Jade01
09-01-2005, 06:19 PM
BY ANDY DAVIS ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE
A state board Wednesday approved spending $1 million in welfare funds on a pilot project that will provide housing, training and substance-abuse treatment for women who are released from prison.
The project, approved by the state Transitional Employment Board, is the state’s first attempt to provide transitional housing for inmates released from prison, said Dina Tyler, a spokesman for the Arkansas Department of Correction.
"That’s an area of the criminal justice system for rehabilitation that’s been lacking," Tyler said. "There hasn’t been any place for them to go."
Under the project, department employees will provide counseling, substance-abuse treatment and other services for women three months before they are released from prison.
The women will then spend four months in a treatment center, where they will receive more counseling and life-skills training and be reunited with their children. The women will be monitored for six to nine months after their release from the center.
The project is expected to serve 60 women in its first year and Department of Community Correction officials are also expected to seek funding for a second year, said Greg Kirkpatrick, the Transitional Employment Board’s program director.
If the project is successful, correction officials will seek funding for a broader transitional housing program, said Max Mobley, director of health and correctional programs for the Department of Correction.
"We hope this is a beginning and a first step," Mobley said. "We pretty well know that we can do good programming in prison and make a real difference while they’re in prison, but in order for that to transition to their real life, their life outside of prison, there has to be a system that picks that up and keeps it going."
Funding for the program will come from the state’s Transitional Employment Assistance program.
The pilot project is designed to ease overcrowding in the state’s prisons and help the women get jobs and become better parents.
The project comes after laws passed during this year’s legislative session that allowed the Community Correction Department to regulate halfway houses and for the Post Prison Transfer Board to allow inmates to enter halfway houses up to a year before the inmate’s release date.
Those measures were among several sponsored by state Sen. Jim Luker, D-Wynne, that were designed to reduce the state’s prison population. Concern about halfway houses also received public attention last year, when at least seven residential facilities in North Little Rock were shut down for failing to obtain business licenses or meet health and safety standards.
Luker said the idea for the pilot project came up during discussions among correction officials and others late in the legislative session.
"I’m optimistic it’s going to prove to be worthwhile, and I hope it can be something we can build on," Luker said.
While private groups operate halfway houses, the state had never had a formal transitional housing program, Tyler said.
About 1,000 of the state’s 13,300 inmates are women, Tyler said. The population of female inmates increases about 7 percent each year, compared with a 2 percent annual increase in male inmates.
The growth has contributed to the backlog of convicts in county jails waiting for prison beds to open up. The backlog includes 235 women and 85 men, Tyler said.
The Department of Correction is spending about $4 million to add space for 200 women at its Wrightsville Unit, and the department will spend another $4 million to add an equal number of beds for women at its McPherson Unit in Jackson County.
The pilot project will help the state release female inmates sooner and keep them from returning to prison, Tyler said.
Inmates who otherwise would be eligible for parole have had to stay in prison because of an inability to show they have a place to live, she said.
"We’re not going to let them back in to a crack house or to a vacant lot," Tyler said. "They have to have an acceptable place."
The funding approved Wednesday will pay groups to provide the transitional housing. Kirkpatrick said officials will solicit proposals.
The inmates selected for the project must have legal custody of children younger than 12. The program won’t accept inmates convicted of sex crimes, of making or selling drugs, or those with an extensive history of violence.
Also on Wednesday, the Transitional Employment Board approved spending about $1.6 million to place human-services workers in 60 schools.
Currently, the Department of Health and Human Services’ Children and Family Services Division pays about $470,000 annually to keep 18 workers in schools, primarily in southeast Arkansas, said Shirlee Flanigan-Isbell, program administrator in the division’s office of community support.
The workers help arrange tutoring, counseling and other services for children and make sure teachers and parents understand how to identify and report abuse, Flanigan-Isbell said.
The expanded program will target schools in which at least 95 percent of the students receive free or reduced-price lunches, Flanigan-Isbell said. The division will solicit applications from schools that want to be included in the program, she said.
This story was published Thursday, August 25, 2005
A state board Wednesday approved spending $1 million in welfare funds on a pilot project that will provide housing, training and substance-abuse treatment for women who are released from prison.
The project, approved by the state Transitional Employment Board, is the state’s first attempt to provide transitional housing for inmates released from prison, said Dina Tyler, a spokesman for the Arkansas Department of Correction.
"That’s an area of the criminal justice system for rehabilitation that’s been lacking," Tyler said. "There hasn’t been any place for them to go."
Under the project, department employees will provide counseling, substance-abuse treatment and other services for women three months before they are released from prison.
The women will then spend four months in a treatment center, where they will receive more counseling and life-skills training and be reunited with their children. The women will be monitored for six to nine months after their release from the center.
The project is expected to serve 60 women in its first year and Department of Community Correction officials are also expected to seek funding for a second year, said Greg Kirkpatrick, the Transitional Employment Board’s program director.
If the project is successful, correction officials will seek funding for a broader transitional housing program, said Max Mobley, director of health and correctional programs for the Department of Correction.
"We hope this is a beginning and a first step," Mobley said. "We pretty well know that we can do good programming in prison and make a real difference while they’re in prison, but in order for that to transition to their real life, their life outside of prison, there has to be a system that picks that up and keeps it going."
Funding for the program will come from the state’s Transitional Employment Assistance program.
The pilot project is designed to ease overcrowding in the state’s prisons and help the women get jobs and become better parents.
The project comes after laws passed during this year’s legislative session that allowed the Community Correction Department to regulate halfway houses and for the Post Prison Transfer Board to allow inmates to enter halfway houses up to a year before the inmate’s release date.
Those measures were among several sponsored by state Sen. Jim Luker, D-Wynne, that were designed to reduce the state’s prison population. Concern about halfway houses also received public attention last year, when at least seven residential facilities in North Little Rock were shut down for failing to obtain business licenses or meet health and safety standards.
Luker said the idea for the pilot project came up during discussions among correction officials and others late in the legislative session.
"I’m optimistic it’s going to prove to be worthwhile, and I hope it can be something we can build on," Luker said.
While private groups operate halfway houses, the state had never had a formal transitional housing program, Tyler said.
About 1,000 of the state’s 13,300 inmates are women, Tyler said. The population of female inmates increases about 7 percent each year, compared with a 2 percent annual increase in male inmates.
The growth has contributed to the backlog of convicts in county jails waiting for prison beds to open up. The backlog includes 235 women and 85 men, Tyler said.
The Department of Correction is spending about $4 million to add space for 200 women at its Wrightsville Unit, and the department will spend another $4 million to add an equal number of beds for women at its McPherson Unit in Jackson County.
The pilot project will help the state release female inmates sooner and keep them from returning to prison, Tyler said.
Inmates who otherwise would be eligible for parole have had to stay in prison because of an inability to show they have a place to live, she said.
"We’re not going to let them back in to a crack house or to a vacant lot," Tyler said. "They have to have an acceptable place."
The funding approved Wednesday will pay groups to provide the transitional housing. Kirkpatrick said officials will solicit proposals.
The inmates selected for the project must have legal custody of children younger than 12. The program won’t accept inmates convicted of sex crimes, of making or selling drugs, or those with an extensive history of violence.
Also on Wednesday, the Transitional Employment Board approved spending about $1.6 million to place human-services workers in 60 schools.
Currently, the Department of Health and Human Services’ Children and Family Services Division pays about $470,000 annually to keep 18 workers in schools, primarily in southeast Arkansas, said Shirlee Flanigan-Isbell, program administrator in the division’s office of community support.
The workers help arrange tutoring, counseling and other services for children and make sure teachers and parents understand how to identify and report abuse, Flanigan-Isbell said.
The expanded program will target schools in which at least 95 percent of the students receive free or reduced-price lunches, Flanigan-Isbell said. The division will solicit applications from schools that want to be included in the program, she said.
This story was published Thursday, August 25, 2005