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Tallahassee, FL – A year ago, then-Governor Charlie Crist proposed a budget with no money for new prisons. Rather, the man once known as "Chain-Gang Charlie" diverted funds to a new, data-driven program: re-entry centers, which prepare inmates for life after release. Will the concept continue in the Scott Administration? Margie Menzel reports.
[prison door slamming]
Baker Correctional Institution - in Sanderson, near Jacksonville - has a visiting area meant for kids. Warden Melody Flores says it's key to readying inmates for release.
"The families will come in and then we'll have the tables out, we've got games for the kids to play, we've got books," she said. "And so the fathers can play games with them, they can color with them, they can read books. Go outside and they sit in the grass and they play with them. Just reconnect the family, you know, just have some fun time with em."
Putting an inmate on a midnight bus with $100 hasn't done much for Florida's recidivism rate - 32.8 percent over a three-year period. With 101,000 Floridians behind bars, and more coming, policymakers agree: it's just not sustainable. So now Baker CI and its partner, the Jacksonville Re-Entry Center, or J-REC, are the first of Florida's four re-entry programs. In addition to punishment, they provide treatment, education, anger management, job training and social services. Warden Flores says frequent visits from family and the J-REC help offenders succeed.
"So when inmate John Doe gets ready to be released, he's already dealt with his counselor from J-REC or his case manager from J-REC for however long he's here. If he's here for two years, then he's dealt with that individual for two years. So the community connection is there."
The re-entry program takes inmates who were convicted in Duval County and will be released back there. Within a week and a half of arriving at Baker, they meet with a multi-disciplinary team of the prison staff and together decide on a plan.
[sound of brick wall under construction]
An inmate slapping mortar. Baker CI has job training in plumbing, masonry, electrical and cabinet-making. Jeremy Bass, the cabinet-making instructor, says his course requires 1,200 hours and takes about a year. Like the other instructors, he's worked in his field recently and successfully enough to be able to help a soon-to-be-released inmate get a job.
"If I was a contractor looking at the certificates and showing what the Department of Education, the curriculum, says this inmate is able to do, that's better than hiring somebody off the street who barely knows how to read a tape measure," said Bass. "You know what I'm saying? At least you can see the qualifications they have."
Roughly one-fifth of Florida inmates are serving time for drug offenses, although the state has spent little on rehabilitation. Lester is one of five men in a group dealing with substance abuse.
"I've been in a program before, but in the short time I've been in here, it's not only dealing with drugs and alcohol but life and cognitive skills. It's helping me look at me from the inside out. And I know I need to change a lot of things on the inside if I want to stay on the outside."
All five men refuse to blame their parents, childhood or anyone else for their being behind bars. Lester says his parents, now deceased, gave him everything.
"For what I'm going through, I don't blame them. For what I'm going through - that's a choice that I made."
Meanwhile, at the Jacksonville Re-Entry Center, inmates can continue their anger management and substance abuse treatment. They can get help from social service agencies, including a place to stay for 30 nights. They can see a nurse, take a shower, select from a roomful of donated clothes, get job referrals and use a computer. Re-Entry Coordinator Katherine Burns gives the tour.
"So they can do their laundry, we provide the laundry detergent," Burns said. "They can wash and dry their clothes."
It may sound soft on crime, but outgoing Corrections Secretary Walt McNeil, who championed the re-entry centers, says the bottom line is public safety. Newly released inmates need a place to stay and a way to earn an honest living, or they'll be crashing with old friends and picking up old habits. McNeil says treatment, education and jobs for inmates benefit society.
"That has been proven to, one, keep the public safe, that these folks who are leaving prison, going into treatment facilities and/or having a job, are far less likely to re-offend - that is, to victimize citizens in our community," said McNeil.
And, he adds, these inmates are not coming back, not adding to the taxpayers' burden.
"A $20 million investment in treatment could result in a $100 million cost avoidance for the state," McNeil said.
Vicki Lukis, a member of DOC's Re-entry Advisory Council, is an ex-offender working with Governor Rick Scott's law-and-order transition team. She says investing in evidence-based re-entry and faith-and character-based programs is more effective than traditional incarceration.
"I think we might find ourselves pleasantly surprised by the outcome," said Lukis. "Clearly, it would increase public safety, decreasing the cost of corrections, and quite possibly it would increase revenue as these people become taxpaying citizens."
The data for the Baker-Jacksonville re-entry program are too new to be reliable but early figures suggest that recidivism rates are a fraction of those for Florida's general prison population.