TEXAS DEPARTMENT OF CRIMINAL JUSTICE Self Evaluation Report Submitted to the Texas Sunset Advisory Commission August 31, 2011 TABLE OF CONTENTS I. Agency Contact Information .............................................................................................................. 1 II. Key Functions and Performance ........................................................................................................ 1 III. History and Major Events .................................................................................................................. 7 IV. Policymaking Structure ...................................................................................................................... 12 V. Funding .............................................................................................................................................. 19 VI. Organization ....................................................................................................................................... 23 VII. Guide to Agency Programs ................................................................................................................ 26 1A Provide Prison Diversions through Probation & Community-based Programs .................. 26 2A Special Needs Offenders ..................................................................................................... 37 3A Incarcerate Felons ................................................................................................................ 41 4A Correctional Health Care ..................................................................................................... 76 5A Ensure And Maintain Adequate Facilities ........................................................................... 92 6A Operate Parole System ........................................................................................................ 97 7A Indirect Administration ....................................................................................................... 103 VIII. Statutory Authority and Recent Legislation....................................................................................... 113 IX. Policy Issues ...................................................................................................................................... 196 X. Other Contacts ................................................................................................................................... 197 XI. Additional Information ...................................................................................................................... 205 Complaint Data .................................................................................................................................. 205 HUB Data .......................................................................................................................................... 206 EEO Data ........................................................................................................................................... 209 XII. Agency Comments ............................................................................................................................. 211 Self-Evaluation Report Texas Department of Criminal Justice Self-Evaluation Report I. Agency Contact Information A. Please fill in the following chart. Texas Department of Criminal Justice Agency Contacts Telephone & E-mail Name Address Fax Numbers Address Agency Head Brad Livingston P. O. Box 99, Huntsville, 936-437-2101 exec.director@ TX 77342-0099 936-437-2123 tdcj.state.tx.us Agency’s Sunset Andrew Hurn P. O. Box 13084, Capitol 512-463-8195 andrew.hurn@ Liaison Station, Austin, TX 78711- 512-936-2169 tdcj.state.tx.us 3084 II. Key Functions and Performance Provide the following information about the overall operations of your agency. More detailed information about individual programs will be requested in a later section. A. Provide an overview of your agency’s mission, objectives, and key functions. The mission of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) is to provide public safety, promote positive change in offender behavior, reintegrate offenders into society, and assist victims of crime. The agency has defined seven key functions, mostly paralleling the agency’s strategic plan and the main goals as outlined in the General Appropriations Act. Those functions are: Provide diversions to traditional prison incarceration by the use of community supervision and other community-based programs. The primary objective of this function is to distribute state financial aid to CSCDs and community service providers that will provide basic supervision and innovative diversionary programs that impact the demand for additional prison capacity. Provide a comprehensive continuity of care system for special needs offenders through statewide collaboration and coordination. The primary objective of this function is to provide for the diversion of special needs offenders into community-based alternatives to incarceration. Another important objective is the coordination of programs and care for special needs offenders which facilitates successful release and reentry into the community. Provide for confinement, supervision, rehabilitation and reintegration of adult felons. The primary objectives of this function are to: provide safe and secure confinement of the inmate May 2011 1 Sunset Advisory Commission Self-Evaluation Report population, including the provision of basic necessities; and provide programs and services which support rehabilitation, reintegration and the successful reentry of offenders into the community. Provide a system of managed health care for the offender population. The primary objectives of this function are the delivery of health care to the offender population as well as the monitoring of that care, which includes investigating medical grievance filled by offenders; ensuring that all offenders have access to primary care and specialty care when warranted; and conducting periodic operational reviews of medical care delivered to the offender population. Ensure and maintain adequate housing and support facilities for convicted felons during confinement. The primary objective of this function is to provide and maintain safe, secure correctional facilities of sufficient capacity to house incarcerated offenders. Provide supervision and administer the range of options and sanctions available for felons’ reintegration into society following release from confinement. The primary objectives of this function are: supervising and assisting parolees in adjusting to community life; and applying appropriate sanctions when necessary to those parolees who fail to comply with the conditions of release. Provide through indirect administration the means to administer and direct agency operations. There are several primary objectives of this function, to include: providing professional training, both practical and on-the-job, for security staff; providing for an inspector general function reporting to the Texas Board of Criminal Justice (TBCJ); providing services to victims of crime; and providing information technology resources to assist the agency in fulfilling its mission. B. Do your key functions continue to serve a clear and ongoing objective? Explain why each of these functions is still needed. What harm would come from no longer performing these functions? Each of the functions described above serves a clear and ongoing objective, and makes an important contribution to public safety; consequently, no longer performing any of the functions would adversely impact public safety. For example, to no longer provide diversions to traditional prison incarceration by the use of community supervision and other community-based programs would leave many convicted felons in the community with little or no supervision. In addition to jeopardizing public safety, no longer performing this function would likely result in more offenders being sentenced to incarceration because judges and juries would find the alternative (remaining in the community without supervision) unacceptable. The cost of incarcerating additional offenders would in all likelihood greatly exceed any savings from discontinuing community supervision funding. There are no other county or state agencies or entities that provide oversight or monitoring of the community supervision corrections departments around the state. Because the community May 2011 2 Sunset Advisory Commission Self-Evaluation Report supervision population, the community supervision and corrections department employees and other stakeholders are a unique but decentralized component of the state’s criminal justice system, failure to perform this function would result in inconsistencies in supervision and compliance throughout the state. Additionally, no longer being able to provide a comprehensive continuity of care system for special needs offenders would make supervision of one of the most challenging populations much more difficult, increasing the likelihood that these offenders would re-offend or commit other violations of probation. Consequently, public safety would be negatively impacted, and the cost of incarceration would increase as more offenders are sentenced to prison. The inability to provide for incarceration and the basic necessities which make the safe and secure confinement and supervision of incarcerated offenders possible would impact public, staff and offender safety.

Load more

Table of Contents