his plans to ask the Legislature to approve $7.4 million to open up more prison beds.

The announcement came as Hutchinson spoke at the association's luncheon at the Arlington Resort Hotel & Spa on the partnership he has had with Arkansas' sheriffs since taking office in January.

"Today I'm announcing that I'll be asking the General Assembly to approve the use of discretionary funds and rainy day funds of $7.4 million to open up 200 more prison beds within the next 16 months," he said. "So I'm asking for your support through your legislative delegations for support for that, that should continue to give us hope and to resolve the problem of the long term."

Hutchinson said the association said "loud and clear" their needs, helped the Legislature address those, and then "once we resolved that, you actually helped put it into place and make it work, and I appreciate your cooperation through that, really, challenge for our state."

"I also want to express my appreciation to many of you who have served on different appointments," he said. "We have a very important criminal justice task force that's going to continue to work and review our criminal justice policy in Arkansas, and I applaud your participation in that and your help to look at the changes that continue to be needed in the state of Arkansas."

The governor, who just returned from the convention of the National Governors Association in West Virginia, said he recognized the common challenges each state faces while meeting with governors from across the country.

"We had presentations on opioid abuse; we had presentations on mental health issues we face," he said. "And, as I hear these challenges from opioid abuse to mental health, the challenges that we face, really the forefront of every one of those battles is our local law enforcement and our sheriffs. So thank you for what you do in confronting these challenges."

Hutchinson said being elected he thought "now I'm in a non-law enforcement position," but jail overcrowding and the criminal justice system have been a priority since he took office.

"So my experience makes a difference," he said. "It helps me to hopefully be a better governor. And much of that experience was with you in the trenches.

"But I also spent time for a while as a private defense attorney handling cases, and I was a very young lawyer in Benton County. This was a time that we didn't have a strong public defender system, so private attorneys got appointed to criminal cases all the time."

According to Hutchinson, hope is important to the criminal justice system.

"Actually, that can apply to a lot of arenas of life," he said. "Today I'm going to apply it to your work in terms of overcrowding of the county jails, and the backlog that you have to deal with every day.

"Please consider that there is hope. We look at the challenge we face, and the legislative session and review the statistics, we've had a high of 2,840 in terms of our backup in our county jails or prisoners that are state responsibility. Today, I checked the number and it is 2,620, so that's a decrease of 220, but what is of greater concern, of course, are the peaks and valleys that we see."

Hutchinson said that since taking office, 526 new beds have opened up in the Arkansas Department of Correction, and that he hopes, by January 2016, 178 more will be added. He said they have put out requests for proposals in terms of re-entry beds of 500, authorizing "additional prison space, but we've also added for the first time in history re-entry beds through our Department of Community Correction."

"You might ask 'Well, how does that help us?'" he said. "We have people waiting in the Department of Correction now that are eligible for parole, but are not being released because they do not have a re-entry plan -- they do not have a place to go. So if we open up 500 re-entry beds, then that will help those prisoners who are eligible for parole to go to the parole board and say, 'Now we have a plan and we have a place to go.' So that should help relieve on the tail-end the prison overcrowding as well."

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The Sentinel-Record/Beth Bright Child advocate: Gov. Asa Hutchinson shakes hands with 6-year-old Samantha Caudle prior to speaking to the Arkansas Sheriffs' Association luncheon on Monday in the Crystal Ballroom of the Arlington Resort Hotel & Spa. The governor announced his plans to ask the Arkansas Legislature for $7.4 million to help with jail overcrowding, and discussed his call to faith-based organizations to provide assistance in foster programs for children affected by the criminal justice system.

In announcing his plans to ask the Legislature for funds to combat overcrowding, Hutchinson asked for the association's patience and support and "to recognize that there's hope around the corner."

"Public safety is my No. 1 responsibility," he said. "But secondly, we have an objective of changing the behavior of those that are coming out of prison so that we can reduce that 45 percent recidivism rate, which (means) 45 percent of those that are leaving prison return to prison. If we can shave it off 10 percent, if we can reduce it to 15 percent -- if we can change behavior in that context, it gives us hope and not only are we going to keep our streets safe, but it gives us hope also that we're not going to have to continually use taxpayers' dollars to build bigger and larger prisons. That is the objective, and I need your help in doing that."

Hutchinson said that for the first time in history the state is investing in re-entry services for those looking for a second chance and by having more parole officers on the street, it gives those individuals a chance and to "hold them accountable, not to overly punish, but to change behavior."

"We want to send to prison those that are a danger to our society, those that have refused repeated chances to turn their life around and continue to engage in criminal behavior," he said. "That's what prison is reserved for.

"Every once in a while I see a case and think perhaps that our system has gone overboard in the wrong direction. I started in the criminal justice system in the '80s, and in the '80s is whenever we brought on forfeiture of assets. We brought on our OCDET, our Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force, and we really enhanced all the penalties -- brought on mandatory minimum penalties -- and while I supported those in the '80s and I still support tough sentencing, I also believe that it is right from time to time to look back at what we're doing in our criminal justice policy and make common sense changes that are needed."

Applauding the work of the task force to make adjustments accordingly to the criminal justice system, Hutchinson said he is "delighted in the partnership that we have had" with faith-based organizations to provide better foster care opportunities, and call for those volunteers in the community to step up for children affected. The secondary is the need for more help provided to those ex-offenders in the re-entry program.

"We need employers that will hire them," he said. "We need to have training services. We need to have additional re-entry beds -- 500 is not enough.

"We have to enlist our faith-based organizations, our religious community, and say, 'You can help us address this problem.' And also to make sure that if there's barriers that we have that need to be broken down, that we address those problems. I'm optimistic that they will respond to the needs that we have."

Local on 07/28/2015

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