MONTGOMERY COUNTY PRE-RELEASE SERVICES
COMMUNITY ADVISORY BOARD

May 8, 2002

Members Attending:

  • Danny Barnett
  • Donald Martin
  • Marlene Beckman
  • Kent Mason
  • Marsh Engel
  • Jane Sachs
  • Carl Hamstead
  • Mark Shulman
  • Michael Lash
  • Mary Nicki Terry
  • John Lavigne
  • Art Wallenstein
  • Debra Lyons-Prince
  • Susan Wiant

 

The Pre-Release Services Community Advisory Board Meeting began at 3:40 P.M. by Chairperson John Lavigne.

Sue Wiant announced the recent promotion of Jane Sachs to the Supervisor of Unit IV. Unit IV houses our MRT residents. Sue also announced Carl Hamstead's promotion to Supervisor of Administration/Training (Jane's "old" position). He will be responsible for training, staff development, intern interviews and management, etc. With Carl's promotion, the job of Community Release Coordinator on Unit IV became vacant and a screener will be moving into that vacancy soon.

The budget has gone fairly smoothly this year. A meeting was held with the County Council's Public Safety Committee and the CART and PRC budgets were accepted. We have done a good job in doing what was expected of us, basically keeping the numbers up. In fact, we have increased our State and Federal counts.

The Federal Bureau of Prisons is requesting that we take more people from Virginia. They are very happy with us and the fact that we take condition of probation cases as well as institutional transfers. A recent inspect by the Bureau of Prisons went well - there were no issues that needed to be remedied and they noted the excellent casework.

Marsha Engel (CART Supervisor) spoke about the interest regarding juvenile placement on the program and from time to time she get calls. The typical age of these placements was 17-18 years old. CART attempts to maintain an Average Daily Population count of 35 people although they can handle up to a count of 50. Most of their referrals come from the Pre-Release Center, but they do take short-term DWI offenders directly from the jail.

Marlene Beckman, U.S. Department of Justice, asked about the low female count on the CART Program. The response was that typically female counts are low in everything - the jail, the Pre-Release Center, etc. There are far less females incarcerated overall. Women are also less likely to have community support and housing for CART. Generally, the men have women in the community who they return to live with.

CART has a new drug testing system, PASSPOINT (PPT). They began using it in February with their new clients. A baseline must be established with this system, therefore the client must be "clean" when the first scan is taken in order to determine an accurate reading for the particular individual. It is hoped that this machine will drastically reduce and/or eliminate the need for routine urinalysis. The machine reads how the pupil reacts to light and the rebound effect. The accuracy of this machine has been tested by PMI and according to their findings and reports, the PPT is more reliable than urinalysis. You cannot "trick" the machine like offenders do with urinalysis. It tests for full eight drugs, designer drugs, and alcohol. An individual under the influence with-in 48 hours will more than likely be "caught" by the PPT. Urinalysis will still be used to confirm a "dirty" scan. This machine cost the Department $42,000 (for a one year trial) but it is believed that the saving will be seen in the elimination of a lab tech position at Pre-Trial, the lower costs of urinalysis, and the decrease of staff time in collection, testing, etc. It is believed that the new technology will pay for itself. Art Wallenstein stated that the new system has the potential for quick, comprehensive tests, and therefore intervention which will improve case management.

Don Martin raised a doubt about the reliability of the PPT verses urinalysis since no independent study has been run. Only PMI (the manufacturer) has conducted tests. The dual review of clients under this system and urinalysis during the pilot may give us a handle on reliability.

Art Wallenstein advised that $2.6 million was received by the Criminal Justice Coordinating Committee and DIST in grant funds for the infra-structure for an integrated justice information system middleware in Montgomery County. Simply put, this means that all criminal justice agencies will be able to access information - it will automate case management. Art also mentioned that a system will be coming soon to eliminate the "dead" zones in areas - before radio transmissions, etc. could not go through. Also laptop computers will be coming soon to the County police cars.

Reuse of MCDC was briefly discussed. The County Council approved MCDC Administration, Central Records, Central Processing/Intake Unit, short-term female housing, Food Services Area, DOCR Inmate Property Storage, Commissioner's area and support space, Pre-Trial R A final vote on ultimately moving the District Court to MCDC along with other offices, i.e., Fugitive and Warrants, Booking, Commissioners Office, etc.

The new jail has hired 89 new correctional officers. The facility is 98% done and hopefully we will be in by September. Art also noted that we have hired people in areas that we have never received applications from in the past, i.e., Vietnamese, French, Urdo, Latino to name a few. New hires reflect some of the increasing diversity in the County.

There are no lawsuits pending and Art Wallenstein credits this to our great staff and the good job that they do. There was nothing negative to report. Art is looking at some new ideas that he would like to present to the Courts regarding DWI offenders - he will keep us updated.

Art also noted that the mentally ill component is a growing concern in corrections. There are concerns about how to effectively deal with them in jails and also once they are released how do they pay for medication, therapy, etc. However, he also pointed out that with regard to PRC/CART that we do not compromise safety by taking inappropriate people to inflate our numbers.

Kent Mason noted that the event marking the 30th anniversary of DOCR was great. He also wanted to acknowledge the passing of Larry Sander - one of the original founders of the Pre-Release Center. It was noted that Larry Sander did help establish the beginning of our Department.

It was also noted that Kent wrote the legislation which has been the cornerstone of PRC and CART's excellent structure.

Debbie Lyons-Prince thanked Dan Barnett and his staff for all his work to get judges to think more about using us.

The minutes of this meeting will be on the website so that any citizen can access. The question about this being a Community Advisory Board was brought up and the fact that not many community people attended. A suggestion was made for having the meetings in the evening? Art advised that we will conduct a proper survey of every Board member and see what timeframe will work best for community involvement.

NOTE: The next meeting was scheduled for Wednesday, September 18, 2002 with the time to be figured out, based on response to the survey. However, the Board meetings need to be moved to Thursdays due to the Parole and Probation Agents changing their clients' meeting day at the Pre-Release Center from Thursday to Wednesday (this creates a parking issue for the Board members).

Survey

Please e-mail back with your first and second choice
for a meeting time.
The Meeting day has been changed to Wednesday.

8:00 - 9:30 A.M.
12 Noon to 1:30 P.M.
3:30 to 5:00 P.M.
5:00 to 6:30 P.M.