Arkansas lawmakers told helping inmates return to society will ease prison overcrowding

Arkansas lawmakers and criminal justice reform advocates agreed Wednesday that improving the systems that help inmates return to society after incarceration will alleviate the state’s prison overcrowding problem.

State correctional facilities have 15,362 beds and 16,804 inmates as of Sept. 1, and county jails are often tasked with holding inmates waiting for state prison beds. 

“We also need to examine what happens before someone reaches those prison beds,” said Marybeth Hill, event coordinator with the ARCHway Institute, a Florida-based substance use treatment organization. “We cannot incarcerate ourselves out of a public health crisis.”

Hill, one of 19 advocates who testified during a daylong hearing on prisons before the House and Senate judiciary committees, said a combination of support, accountability and substance use treatment helped her move on after serving time for drug charges.

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One obstacle to reentry to society is the presence of drugs in prison, said Jarad Harper, executive director of the faith-based Shackle Free Ministries, based in Clarksville. Committee members said this needs to be addressed legislatively, especially if corrections employees are supplying inmates with drugs.

“I’m asking if we should be throwing the book not at the first-time criminals…but maybe throw the book at people who are government employees making a very good living and eventually getting a huge pension for being part of the problem,” Ferndale Republican Sen. Mark Johnson said.

Wednesday’s hearing was the latest in series of meetings the panel is holding on prisons and overcrowding. The meetings are being held as the state is looking at alternatives after Republican Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders’ plan to build a 3,000-bed prison in Franklin County was put on hold because of legislative resistance. 

Former Republican lawmaker Jeremy Hutchinson, son of former U.S. Sen. Tim Hutchinson and nephew of former Gov. Asa Hutchinson, also shared his criminal justice reform ideas with the committee.

Jeremy Hutchinson resigned from the Legislature in 2018 after he was indicted in federal courts in Missouri and Arkansas on federal bribery and tax charges. The corruption scandal involved several other lawmakers, as well as lobbyists and healthcare executives.

Hutchinson served two years of an eight-year prison sentence before President Donald Trump pardoned him last year. He then became director of strategic initiatives for Unify.US, a Washington D.C.-based criminal justice reform organization that works primarily with Republican-led states.

Sanders and the majority-GOP Legislature passed the Protect Arkansas Act into law in 2023. The law is expected to increase the demand for prison beds, likely adding 2,902 offenders by 2040, because it requires longer criminal sentences and reduces parole eligibility.

One policy change Hutchinson suggested was to allow nonviolent offenders over 60 years of age to serve their sentences in home confinement instead of in prison. This would save the Department of Corrections “a fortune” in inmates’ healthcare costs, since those individuals could be eligible for Medicaid, Hutchinson said.

“Their sentence isn’t being relieved, and if they screw up, they can be hauled right back into the prison environment, but they’re still in custody,” he said.

Hutchinson also suggested that Arkansas’ court system automatically expunge nonviolent crimes after inmates complete their sentences, since having a criminal record makes it difficult to obtain housing and employment and increases the likelihood of reoffending.

One of the contributors to Arkansas’ rising prison population is recidivism, a term applied when inmates violate the terms of their release or are convicted of new crimes within three years of leaving prison. Corrections staff turnover and high caseloads can reinforce the problem, according to experts.

Another policy change that could reduce recidivism and strengthen inmates’ reintegration into society would be to hold inmates financially responsible for it, said Sharon Garrett, executive director of Safe Haven Ministries, a Clarksville-based nonprofit that assists formerly incarcerated women.

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If the state paid reentry programs only $50 per day for 45 days, it would save $1,870 per inmate that uses the program, Garrett said. She added that many reentry programs are only 90 days, but many inmates need at least a year to make the changes that prevent them from reoffending.

“I propose that we treat them with dignity, we make them stay longer, we inspire their vision and we let them share in the cost of their journey,” Garrett said.

Arkansans can already rack up a variety of expenses while incarcerated, such as payments for court proceedings and commissary products, and they often continue to owe the corrections system after being released.

Courtesy of Arkansas Advocate