COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE HEARING
STATE CAPITOL MAJORITY CAUCUS ROOM ROOM 140 HARRISBURG, PENNSYLVANIA
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 2009 9:00 A.M.
VOLUME I OF IV
PRESENTATION BY PENNSYLVANIA DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS AND PENNSYLVANIA BOARD OF PROBATION AND PAROLE
BEFORE: HONORABLE DWIGHT EVANS, MAJORITY CHAIRMAN HONORABLE MATTHEW D. BRADFORD HONORABLE TIM BRIGGS HONORABLE H. SCOTT CONKLIN HONORABLE DAN FRANKEL HONORABLE JOHN T. GALLOWAY HONORABLE WILLIAM F. KELLER HONORABLE WILLIAM C. KORTZ II HONORABLE DEBERAH KULA HONORABLE BRYAN R. LENTZ HONORABLE KATHY MANDERINO HONORABLE CHERELLE L. PARKER HONORABLE JOSH SHAPIRO HONORABLE JOHN J. SIPTROTH HONORABLE GREG VITALI HONORABLE JAKE WHEATLEY HONORABLE JEWELL WILLIAMS
————————— JEAN DAVIS REPORTING 7786 Hanoverdale Drive • Harrisburg, PA 17112 Phone (717)503-6568 • Fax (717)566-7760 2
1 BEFORE (cont.'d): HONORABLE MARIO J. CIVERA, JR., MINORITY CHAIRMAN 2 HONORABLE GORDON DENLINGER HONORABLE BRIAN L. ELLIS 3 HONORABLE JOHN R. EVANS HONORABLE MAUREE GINGRICH 4 HONORABLE THOMAS H. KILLION HONORABLE DAVID R. MILLARD 5 HONORABLE RON MILLER HONORABLE SCOTT A. PETRI 6 HONORABLE DAVE REED HONORABLE DOUGLAS G. REICHLEY 7 HONORABLE MARIO M. SCAVELLO HONORABLE RICHARD R. STEVENSON 8 HONORABLE KATIE TRUE
9 ALSO PRESENT: 10 DEBBIE REEVES MAJORITY BUDGET ANALYST 11 EDWARD J. NOLAN MINORITY EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR 12
13 JEAN M. DAVIS, REPORTER 14 NOTARY PUBLIC
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2 TESTIFIERS
3 NAME PAGE 4 JEFFREY A. BEARD, PH.D. 5 SECRETARY, PA DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS...... 4 6 CATHERINE C. McVEY 7 CHAIRMAN, PA BOARD OF PROBATION AND PAROLE...... 4 8
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1 P R O C E E D I N G S
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3 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: The hour of
4 9 o'clock having arrived, I would like to reconvene
5 the House Appropriations Committee.
6 We have before us the Commissioner of
7 Corrections, or the Secretary of Corrections, right?
8 Is it the Secretary of Corrections?
9 SECRETARY BEARD: Secretary; yes. Yes,
10 Mr. Chairman.
11 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: So would you
12 introduce yourself for the purpose of the record and
13 the person who is with you.
14 SECRETARY BEARD: I'm Jeffrey Beard, the
15 Secretary of the Pennsylvania Department of
16 Corrections.
17 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Okay.
18 CHAIRMAN McVEY: And I'm Chairman
19 Catherine McVey of the Pennsylvania Board of
20 Probation and Parole.
21 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Thank you.
22 I would like to say good morning to both of
23 you.
24 SECRETARY BEARD: Good morning.
25 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Good morning. 5
1 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Can you talk a
2 little bit about your budget relating to the proposed
3 increase and what exactly is happening relating to
4 your department?
5 SECRETARY BEARD: Sure.
6 We're requesting a 10-percent increase in
7 our budget, which would be about $163 million, which
8 would bring our budget to $1.8 billion.
9 Ninety million dollars of that increase is
10 contractual salary and benefits for staff, you know,
11 for contracts that were put in place over the last
12 year.
13 Forty million dollars of the increase is for
14 increased housing, because my population continues
15 to grow and I continue to need more space for
16 inmates.
17 Twenty-six million dollars of the increase
18 is for increased medical care and to pay for the
19 increased inmates that we will have in the system.
20 And most of the medical increase is because of the
21 increased inmates as well.
22 I think out of the total $163 million, only
23 about $7 or $8 million is in there for inflationary
24 purposes.
25 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Okay. 6
1 As you look at the trends relating to your
2 department, and obviously you have just described
3 what is occurring for next year, what do you see in
4 the next 2 to 3 years relating to your department?
5 SECRETARY BEARD: Well---
6 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: You know, if an
7 increase of 10 percent is being asked for this year,
8 what do you see?
9 SECRETARY BEARD: Well, we see a continuing
10 growth of the inmate population over the coming
11 years.
12 We're projecting that between now and the
13 end of 2013, we will grow by about 8,500 inmates.
14 And that's even taking into account the legislative
15 package that passed last fall that should help bring
16 down our population by about 2,000 inmates.
17 So, you know, we see a continuing increase
18 in growth in the population, and, you know, then the
19 cost of running the department will go up as well.
20 Over 70 percent of the costs of our department is
21 personnel. And if you add more inmates in order to
22 have secure and safe and humane institutions, you
23 have to add more staff, and that increases the
24 costs.
25 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: What about with 7
1 the prison package of bills that we passed, which was
2 recommended by the Administration in terms of, at
3 what point does that kick in to at least in some way
4 affect that number you describe between here and
5 2013? Does that affect that in any way?
6 SECRETARY BEARD: Well, it does. And
7 without that package, we think the growth would have
8 been about 10,500 between now and the end of---
9 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: So that's 1,500?
10 SECRETARY BEARD: About 2,000.
11 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: About 2,000. It
12 will have an effect.
13 SECRETARY BEARD: That's correct.
14 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: You say 8,500, so
15 about 2,000---
16 SECRETARY BEARD: Yes.
17 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: ---and it doesn't
18 increase it over to 10,000, is what you said.
19 SECRETARY BEARD: That's correct.
20 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Okay.
21 SECRETARY BEARD: And, you know, we're
22 trying to be conservative with that. The start-up
23 will be slow, so we will see very little impact this
24 year.
25 When you have something new, it always takes 8
1 awhile for people to understand it and for it to
2 start having an impact. We'll see a little more
3 impact next year, but then in 2011 and '12, there
4 should be greater impact from that legislative
5 package.
6 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Okay.
7 Let me say to the Board Chair of Parole and
8 Probation, talk a little bit about your budget.
9 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Our budget request for this
10 year will give us an 8.6-percent increase, which is
11 $7.6 million. It will take us up to $99.2 million.
12 That 8.3-percent increase is primarily for
13 personnel costs and costs to carry. Eighty-five
14 percent of our budget is personnel costs. This
15 budget proposal would include the addition of
16 30 field parole agents, which would allow us to
17 maintain the current workload and caseload ratio.
18 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Okay.
19 The same question I asked the Secretary of
20 Corrections in terms of the future -- 2 years,
21 3 years, 4 years out in terms of the trend. What do
22 you see in terms of the trend relating to parole and
23 probation?
24 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Well, the legislative
25 package that had passed through the rebuttable and 9
1 the RRRI parole doesn't increase so much the number
2 of offenders, it increases the speed with which they
3 are released.
4 So our population in the first year would
5 not be greatly impacted. In the second year, similar
6 to the Department of Corrections, we would then see
7 for us our population slightly increase and then it
8 would level out.
9 In terms of our overall population growth,
10 our current population is a little over 31,000. At
11 the end of this fiscal year, we're looking at 32,600,
12 and at the end of FY '09, we are looking at a
13 population of 33,600.
14 So we're increasing at a rate of about a
15 little over a thousand a year.
16 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Okay.
17 I would like to talk about, after both of
18 you have kind of put those numbers on the table
19 relating to the next year and looking toward the
20 future, in the case of Philadelphia, you may be aware
21 that there was a police officer who was shot and
22 killed, and in the last couple of years, there have
23 been a number of police officers who have been shot
24 and killed by individuals who were at one time or
25 another in the corrections system. 10
1 And obviously there's a struggle to figure
2 out, is there a way for us to know ahead of time or
3 have some sense of what's taking place. I've told
4 people over and over again that life means life in
5 Pennsylvania. When you go to prison, you're in there
6 for life, and you can describe that for yourself.
7 And I know that we in the Legislature,
8 responding to the people, pass the laws and put the
9 laws on the books, and your jobs are to manage the
10 laws that we put on the books.
11 What I'm trying to understand now is, is
12 there some way -- in my understanding, there was a
13 report done for probation and parole -- to begin to
14 look at the culture of how things operate relating to
15 individuals who may have at one time been in prison,
16 who come out and unfortunately create, such as the
17 crime that occurred in the case of the city of
18 Philadelphia.
19 I'm just interested in your thoughts and any
20 ideas of what is happening.
21 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Well, this has been a very
22 difficult year for parole.
23 I mean, in spite of all of the
24 evidence-based practices, the overall increase in
25 improved performance that we have experienced -- we 11
1 have released and supervised more successfully more
2 offenders than has ever occurred in parole -- and
3 besides the overall increase in the number of
4 successful parole completions, we have had a small
5 number of offenders who have gone on to violently
6 re-offend. You are correct in that.
7 To put it in perspective, one-half of
8 1 percent of all the offenders that we have released
9 since 2005 -- and that would be 39,000 offenders --
10 149 of those, one-half of 1 percent, went on to be
11 re-committed for a violent offense. And while that
12 is relatively low compared to most systems, one
13 tragedy like you have referenced is one too many.
14 Now, our system uses the best that science
15 has in our discipline, but that's really not good
16 enough at this point. Not only Pennsylvania, but
17 other States are experiencing this kind of emergence
18 of a violent subculture.
19 I was reading an article the other day from
20 Commissioner Ramsey who actually referenced that, and
21 I actually met with him on Tuesday afternoon and we
22 talked about that. So our challenge is to identify,
23 to kind of drill down and identify that violent
24 subset.
25 We're working closely with Dr. John Goldkamp 12
1 of Temple, and we're also forging a relationship with
2 Dr. Richard Burke of the University of Pennsylvania,
3 who did a wonderful analysis of adult probationers.
4 The product that we are anticipating getting
5 will be a violent risk assessment to help us further
6 analysis that population. So that's where I see us
7 going in the future, not looking just at general
8 re-offending but being able to predict specifically
9 violent re-offending.
10 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: From a corrections
11 standpoint, any thoughts?
12 SECRETARY BEARD: I think from the
13 corrections standpoint, we're always looking to
14 improve what we do. We're always trying to get
15 better instruments out there to see who is going to
16 re-offend, who is going to violently re-offend.
17 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Right.
18 SECRETARY BEARD: We're looking to improve
19 the programs that we offer to the inmates that we
20 hope will make a difference and will turn them around
21 so they won't re-offend when they go back out.
22 And we're constantly doing research and
23 outcome evaluations of the programs that we do to
24 make sure they're effective. And when we find that
25 programs aren't effective, then we change those 13
1 programs or we get rid of them or we start new
2 programs.
3 So from our perspective, we're going to
4 continue to move ahead. I think we're better today.
5 You heard the very small numbers that the Chairman
6 mentioned that go out and commit a violent offense.
7 It gets more and more difficult as that number gets
8 smaller to identify those people.
9 And so the challenge is for us, you know, to
10 get better instruments and better treatment and to
11 try to get those things in place and try to deal, you
12 know, with those individuals and make that group even
13 smaller as we move towards the future. I think if we
14 looked in the past, we'd find that there were more
15 people who violently re-offended.
16 So I think the system is moving in the right
17 direction. I think we are doing some very good
18 things. But, as always, we're not perfect. We're
19 not going to, 100 percent of the time, catch every
20 person that goes out there, but we're going to get a
21 little bit better each day as we move forward, and
22 we're going to continue to work for that.
23 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Well, one of the
24 things I would like to say, Chairman Mario Civera and
25 myself, working along with Chairman Tom Caltagirone, 14
1 and I think Ron Marsico is here, and we have
2 subcommittee chairs on the Appropriations Committee
3 in criminal justice, we need to kind of work with
4 you, both of you, in trying to figure out how we can
5 work in conjunction.
6 I mean, I know I have talked to you
7 directly, Commissioner, and, you know, I think
8 everybody wants to get the bad guy. I think
9 everybody wants to get the bad guy off the street.
10 But I think the percentage of people who are in
11 prison who tend to be nonviolent versus those that
12 are violent, I know that's always been an issue as we
13 look at this situation. Because obviously when money
14 is tight, which it is, we need to be more effective
15 in how we use those dollars and where we use those
16 dollars at.
17 SECRETARY BEARD: Right.
18 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: And I think part
19 of this process is us really listening to you and
20 vice-versa in trying to figure out ways we can be a
21 lot more effective. Ultimately, we're putting public
22 safety first.
23 SECRETARY BEARD: Right.
24 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Because I think
25 the number one responsibility for government is 15
1 public safety. And that should be our number one
2 issue, and I know that's the commitment of the
3 Rendell Administration in terms of public safety as
4 the number one issue.
5 SECRETARY BEARD: Right.
6 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Because you can't
7 have economic growth with education if you don't have
8 public safety. And obviously, that's an area that we
9 all need to continue working with.
10 So, you know, we're not pointing fingers at
11 anyone. We all are equally responsible for trying to
12 figure out how we can make this system even a lot
13 better.
14 SECRETARY BEARD: Absolutely.
15 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Mario Civera,
16 Chairman Civera.
17 MINORITY CHAIRMAN CIVERA: Thank you,
18 Mr. Chairman.
19 Basically I'm going to go where the Chairman
20 was, because I represent a district in the southeast,
21 and our crime in the district that I represent has
22 increased, and it's been people that have been on
23 parole.
24 We had an incident in Upper Darby during
25 Christmas. It was absolute brutality what took place 16
1 there.
2 I read in the paper that California has --
3 and everybody has been reading about California.
4 Thank God we're not in the financial condition that
5 they are. But their parole as far as the Department
6 of Corrections and the Department of Parole is that
7 there are suggestions that they might open that up a
8 little bit more, which I have a real problem with.
9 Pennsylvania, Madam Chairman, we're not
10 looking in that direction to be a little bit more
11 liberal, or I would hope not. But could you give me
12 some type of answer?
13 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Absolutely.
14 You know, our challenge is public safety.
15 And in order to enhance public safety, we need to use
16 our prison beds for the really bad guys. The
17 offenders who are nonviolent, drug offenders,
18 property offenders, who can serve their time, get
19 re-situated in the community and go on successfully,
20 are the ones that we should be focusing to parole.
21 Our Parole Board has always held to a higher
22 stringent standard violent offenders' parole versus
23 nonviolent offenders.
24 So I think the direction that we've gone
25 with the RRRI and the rebuttable parole is absolutely 17
1 correct. I think it's right on. And I think that as
2 we look at the violent repeat offenders, we need to
3 be very conservative, and I will tell you that the
4 board is very conservative with that population.
5 On average, our violent offenders serve
6 134 percent of their minimum sentence. So we are not
7 eager to automatically parole violent offenders.
8 MINORITY CHAIRMAN CIVERA: Okay.
9 Mr. Secretary, the legislation -- and
10 Dwight, he went in that direction with the question
11 -- could you elaborate a little bit more how really
12 that is?
13 SECRETARY BEARD: Sure.
14 MINORITY CHAIRMAN CIVERA: Because you were
15 so emphatic about that last year.
16 And let me just say this, that both of you
17 do your job very well. This is in no way a criticism
18 to either one of you.
19 But, you know, we're kind of like caught in
20 the middle of this, just like you are, and where do
21 we go at this point and how do we handle it,
22 especially a person like me and Dwight that we come
23 from the southeast?
24 But the legislation that was done last year,
25 could you, you know, go into more detail than what 18
1 you did with the Chairman as far as how really --
2 because maybe it does take a part of us, and it does,
3 to help with this and to try, you know, to get a
4 handle on it better.
5 SECRETARY BEARD: Well, the big thing that's
6 driving the growth of our prison population isn't the
7 violent offenders that we're sitting here talking
8 about.
9 MINORITY CHAIRMAN CIVERA: Okay.
10 SECRETARY BEARD: The biggest thing that's
11 driving the growth is the Part II less serious
12 offenders, primarily the property and the drug
13 offenders.
14 Last year, 65 percent of our court
15 commitments were those Part II offenders. You know,
16 well over half of the people that walked in our front
17 door weren't the violent offenders. It was those
18 less serious people.
19 And fully 33 percent of the people that came
20 in our front door had 12 months or less to serve
21 before they reached their minimum date.
22 So what we were proposing in that
23 legislation and what I have been proposing for years
24 is that we try to do things to divert these less
25 serious offenders from the prison system so that we 19
1 can save our valuable prison space for the more
2 serious offenders.
3 And that, to a large extent, was what some
4 of that legislation approached, you know, dealt with.
5 I mean, we had a risk-reduction initiative that was
6 put in there so that nonviolent, less serious
7 offenders, if they get involved and finish their
8 programs, they can get out of jail a little bit
9 earlier. Because the research is very clear that
10 leaving them out earlier isn't going to -- you know,
11 they're not going to do worse. And in fact some
12 studies have shown that people who get out a little
13 bit earlier but complete their programs actually do
14 better. They're less likely to come back.
15 Another big piece of that legislation was to
16 expand on the State Intermediate Punishment Program.
17 That program lets these less serious offenders come
18 to us for a shorter period of time but get a very
19 intensive drug treatment program to deal with their
20 drug treatment problems and then get them back out in
21 the community.
22 And, you know, we were seeing some, not, I
23 think, as much use of that program as we would like,
24 so the legislation allowed some expanded use of that
25 program. 20
1 Some of the initial things that we're seeing
2 there, it's very earlier, very preliminary, but the
3 people who are going through that State Intermediate
4 Punishment Program are doing much better than even we
5 had projected they would do once they complete and
6 get through the program.
7 So we need to ramp up those numbers. We
8 need, you know, to do more drug courts and DUI courts
9 here in Pennsylvania to divert some of these less
10 serious offenders.
11 We need to try to divert some of these less
12 serious people so that we can focus on the more
13 violent offenders in our system and then not keep
14 running the cost of this system up quite as quickly
15 as what we are.
16 MINORITY CHAIRMAN CIVERA: Okay. Thank you.
17 SECRETARY BEARD: You're welcome.
18 MINORITY CHAIRMAN CIVERA: Thank you,
19 Mr. Chairman.
20 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Representative
21 Scott Conklin.
22 REPRESENTATIVE CONKLIN: Thank you,
23 Mr. Chairman.
24 Thank you, Secretary Beard.
25 SECRETARY BEARD: Thank you. 21
1 REPRESENTATIVE CONKLIN: When I'm looking at
2 your upcoming budget, you're showing that you're
3 going to be expanding the facility up in Centre
4 County, Rockview, and one in Fayette County.
5 SECRETARY BEARD: Yes.
6 REPRESENTATIVE CONKLIN: My first question
7 is, approximately how many more inmates do you think
8 you'll be bringing to both those facilities? And for
9 me, it would be the one in Centre County. And
10 approximately how many more folks will you be
11 employing?
12 SECRETARY BEARD: The Centre County facility
13 will house 2,000 inmates, which is about what the
14 facility up there now houses. So we'll be doubling
15 the number of inmates in that area.
16 REPRESENTATIVE CONKLIN: Okay.
17 SECRETARY BEARD: The old facility will
18 remain, and the new facility will have 2,000 people.
19 We'll have probably between 550 and 600 jobs at that
20 facility as well.
21 And we're hoping that ground will be broken
22 on that maybe as early as sometime this summer.
23 REPRESENTATIVE CONKLIN: Just for the folks
24 listening, what is the starting wage now for a
25 correctional officer within the State? 22
1 SECRETARY BEARD: About $25,000, $26,000.
2 REPRESENTATIVE CONKLIN: And my second
3 question is, as you build this -- historically, we
4 use an indirect type of supervision, the lineal
5 type. But lately I know myself, when I chaired the
6 Prison Board, we went to more of the direct type
7 supervision, which had a lot more interaction with
8 the inmates and the guards.
9 As you build these new facilities, are you
10 looking more at the direct type of supervision with
11 the pod setting where you have more of a room
12 setting, or are you still looking at the lineal type
13 of construction?
14 SECRETARY BEARD: All of our facilities that
15 we've been building in the last 10, 15, 20 years have
16 been more the pod-type facilities and we do direct
17 supervision. We don't have the officers and staff
18 separated from the inmates.
19 REPRESENTATIVE CONKLIN: Good. Thank you,
20 Mr. Secretary.
21 SECRETARY BEARD: Sure.
22 REPRESENTATIVE CONKLIN: Thank you,
23 Mr. Chairman.
24 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Gingrich.
25 REPRESENTATIVE GINGRICH: Thank you, 23
1 Mr. Chairman.
2 Welcome, Mr. Secretary and Madam Chairwoman.
3 SECRETARY BEARD: Thank you.
4 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Thank you.
5 REPRESENTATIVE GINGRICH: I would like to
6 talk a little bit about your medical-care
7 appropriation. It would appear to me that you're
8 facing the monumental task that the general
9 population faces in being able to provide and fund
10 the level of care that you're committed to do.
11 And in this budget, proposed budget, I see
12 an increase of about 8 percent.
13 SECRETARY BEARD: Yes.
14 REPRESENTATIVE GINGRICH: Could you, I
15 think, Secretary Beard, give me an idea, a profile, a
16 health profile, over the board of your population,
17 most specifically to age and chronic disease.
18 SECRETARY BEARD: Well, we have a growing
19 aging population in the prison system. We generally
20 look at anybody over age 50 as being elderly, because
21 inmates tend to age---
22 REPRESENTATIVE GINGRICH: Did you say 50?
23 SECRETARY BEARD: 50.
24 REPRESENTATIVE GINGRICH: I thought that's
25 what you said. 24
1 SECRETARY BEARD: People usually get
2 surprised by that. But we do that because inmates,
3 because of their lifestyles, generally age 5 to
4 10 years faster than the general populace does.
5 REPRESENTATIVE GINGRICH: Okay.
6 SECRETARY BEARD: So they tend to have more
7 problems and more chronic problems.
8 REPRESENTATIVE GINGRICH: Sure.
9 SECRETARY BEARD: We've seen an 18-percent
10 increase in those elderly offenders. We have 8,100
11 that are over age 50.
12 We saw an 18-percent increase in the last
13 2 years where the whole population went up only
14 11 percent. So that means that the elderly
15 population is growing faster than the general
16 population. And it is more of a challenge to deal
17 with that, and that is in some way driving up our
18 health-care costs.
19 But our actual costs are only going to go up
20 about 4 percent this year. The rest of the increase
21 there is because we're going to have more inmates to
22 take care of. So that's part of what drives that
23 cost increase.
24 REPRESENTATIVE GINGRICH: I see.
25 SECRETARY BEARD: There is some, in the one 25
1 pamphlet that we handed out, the Costs & Population
2 book, it does some comparison between what it costs
3 us to deal medically with an inmate versus what a
4 person on the street, what it would cost, and we run
5 about 60 percent of the cost of what it would cost
6 out on the street.
7 So we do pretty good at keeping the costs
8 down, but we do have increasing challenges.
9 REPRESENTATIVE GINGRICH: Sure.
10 SECRETARY BEARD: We do have a facility,
11 Laurel Highlands, which has a nursing home in it. We
12 have 165 people there that require nursing-home-level
13 care, another 250 that require personal care. So
14 they have a higher level of needed nursing care but
15 not quite that skilled-care level, and we see this as
16 becoming an increasing problem.
17 The Chairman mentioned life is life. We now
18 have 4,600 lifers in our system, and that group of
19 people is only going to get older, and by and large,
20 it is going to stay with us as we move towards the
21 future.
22 REPRESENTATIVE GINGRICH: Thank you for that
23 comment.
24 You share the plight of the population over
25 the board. We are living a lot longer. There's a 26
1 price to pay with longevity. And much of it is based
2 on prescription drugs, new technologies and that type
3 of medical advancement that keeps people alive
4 longer.
5 SECRETARY BEARD: Yes.
6 REPRESENTATIVE GINGRICH: Plus you made the
7 comment -- and I'm glad I've led a pretty straight
8 and narrow life. At least I'm not aging 5 years
9 faster, because you had me pretty shook about the age
10 range there. Don't be fooled by the white hair.
11 SECRETARY BEARD: Of course not.
12 REPRESENTATIVE GINGRICH: You have to smile
13 once in a while, Mr. Chairman, at these meetings.
14 But the cost of prescription drugs, that's
15 where I was going with this. I hear you say you are
16 operating at 60 percent of cost in the general
17 medical population.
18 Can you say that about the access and cost
19 of prescription drugs? Is there a way we can do --
20 you're going to need a lot more of them, obviously.
21 We've just come to that agreement. But is there a
22 better way? Is there a copay option that we could be
23 looking at?
24 Have you looked at all of that? I know you
25 must have. 27
1 SECRETARY BEARD: Well, first of all, we've
2 done a couple of things.
3 Number one, a few years ago, we split out
4 the drug costs from the general health care and
5 mental health costs. So we went to a company --
6 because, you know, before what we had been doing is
7 having a person who is good at doing health care do
8 it all, but they weren't necessarily good at doing,
9 you know, the pharmaceutical part of it.
10 REPRESENTATIVE GINGRICH: Okay.
11 SECRETARY BEARD: So now we have a company
12 who that's what they do. They do the pharmaceutical
13 part of it. And we have saved millions of dollars
14 working with that company to bring down our costs
15 over the years.
16 And, you know, I can get you more specifics
17 on exactly what we've saved. But we have done very
18 good in bringing those costs down by splitting that
19 group out.
20 REPRESENTATIVE GINGRICH: I'd be interested
21 in knowing that since there's a lot of cost in that
22 direction.
23 SECRETARY BEARD: Sure.
24 REPRESENTATIVE GINGRICH: And finally, I
25 know life in our prisons is no cruise ship. However, 28
1 it is a confined area.
2 Have you had any outbreaks in some of the
3 things we worry about like MRSA and staph infections?
4 How do you do with the control of those types of
5 things?
6 SECRETARY BEARD: We're like any other
7 confined thing -- a nursing home, a hospital, or
8 anything else. We have staph infections on a regular
9 basis in our institutions.
10 We probably average about 20 staph
11 infections systemwide a week, and a certain subset of
12 those staph infections are MRSA. But we don't
13 culture them all; we just treat every staph infection
14 as MRSA.
15 REPRESENTATIVE GINGRICH: Okay.
16 SECRETARY BEARD: And we have not had any
17 major outbreaks. We have things under control. Our
18 staff understands it. I think, you know, we have
19 been training the inmates to wash your hands and keep
20 the linens clean, and, you know, keep the instruments
21 sterile when they're in our infirmaries and those
22 kinds of things.
23 REPRESENTATIVE GINGRICH: Good.
24 SECRETARY BEARD: So I think we've been
25 doing a very good job of keeping it down and keeping 29
1 control of it, but we're never going to totally
2 eliminate it.
3 And let me just add one other thing.
4 REPRESENTATIVE GINGRICH: Sure.
5 SECRETARY BEARD: I did forget to mention
6 about -- you mentioned copay.
7 REPRESENTATIVE GINGRICH: Right.
8 SECRETARY BEARD: Since 1998, the inmates
9 have been paying a copay, not only to see a doctor
10 but also for their initial prescription whenever they
11 get an initial prescription.
12 It was $2 in 1998. That copay was raised to
13 $4 in 2005, and then it was raised to $5 in 2007. So
14 they pay a $5 copay for the initial visit on an event
15 and for any initial medication on any event.
16 REPRESENTATIVE GINGRICH: Okay. That's a
17 major challenge for you to be handling, and I
18 appreciate hearing your optimism on it.
19 Thank you.
20 SECRETARY BEARD: Thank you.
21 REPRESENTATIVE GINGRICH: Thank you,
22 Mr. Chairman.
23 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Representative
24 Bryan Lentz.
25 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: Thank you, 30
1 Mr. Chairman.
2 Good morning to both of you.
3 SECRETARY BEARD: Good morning.
4 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Good morning.
5 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: Let me start off by
6 echoing both Chairmen's comments acknowledging that
7 you both have a very difficult job, probably one of
8 the most difficult jobs in government, if not the
9 most difficult job.
10 SECRETARY BEARD: Thank you.
11 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: So I'm going to ask
12 you a series of questions, and these are not critical
13 of you as public officials. I think, however, that
14 the system is deserving of a lot of criticism, and
15 the rules that you're following and the system that
16 you're working within is deserving of a lot of
17 criticism.
18 Like Chairman Civera, I represent part of
19 Delaware County, and the parolee who committed the
20 murder in Upper Darby also murdered an 84-year-old
21 woman in my district.
22 That case and the case of the killing of
23 Officer McDonald in Philadelphia I think highlight
24 that there are major, major problems in both parole
25 and re-entry. 31
1 In the case of the murder in Delaware
2 County, he was a parolee with a long violent history.
3 The local police in Upper Darby, the local community
4 leaders in Upper Darby, had no idea that this violent
5 offender was living in their community.
6 And the 84-year-old woman in my district --
7 he was living next door to her for a period of weeks
8 -- she had no idea that he was living there, nor did
9 the local police department.
10 But I really think Giddings, who murdered
11 Officer McDonald, is the poster child, for lack of a
12 better phrase, for problems with both parole and
13 re-entry.
14 Giddings was paroled in August of 2008. In
15 May of 2008, Sergeant Stephen Liczbinski was murdered
16 by a parolee, and supposedly at that time there was a
17 heightened focus at the Parole Board.
18 A few months later, Giddings comes before
19 the Parole Board, and he's paroled. Seven days after
20 his release from Frackville, he walks away from the
21 halfway house, which was part of his re-entry
22 program.
23 Nine days after his release from prison, he
24 has a violent encounter with highway patrol officers
25 in Philadelphia where he assaults one of them and 32
1 breaks free.
2 And about a month after his release, he
3 executes Police Officer McDonald by standing over him
4 and then firing at point-blank range.
5 Starting with parole, you talked about risk
6 assessments. Well, in that study that you
7 referenced, they talk about the early onset of
8 violence, repeated violent offenses, and use of a
9 firearm.
10 Giddings had his first adjudication at
11 age 10 for a violent robbery of a mentally disabled
12 man. In the crime for which, the instant crime for
13 which he was incarcerated, he had shot the victim in
14 the kneecaps gratuitously after having secured the
15 vehicle that he was carjacking.
16 He had been thrown out of just about every
17 prison in the correctional system. So he hit all the
18 risk markers, and yet he was paroled and able to walk
19 away from the halfway house that he was in for 7 days
20 and go right back to criminal behavior.
21 So I guess the question is, if we knew all
22 that about Giddings and we already have -- you know,
23 research going forward is a great thing, and we want
24 risk-assessment tools to get better and better as we
25 go forward, because I know they're a valuable asset 33
1 for you. But in the case of Giddings, we didn't need
2 any research to know that he was a repeat violent
3 offender that was probably a 150-percent risk that he
4 would re-offend.
5 He was paroled, first, and second, he was in
6 a re-entry program where he essentially was able to
7 walk away and not be found.
8 So the question is, what are the standards?
9 First off, what were the standards in May of 2008
10 when Liczbinski was murdered?
11 And when you refocused between May and
12 August of 2008, what did you focus on that would have
13 permitted Giddings to get out?
14 And what can we change at the parole level
15 so that people like Giddings, even if he does the
16 full 12, don't get out of prison?
17 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Well, the reality is about
18 17 percent of the offenders that we consider for
19 parole have pure backgrounds of complete nonviolence,
20 no early onset, no use of firearms. And the rest of
21 them have some degree of historical criminal
22 involvement that's indicative that there is a risk of
23 them re-offending.
24 So very few people are pure low risk with no
25 violent history, current instant offense, nonviolent. 34
1 Eighty percent of them are much more complicated
2 cases. These cases were all more complicated.
3 In the case of Giddings, he was incarcerated
4 at age 16. He had no prior adult convictions. He
5 had never been paroled before. He had a 6- to
6 12-year sentence. He came in the system.
7 We refused him for parole four times. When
8 he was 24 months short of maxing out, we paroled him.
9 And we did not parole him to the street; we paroled
10 him to a community correctional center, because we
11 recognized as a youthful offender who had been locked
12 up for a long period of time, 10 years, that he
13 needed that step-down, secured type of environment.
14 We make thousands of decisions of people
15 like Giddings who do not go on to re-offend. And
16 what I'm saying to you is, it is very difficult to
17 find the needle in the haystack.
18 Now, we're working very, very hard, as you
19 said, to improve our system. We always need to be in
20 search of improving our system. And I'm optimistic
21 that we can further refine our assessment.
22 The work, as I mentioned, of Dr. Richard
23 Burke has been wonderful in Philadelphia, looking at
24 66,000 adult probationers to create that risk
25 assessment. He's going to be doing that with us. 35
1 The decisional process is to look at all of
2 the information we have. I have to tell you that we
3 don't always get the information that we need totally
4 as we look at a system failure that I think you've
5 referenced.
6 Only one in five offenders come to our
7 system in corrections and parole with a PSI. If we
8 had that background---
9 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: Presentence
10 investigation?
11 CHAIRMAN McVEY: That's right.
12 If we had that information, we would know
13 more about the offender. We could make better
14 treatment decisions, better release decisions, and
15 better supervision.
16 Equally, as we look to improve the system,
17 we have huge numbers of offenders with long rap
18 sheets. And guess what? We have cases of murder,
19 rape, robbery, assault, that show unreported.
20 They're arrested, but we don't know the resolution.
21 We have thousands of cases that are not
22 prosecuted or the cases are withdrawn. So as we look
23 at our criminal justice system, we need information
24 to better make the evaluation that we both want to
25 make. 36
1 It's difficult when you are looking at
2 22,000 cases a year and thousands of them go on to be
3 paroled who fit this same profile.
4 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: Right.
5 CHAIRMAN McVEY: We kept Giddings locked up
6 for a long time. Typically, you do not want a person
7 to max out. You want them to parole under
8 supervision, under structure, and that's what we felt
9 best at that point in time for Giddings.
10 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: Now, you mentioned
11 the presentence investigation. Just so it's clear,
12 in many cases where it's a no-brainer what the Judge
13 is going to sentence the defendant to, they'll waive
14 the presentence investigation because it's not going
15 to impact the sentence or it's a plea agreement or
16 something like that. And in those cases, you're
17 saying you don't get all the information that would
18 be obtained in a presentence investigation.
19 In the case of Giddings, you mentioned the
20 fact that it was his first adult conviction. And
21 that's not necessarily a helpful fact, because he was
22 prosecuted in adult court as a juvenile. So he
23 couldn't have had any other adult convictions. He
24 was 17 at the time he was convicted as an adult.
25 Did the Parole Board have the juvenile 37
1 record that showed he had been violent since the age
2 of 10 and had multiple juvenile offenses?
3 CHAIRMAN McVEY: We had an awareness of his
4 juvenile history. We were aware of the juvenile
5 history.
6 What I was saying is, he did not have like a
7 long rap sheet. Because he was a youthful offender,
8 we did not have a long rap sheet on him showing a
9 pattern of violent behavior with him.
10 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: So it would be
11 helpful, I'm hearing, for the Parole Board, the more
12 information you have from the various elements of the
13 criminal justice system, the better decisions the
14 Parole Board is able to make. Is that an accurate
15 statement?
16 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Absolutely.
17 SECRETARY BEARD: Could I comment on that,
18 too?
19 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: Sure.
20 SECRETARY BEARD: You know, you all passed
21 Act 84 back in 1998, and part of Act 84 was for
22 counties to provide information to us on inmates that
23 come into our system.
24 As it is right now, far less than 50 percent
25 of the counties are providing the information they 38
1 should be providing under Act 84. And when it is
2 provided, it very often is not provided in a timely
3 manner.
4 So I would like to echo what the Chairman
5 says, that a lot of times we're getting people in our
6 system that we really don't have a full, complete
7 understanding of them.
8 What we know sometimes about the crime they
9 commit is what they tell us.
10 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: Okay.
11 SECRETARY BEARD: And, of course, that lacks
12 accuracy.
13 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: Sure.
14 SECRETARY BEARD: The other thing is, I
15 think it's critically important for violent
16 offenders, when they come up for sentencing, that we
17 have a real good presentence done and an assessment
18 done at the time of sentencing---
19 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: Risk assessment.
20 SECRETARY BEARD: Yes. ---so that the Judge
21 and the DA and everybody right there knows what
22 they're dealing with and could better sentence that
23 inmate.
24 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: Right. And would
25 have to prioritize that risk as part of sentencing. 39
1 SECRETARY BEARD: That's correct.
2 And, you know, if you look at the Giddings'
3 case, he could have potentially had a 22- to 44-year
4 sentence. And he should have, under the guidelines,
5 probably had a 12- to 24-year sentence, which means
6 we wouldn't be talking about him today had he had
7 that. He wouldn't have even reached his minimum date
8 yet.
9 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: Right.
10 SECRETARY BEARD: I also want to echo that I
11 think it's very important that you don't just put
12 people out without any supervision.
13 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: Right.
14 SECRETARY BEARD: I think if we start doing
15 that and start letting more and more people max out
16 of our system, I think that's not good for public
17 safety and we're going to have more problems.
18 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: So some kind of tail
19 at the end?
20 SECRETARY BEARD: You need some kind of
21 tail, whatever it is.
22 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: Right.
23 SECRETARY BEARD: And so, you know, we sit
24 there, both Corrections and Parole, and we have to
25 manage the sentence we're given. 40
1 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: Right.
2 SECRETARY BEARD: And in this case, it was a
3 6 to 12. He did 10. He had been bad early on in the
4 system, like a lot of young offenders are. And then
5 the last 5 years he had cleaned up his act and he had
6 taken his programs and done what he was supposed to
7 do.
8 So the choice then that Parole had was to
9 either release him with some supervision or let him
10 max out, and I think it would have been a real
11 disservice to let that person max out with no
12 supervision.
13 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: If I may,
14 Mr. Chairman, very briefly.
15 On the issue of the halfway house with
16 someone like that, I understand -- and I don't want
17 to characterize the thinking of the Parole Board.
18 But as a general matter, you're saying you'd rather
19 have somebody on the street for some period of time
20 while you still have supervision of them than letting
21 them walk out of prison free and clear.
22 What consideration have you given to the
23 increased use of technologies like GPS for guys like
24 Giddings? Because it seems to me he walks out 7 days
25 afterwards -- he can sign in and out of that halfway 41
1 house -- he fights with cops 9 days after his release
2 from prison, and then nobody knows where he is until
3 he kills Liczbinski.
4 And it's like when you have a guy of that
5 level of danger, just for the community, it would be
6 nice to know where he is. Is GPS an option for
7 people like that?
8 SECRETARY BEARD: Well, you know, I think
9 certainly it's an option. You know, we've done some
10 testing with parole with the GPS, and it's not all
11 it's cracked up to be, because it still doesn't work
12 quite as well as what the vendors would want to tell
13 you.
14 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: So it needs to get
15 better.
16 SECRETARY BEARD: It needs to get better,
17 but it certainly is an option you could do.
18 But in this particular case, when he decided
19 he was going to leave that center, you don't think he
20 would have kept the GPS unit on. He would have cut
21 it off and he would have been gone.
22 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: That's one of the
23 ways it has to improve. It can't be cut off.
24 SECRETARY BEARD: Right.
25 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: And then a final 42
1 question, and then I thank the Chairman for his
2 indulgence.
3 This is for the Department of Corrections.
4 SECRETARY BEARD: Okay.
5 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: And it's kind of
6 related to Giddings as well.
7 SECRETARY BEARD: Sure.
8 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: I'm interested in
9 recreation in prisons, specifically weights.
10 How are your weight rooms equipped? And do
11 you have weight rooms in every prison? And is there
12 any positive justification for that as an activity?
13 And the reason I ask is when Giddings -- I
14 happened to be in the unit in the DA's office that
15 prosecuted Giddings when he was 17. He was a skinny
16 17-year-old.
17 He came out of prison 10 years later a
18 240-pound 27-year-old having spent 10 years in the
19 weight room, and that was part of the reason that
20 Officer McDonald was unable to subdue him, because he
21 was so prison strong, as they say. And it occurs to
22 me that we shouldn't be financing or subsidizing
23 making people like Giddings stronger, tougher
24 criminals.
25 So is there a reason other than it gives 43
1 them something to do to have weights in our State
2 prisons?
3 SECRETARY BEARD: Well, historically we have
4 had weights. The weights are not bought with General
5 Fund money. They're bought with inmate general
6 welfare money.
7 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: And where does that
8 come from?
9 SECRETARY BEARD: That comes from
10 commissions on telephone calls that the inmates make
11 and on an almost 5-percent commission on the
12 commissary sales. That's what generally funds the
13 IGWF.
14 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: Okay.
15 SECRETARY BEARD: They take in about
16 $4 1/2 million a year. And then that's used to buy
17 various recreation equipment, including the
18 weights.
19 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: Okay.
20 SECRETARY BEARD: A number of years ago, we
21 pretty much eliminated buying any kind of free
22 weights, which they used to have historically. When
23 we buy machines now, the free weights are welded
24 together so they can't be used as weapons. As they
25 break, we get rid of them. 44
1 Historically, weight-lifting activity in the
2 prisons tended to be less of a problem. It does keep
3 them busy. It does give them something to do, which
4 is important in the prison setting. The more they
5 sit around, the more time they have to figure out how
6 to cause a problem.
7 When we look back, we have had little
8 problem in the prisons because of weight-lifting
9 activities. I'm not aware of any trend that people
10 come in and bulk up and then it's a problem when they
11 get back out in the community.
12 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: Thank you.
13 SECRETARY BEARD: You're welcome.
14 REPRESENTATIVE LENTZ: Thank you,
15 Mr. Chairman.
16 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Representative
17 True.
18 REPRESENTATIVE TRUE: Thank you,
19 Mr. Chairman.
20 Can you see me?
21 SECRETARY BEARD: Yes, we can.
22 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Yes.
23 REPRESENTATIVE TRUE: I'll try to be brief.
24 It's nice to see both of you, as always.
25 SECRETARY BEARD: Thank you. 45
1 REPRESENTATIVE TRUE: I have my traditional
2 question that we usually talk about whenever we see
3 each other, and that is I am curious as to how your
4 drug and alcohol population is doing.
5 I believe the last time you were in front of
6 the committee, we talked about that 70 percent of
7 those incarcerated had something to do with drug and
8 alcohol.
9 Are we doing any better on that? Could you
10 just update us on that?
11 SECRETARY BEARD: I think we are.
12 You know, as you said, about 70, 71 percent
13 of the inmates who come in our front door have a
14 substance abuse problem, either drug or alcohol, that
15 we have to deal with.
16 We have been working very hard to expand our
17 capacity in that area. Last year over 10,000 inmates
18 were involved in either our therapeutic communities
19 or our outpatient drug and alcohol treatment
20 program.
21 We have doubled. Since I have taken over as
22 Secretary, we've doubled the number of therapeutic
23 community beds from 1,000 to 2,000. And we continue
24 to expand there, because the research that we have
25 been doing has shown us that that is one of the most 46
1 effective programs that we have.
2 And in fact we have a rather long-term study
3 that we've been doing with Dr. Wayne Welsh out of
4 Temple University which shows that even after 5 to
5 7 years, there's still a 15-percent reduction in
6 recidivism from the people who go through our
7 therapeutic communities versus the people who didn't
8 get the opportunity to go through that.
9 And that was back at a time before we
10 started doing after-care. So now that we're doing
11 after-care, which is a critical component of any drug
12 treatment, we would expect that perhaps we're even
13 doing better than that 15 percent.
14 So I think we're really heading in the right
15 direction, and that is certainly the major
16 criminogenic factor that we have to deal with among
17 most of the people that come in our system.
18 REPRESENTATIVE TRUE: Well, again I thank
19 you for your philosophy, because I know it's
20 important that those of you that are doing the jobs
21 you are doing need to have that philosophy rather
22 than ignoring it.
23 Just the other question that I had, I'd just
24 like to go over -- and I don't want it to have to be
25 long. But I wanted to talk a bit about sex 47
1 offenders.
2 In Lancaster County, we've had a bit of a
3 stir and a problem with how sex offenders are housed.
4 We just had several stories in the paper. A former
5 Legislator housed three sex offenders in his home.
6 They were safe; they were wonderful; nobody had to
7 worry. Of course, the neighbors were up in arms. I
8 don't blame them for that. And then one was picked
9 up, I believe, on a parole violation harassing women
10 at a Walmart.
11 Now, having said that, I'm just looking to
12 see what your thoughts are. You know, I understand
13 we have to do something. I understand people have to
14 have a place to live.
15 Thoughts as far as how we should go about
16 that, because no neighborhood really wants them
17 living in the neighborhood, and that's just the way
18 it is.
19 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Yes.
20 Well, sex offenders are a complicated issue.
21 Nobody wants them living next door. The reality
22 is, about one out of six or seven offenders in the
23 Department of Corrections have some sexual
24 offending either as a current instant offense or
25 historically. 48
1 So we do have significant numbers of sex
2 offenders who have served their sentence, done all
3 their programming, have actually a relatively, for a
4 portion of them, a relatively low recidivism rate
5 compared to other populations.
6 With many of the ordinances that have been
7 passed throughout the Commonwealth -- and we see that
8 same thing occurring nationally with really
9 tremendously detrimental effects, sex offenders who
10 get out sometimes kind of go under in terms of hiding
11 out. They don't report because they have no place to
12 go.
13 And, you know, I think many of you have read
14 the story in Florida where they actually had sex
15 offenders living under a bridge, and that's certainly
16 a public safety issue.
17 So we have to provide a safe residence for
18 sex offenders. The board does have a sex offender
19 protocol that does not allow sex offenders, depending
20 if their victim is an adult or a minor, living under
21 certain circumstances, you know, next to a school or
22 a daycare or with minor children in the house. But
23 having ordinances that completely ban them from
24 living within the community is certainly not the
25 answer. 49
1 REPRESENTATIVE TRUE: Okay.
2 CHAIRMAN McVEY: So we have to find safe
3 living residential facilities for them, and it is a
4 problem. We have a wait list of sex offenders that
5 we've already approved parole for who are backed up
6 in the Department of Corrections because we have no
7 place to put them.
8 REPRESENTATIVE TRUE: Are you comfortable
9 with those statistics about recidivism, because most
10 of us are not.
11 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Right.
12 REPRESENTATIVE TRUE: I mean, so that's a
13 real -- I mean, it's very personal for all of us.
14 CHAIRMAN McVEY: It is. It is.
15 You know, the good news is, we have
16 excellent assessments on sex offenders. The Sex
17 Offender Assessment Board does excellent assessments.
18 We have wonderful treatment in the Department of
19 Corrections. We have specific assessments called the
20 Static 99 to really comprehensively evaluate those
21 offenders.
22 Sex offenders tend to be in groups of high
23 risk to very low risk. However, I will say to you
24 that as you look longitudinally out at an offender,
25 sex offenders who have been out, who may initially 50
1 have a relatively low risk level, that risk does tend
2 to go back up slightly after they're off supervision
3 and after a period of time.
4 So I don't want to represent that there is
5 no risk to them. But the truth is, they served their
6 sentence. They max out. They've got to live
7 somewhere.
8 REPRESENTATIVE TRUE: And how would you -- I
9 guess it's a real constitutional question as to the
10 ankle bracelet unit as far as, you know, particularly
11 some that might be out so that we know where they
12 are.
13 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Well, I think---
14 REPRESENTATIVE TRUE: And it's expensive. I
15 do understand that.
16 CHAIRMAN McVEY: It is fairly expensive, but
17 I think expense is really not the issue for us.
18 REPRESENTATIVE TRUE: Okay.
19 CHAIRMAN McVEY: I think that we have done
20 two rounds of pilots with GPS in conjunction, as the
21 Secretary mentioned, with looking at the GPS. And
22 the technology is not all that it's cracked up to be
23 that the vendors, quite frankly, would infer that it
24 is.
25 So we're waiting for that technology to 51
1 catch up so that we can use it. I do believe that
2 GPS has a place. I'm a supporter of the use of GPS
3 for domestic violence cases and sex offenders and
4 other high-risk predatory types of cases, and I do
5 think that's part of the answer.
6 REPRESENTATIVE TRUE: I thank you very much.
7 You're always very forthright.
8 Thank you both.
9 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Thank you.
10 REPRESENTATIVE TRUE: Thank you,
11 Mr. Chairman.
12 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Representative
13 Parker.
14 REPRESENTATIVE PARKER: Thank you,
15 Mr. Chairman.
16 And good morning, Secretary Beard and
17 Chairwoman McVey. It's a pleasure to see you.
18 SECRETARY BEARD: Good morning.
19 REPRESENTATIVE PARKER: Chairwoman McVey, as
20 a result of the horrific acts of violence that have
21 been referenced here this morning, during that time,
22 particularly in the Philadelphia media, aside from
23 your department overall, in particular the work of
24 the parole agents has clearly come under fire.
25 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Yes. 52
1 REPRESENTATIVE PARKER: And in response to
2 that, I have received several calls and letters and
3 seen articles in newspapers where the parole agents
4 were just saying, you don't understand what our
5 caseload is like today.
6 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Right.
7 REPRESENTATIVE PARKER: Could you talk a
8 little bit about what a normal caseload for a parole
9 officer is today and what it would be like if the
10 additional $2 million that the Governor is
11 recommending for the department is in the budget?
12 That's the first question.
13 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Yes.
14 The way we -- and we have provided handouts,
15 and there's a great explanation in our handouts, our
16 parole handouts, that if you don't have them, I'll
17 make sure you have a copy, that explains the
18 difference between workload and caseload.
19 REPRESENTATIVE PARKER: Okay.
20 CHAIRMAN McVEY: We use a nationally
21 recognized formula to establish workload that was
22 adopted by the American Correctional Association in
23 the 1970s and by the American Association of
24 Probation and Parole in the 1990s.
25 REPRESENTATIVE PARKER: Okay. 53
1 CHAIRMAN McVEY: So we are using the premier
2 way to assess how many agents we need based on how
3 many offenders.
4 REPRESENTATIVE PARKER: I see.
5 CHAIRMAN McVEY: People talk about ratios.
6 The truth is, the ratio is the result of what the
7 workload is. In Pennsylvania, our agents have
8 131 hours per month to do direct field work, making
9 contact with the parolees.
10 Now, overall, our ratio since I've been
11 Chairman has gone from 1 to 75 down to 1 to 66.
12 REPRESENTATIVE PARKER: Okay.
13 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Now, I feel compelled to
14 say to you, we get the right authorized complement.
15 It is impossible for us to keep all of the positions
16 filled. We typically have a 4-percent vacancy
17 rate.
18 Philadelphia is really the problematic area
19 for us in terms of recruiting, hiring, and retaining.
20 This is a problem that we have been struggling with,
21 that I have been really focused on for the last
22 2 years, when I see I have enough authorized
23 complement but I don't have enough agents on the
24 street.
25 REPRESENTATIVE PARKER: Okay. 54
1 CHAIRMAN McVEY: And while our overall
2 statewide ratio right now is running about 1 to 66,
3 in Philadelphia, that ratio is closer to, on average,
4 1 to 80. And we do have agents that have higher
5 caseloads.
6 REPRESENTATIVE PARKER: Okay.
7 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Now, if you're an agent and
8 you have 100 people who are minimum supervision,
9 that's perfectly good. APPA says you can have up to
10 1 to 200.
11 So we are well, I will tell you, well within
12 the overall national standards and norm when you
13 compare us across other States. We actually compare
14 very favorably.
15 REPRESENTATIVE PARKER: Okay.
16 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Now, the other thing that
17 you need to know is that from the time an agent
18 position becomes vacant, it takes us exactly
19 12 months to have another agent on the streets
20 working at a full caseload.
21 It takes 170 days to fill a position and get
22 them through basic training, and it takes 6 months,
23 once we assign them, to build up their caseload until
24 they have a full caseload. So it's a very arduous
25 task. 55
1 In the last year, Representative -- and I
2 know you'll be interested in this -- for
3 Philadelphia, we were able in September to secure a
4 9-percent pay differential for our Philadelphia
5 agents after 4 years of service.
6 We have been able to augment our authorized
7 complement, which is 136 agents, with limited-term
8 agents above that. We have not been able to fill all
9 of those positions, just from the struggle of filling
10 three positions and one becoming vacant.
11 Now, what we also have done is we've
12 actually hired in Philadelphia and places at the
13 various units seven annuitant parole agents who work
14 full time in the parole offices doing the
15 office-bound paperwork to allow the agents, the
16 balance of the agents, to be working the streets.
17 We have also hired a classification
18 specialist to look at our job description, look at
19 our specifications, so we can better attract those
20 individuals who are most suited for the work.
21 So I say to you, we have admittedly had real
22 difficulty in Philadelphia keeping filled to that
23 authorized complement. But with the four things that
24 we've put in place, we are tracking, as we speak
25 right now, because we are hopeful to feel the 56
1 beginning positive impact of those measures that
2 we've put into place, to address the caseload ratio.
3 REPRESENTATIVE PARKER: And just to follow
4 up on that, Chairwoman.
5 You know, last year during these hearings, I
6 mentioned to you that I'm a firm believer that an
7 ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.
8 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Absolutely.
9 REPRESENTATIVE PARKER: And although we
10 don't have any specific data as it relates to the
11 children here, I'm definitely concerned about the
12 very special needs of children who have parents who
13 are incarcerated.
14 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Certainly.
15 REPRESENTATIVE PARKER: I really think that
16 if we can do as much as we possibly can in a very
17 collaborative way to direct services to the young
18 people who have parents who are incarcerated, that
19 hopefully not only will these children not end up in
20 a juvenile center but eventually in our county and
21 State prisons.
22 So could you talk to us about any of your
23 efforts?
24 CHAIRMAN McVEY: You and I have talked
25 before, and I have to commend you for being 57
1 farsighted in your vision.
2 We have to address the future while we're
3 addressing our current situation with our current
4 criminal population.
5 We have, and particularly in the large urban
6 areas, communities that we take offenders and we
7 parole them back with their loved ones in communities
8 that are absolutely saturated with guns, gangs,
9 drugs, and a culture of violence.
10 Those offenders whom we put in those
11 communities, for lack of any other place to put them,
12 will re-offend. And they impact the entire
13 community, including their children, including their
14 loved ones.
15 We actually have a proposal -- and I had
16 talked with you last year. We were in the process of
17 developing that. We now have a proposal to work with
18 an organization called La Bodega, and we actually are
19 working to get a grant to hopefully fund that.
20 In fact, about 2 months ago -- I guess it's
21 been about 6 weeks ago -- we had a meeting with the
22 Governor's Office, and the commitment was made for us
23 to actually visit the program and get some of those
24 representatives to come and talk with us further.
25 Hopefully this year, we're going to be able 58
1 to start that pilot. That program actually assesses
2 the family, identifies their social service needs,
3 and begins to make referrals with those family
4 members to stabilize them before you bring the
5 offender back into the community.
6 So we are working on that, you know, full
7 speed ahead.
8 REPRESENTATIVE PARKER: Thank you.
9 A final question, and this will be it,
10 Mr. Chair.
11 Could you talk to us just about the progress
12 associated with re-entry?
13 I'm specifically interested in, one, during
14 this past Presidential election, I was surprised at
15 the number of individuals who were paroled and they
16 did not know that they were eligible to vote.
17 And in addition to that, when the Committee
18 of 70 in Philadelphia along with the League of Women
19 Voters developed a brochure to tell people about the
20 case and about their rights, I was surprised at how
21 many of them noted they had such a difficult time
22 after being paroled in just obtaining general
23 identification -- a Social Security card,
24 non-driver's license, and so forth.
25 So could you talk to us about that process? 59
1 CHAIRMAN McVEY: I'll talk to you about the
2 voting, and I'm sure Secretary Beard will want to
3 talk about the work that he does before they get out
4 that helps us once the offender is paroled.
5 REPRESENTATIVE PARKER: Okay.
6 CHAIRMAN McVEY: In terms of voting, that
7 issue did come up, and we -- first of all, we give
8 information out to offenders before they are
9 released.
10 They actually get like a little written
11 brochure that tells them what their rights are once
12 they are on parole status to include the right to
13 vote.
14 In addition to that, we have brochures in
15 all of our parole district offices that reminds the
16 individuals that they have the right to vote.
17 Last fall when that issue came up and I
18 actually got an e-mail saying, Parole Board, you
19 know, are you refusing to let these individuals vote?
20 the answer was not only no, but this is what we've
21 done.
22 But we went and rebounded our efforts, and
23 we went through all of the district offices to
24 ensure that our parole agents reinforced the right to
25 vote. 60
1 SECRETARY BEARD: And we actually give them
2 a form that's part of a release book thing that they
3 get that they can fill out to register to vote before
4 they go.
5 REPRESENTATIVE PARKER: Okay.
6 SECRETARY BEARD: Now, to address some of
7 the issues on identification, you're right, that's
8 really a real problem. And frankly, prior to the
9 last few years, we didn't do a very good job there.
10 But, you know, we now have other agencies in
11 the State and the Federal Government who are working
12 with us much closer.
13 For instance, PENNDOT works with us, and we
14 now can get a driver's license from PENNDOT if they
15 have one. Or if they don't have a driver's license,
16 they can get a non-driver's ID.
17 REPRESENTATIVE PARKER: Okay.
18 SECRETARY BEARD: We actually can take the
19 picture and electronically send it to PENNDOT. They
20 make the license and send it back in to us. So
21 that's really helping a lot.
22 The other thing is, we work from the day the
23 person comes in to try to get their birth
24 certificate, because that's another piece of
25 identification that a lot of times is needed. 61
1 We also have a memorandum of understanding
2 with the Social Security Administration to get the
3 Social Security card.
4 So in the past, we weren't doing a very good
5 job. Today, we're doing a better job. And hopefully
6 we will continue to improve and more people as they
7 go out will have these critical pieces of
8 identification that they really need to get jobs, to
9 get benefits, and things like that.
10 I might also say that for seriously mentally
11 ill or people with serious medical problems, we work
12 with DPW and fill out their COMPASS forms prior to
13 their release so their eligibility can be determined
14 and there's no break in the benefits, which we used
15 to have, you know, a break there when they would go
16 out.
17 So there's a lot of things that are getting
18 better in that whole continuity as we re-enter people
19 back out into the community.
20 REPRESENTATIVE PARKER: I have no more
21 questions.
22 Thank you.
23 SECRETARY BEARD: Sure.
24 REPRESENTATIVE PARKER: Thank you,
25 Mr. Chairman. 62
1 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Representative
2 Petri.
3 REPRESENTATIVE PETRI: Thank you,
4 Mr. Chairman.
5 Starting with Chairman McVey, I saw in your
6 budget proposal to the Governor you had proposed
7 $62 million to help out the counties on the
8 adult probation services and that item has been
9 removed.
10 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Yes.
11 REPRESENTATIVE PETRI: What is the impact to
12 our counties in having to fulfill those requirements
13 under the adult probation services without the
14 funding?
15 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Actually, overall, we are
16 maintaining the grant and aid program for the adult
17 probation services.
18 Typically what is appropriated is about
19 $21 million from State funds, and we receive in
20 supervision fees across the counties between $14 and
21 $15 million, for an aggregate total of about
22 $35 million.
23 So with that funding that is proposed, we
24 anticipate that overall, the level of funding and
25 impact will be pretty neutral. 63
1 REPRESENTATIVE PETRI: Am I correct, though,
2 that you had proposed the figure of $62 million, and
3 if so, where did that come from?
4 CHAIRMAN McVEY: The $62 million is based on
5 something that the board has traditionally done, and
6 that is, if we were to fund -- in 1991, there was a
7 cap of a little over a thousand, I think it was 1,100
8 county probation officers. That cap is the cap of
9 funding that we support to pay for a portion of their
10 salaries through the grant and aid.
11 REPRESENTATIVE PETRI: I see.
12 CHAIRMAN McVEY: As that population has
13 increased and we now have about 1,500, 1,600 adult
14 probation officers throughout the community, we have
15 then taken and calculated, if we were to also provide
16 funding support above the cap that was legislatively
17 established, then this is what the funding request
18 would be in the perfect world to fund 100 percent of
19 the positions.
20 Since 1991, the Legislature has always kept
21 that cap at about, I think it's 1,014, specifically,
22 adult probation officers. So that $62 million is
23 that difference between that and the typical funding
24 of $21 million that we get.
25 REPRESENTATIVE PETRI: Does your office 64
1 maintain distribution charts of how that would be
2 impacted both at the $62 million and at the amount
3 that the Governor is recommending per county? I
4 mean, can you give us a breakout of how that impacts
5 each of our counties?
6 CHAIRMAN McVEY: We could certainly do that.
7 Yes, sir.
8 REPRESENTATIVE PETRI: That would be good.
9 Now, moving to the Department of
10 Corrections, I want to just ask a general question
11 about how you go about deciding which facilities
12 should be closed and transferred for cost-saving
13 reasons, and I'll use Graterford as an example since
14 it's in the southeast and I'm very familiar with
15 it.
16 Does the department go through an analysis
17 of, when they decide whether to mothball a prison,
18 the value of that property on the open market versus
19 the cost of maybe transferring or enhancing another
20 facility, building a new facility?
21 Because as I understand it, Graterford, you
22 know, is an older facility where there are probably a
23 lot of administrative costs that could be saved by
24 moving to a more modern facility.
25 SECRETARY BEARD: Well, and that's precisely 65
1 why, you know, we're moving forward with building
2 two 2,000-man prisons on the grounds of Graterford to
3 replace the current Graterford prison.
4 That prison is very expensive to operate.
5 We house generally about 3,000 inmates there. Right
6 now, we're a little high, but we generally house
7 about 3,000 inmates there.
8 So we're building two 2,000-man prisons,
9 which can house 4,000 inmates, and we'll use
10 basically the same staff that's at Graterford to run
11 those 4,000 inmates. In other words, the same staff
12 for 1,000 more inmates.
13 REPRESENTATIVE PETRI: Okay.
14 SECRETARY BEARD: Because the new prisons
15 are designed with much better lines of sight, much
16 better controls within them, and they're much safer
17 and easier to operate and you need less staff.
18 The other thing is, when we look at what
19 institution do we want to do this with, Graterford,
20 as you said, isn't old; it's a very expensive
21 institution.
22 Not only is it very difficult to manage
23 because of its size and complexity, but we would have
24 to spend over $60 million in capital money in the
25 next 10 years to keep that facility going. 66
1 REPRESENTATIVE PETRI: Yeah.
2 SECRETARY BEARD: So by building a new
3 facility, we forgo that expenditure as well.
4 REPRESENTATIVE PETRI: Now, when all that is
5 done, will you have excess property there, or what
6 will you do with the old prison?
7 SECRETARY BEARD: We will at least initially
8 mothball the old prison in the event, you know, that
9 we have a sudden increase in our population and you
10 would need to use some of that space in the future.
11 So at least initially it will be mothballed.
12 REPRESENTATIVE PETRI: I see.
13 SECRETARY BEARD: As far as the land in that
14 area, the people in that area really don't want that
15 land sold, because, you know -- I don't know if
16 you're familiar, but there was a plan back a few
17 years ago to actually turn over the entire Graterford
18 property to a developer who would then build us two
19 prisons in another location fairly close by.
20 REPRESENTATIVE PETRI: Yes.
21 SECRETARY BEARD: And the people down there
22 did not want that. They do not want more building
23 and construction in that area.
24 What I'd foresee is the possibility that
25 maybe some pieces of that land may go for other uses 67
1 such as commercial use or something like that.
2 REPRESENTATIVE PETRI: Okay.
3 SECRETARY BEARD: But the people don't want
4 more houses and developments in that area. And so
5 that's why we've moved ahead. They actually said,
6 we'd rather have a prison here, so that's why we're
7 replacing the prison right there on the grounds of
8 Graterford.
9 REPRESENTATIVE PETRI: Okay. So you do go
10 through a very detailed cost analysis and a benefit
11 analysis, because I know the ground there is very
12 valuable and there have been a number of other
13 suggested uses, at one point including a national
14 cemetery, which, of course, the veterans didn't
15 really want.
16 SECRETARY BEARD: Right.
17 REPRESENTATIVE PETRI: But as I understand
18 it, when they were looking at that property, there
19 was something like 1,500 acres that were considered
20 in excess. Is that about right?
21 SECRETARY BEARD: That might be a little too
22 much, but it's in that range, yes. It's somewhere in
23 the thousand to 1,400 or so acres in excess, yes.
24 And let me just further say that the savings
25 that we'll get -- you know, we will actually save 68
1 enough money operationally in running that new
2 4,000-man prison to pay for the construction of both
3 of those prisons in 20 years.
4 REPRESENTATIVE PETRI: Fantastic.
5 And when does that -- has that construction
6 started?
7 SECRETARY BEARD: The construction has not
8 started. They hope to break ground later this year.
9 REPRESENTATIVE PETRI: Okay. So that's
10 another shovel-ready project, Mr. Chairman, that we
11 should put on our radar screen to help employ
12 Pennsylvanians.
13 Thank you.
14 SECRETARY BEARD: Sure.
15 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: You don't really
16 believe you're going to be able to mothball that
17 prison, do you? Graterford.
18 I mean, you mothballed Pittsburgh and
19 brought that back on line.
20 SECRETARY BEARD: Well, that's true. We
21 did.
22 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: I mean, you don't
23 have to answer that. I'm just talking aloud. I
24 don't think you really believe you're going to be
25 able to mothball it. 69
1 SECRETARY BEARD: You know, it's a difficult
2 thing. I think we're going to have to do more with
3 how we deal with offenders. I think that legislative
4 package is a start, but we're going to have to look
5 at that a year or two down the road.
6 And if we're not willing to start doing more
7 things to divert more of these less serious
8 offenders, do more drug courts, those kinds of
9 things, if we're not willing to do that, then you're
10 right, it's going to be very difficult to mothball
11 it.
12 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: And I guess I only
13 say that to you, not to put you on the spot, because
14 it's not you. You are the manager of the system.
15 It's us being the General Assembly and how we deal
16 with things.
17 And we went through this mothballing in
18 Pittsburgh, and it's back on line. So I'm only
19 saying, you know, realistically, we spend money to do
20 this and then we turn around. We just need to think
21 differently.
22 And that's not you. You just manage. It's
23 us, the General Assembly.
24 Representative Wheatley.
25 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: Thank you, 70
1 Mr. Chairman.
2 And good morning to both of you.
3 SECRETARY BEARD: Good morning.
4 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Good morning.
5 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: Since they ended
6 up with those, that was going to be a part of my
7 conversation around the fact that I'm told that over
8 the next 3 years, we're going to spend $800 million
9 to create these new prisons.
10 And based on your -- I was just reading
11 through your written testimony, and you talk about
12 the increase, the projected increase.
13 SECRETARY BEARD: Right.
14 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: So, one, before
15 the moratorium, you were projecting 500 new -- let me
16 ask you this question first.
17 SECRETARY BEARD: Sure.
18 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: Are these new
19 inmates or are these a combination of new offenders
20 plus re-offenders in that projection of 500, or even
21 the 1,800 that it ended up being for those 2 or
22 3 months that you had the moratorium?
23 And in your projection, are these new
24 offenders or a combination of new and re-offenders?
25 SECRETARY BEARD: I think our current 71
1 projections are based both on the increasing court
2 commitments that we're seeing and on the fact that
3 the parole rate is likely not to be as high as what
4 it was prior to these tragic events.
5 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: So it's those
6 staying longer, and then it is a projection based off
7 of new offenders who will come back into your system,
8 not necessarily those who get out and then re-offend?
9 SECRETARY BEARD: Right. There would be new
10 commitments coming in the front door and then people
11 staying longer. That's correct.
12 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: Okay.
13 And then you jump to the projection for
14 2013, which is why you need the capacity to be
15 expanded. You are projecting basically 8,500 new
16 inmates to come in the door.
17 Is that also a combination of those staying
18 longer plus what you think will be the average?
19 SECRETARY BEARD: Yes. That's taking all of
20 those things into account, plus taking into account
21 the likely effect of the prison reform legislation to
22 somewhat moderate the growth.
23 When you take all of that, our best
24 projection right now is that we would grow about
25 8,500 inmates. 72
1 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: Okay.
2 SECRETARY BEARD: Now, let me just say that
3 there's a lot of things in flux here. The parole
4 rate is a little bit in flux. We have this new
5 legislation and we're making guesstimates on what
6 that new legislation will be.
7 So we can always hope that things are a
8 little bit better when we get out there, but then
9 they could also be a little bit worse. I mean, I
10 don't know what laws might get passed between now and
11 2013 that might adversely affect the population
12 growth.
13 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: Right.
14 SECRETARY BEARD: So there's a lot of
15 unknowns. It's very difficult to go out much more
16 than a year or two in your projections. You
17 basically have to look at trends today and what's
18 happening and then sort of apply that out 4 or
19 5 years, and a lot of times things shift by the time
20 you get there.
21 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: And so in your
22 calculation and how you see things unfolding in our
23 Commonwealth, even though we have these things in
24 flux, your suggestion is to build more prisons just
25 in case the need is there? 73
1 If we don't necessarily use them to
2 capacity, then we will still have them in case
3 that---
4 SECRETARY BEARD: I think we will absolutely
5 need that capacity.
6 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: Okay.
7 SECRETARY BEARD: Even before the prison
8 reform legislation passed, I said that I thought we
9 were going to need probably two new prisons. And
10 we're essentially doing that. We're building two new
11 prisons. The only addition is the Graterford
12 replacement which would add another 1,000 beds.
13 Now, if things worked out well for us, and,
14 you know, let's say things are better and the
15 population doesn't grow as much, we have some other
16 smaller, very expensive to operate prisons that could
17 be closed, and you basically can use the money from
18 closing those prisons.
19 We did a study at Huntingdon. We could
20 build a new Huntingdon, move the inmates to the new
21 Huntingdon, and pay for it in the operational savings
22 in 10 years.
23 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: And then---
24 SECRETARY BEARD: I mean, even building
25 this, if we overshoot, what we're going to do is be 74
1 saving the Commonwealth a lot of money in the
2 future, because you're going to have a more efficient
3 system.
4 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: And I was getting
5 there, because I think that's the same rationale that
6 I read about the Graterford change, is to make it
7 more efficient.
8 SECRETARY BEARD: Yes.
9 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: And I, of course,
10 have SCI Pittsburgh that was originally mothballed
11 and then opened back up.
12 And let me say, first, you do have a very
13 difficult job, but I'm also not one to want to drive
14 a prison industry as a way of economic development,
15 even though I have SCI Pittsburgh and I fought very
16 hard to try to keep it open. I'm saying that.
17 But I want to go back to this whole thing
18 around evidence-based strategies of proven -- proven
19 evidence-based strategies.
20 Now, everything I can read and get my hands
21 on says that if you want to help an offender become a
22 productive citizen -- and that's if your Commonwealth
23 or your State believes in rehabilitation and not just
24 punishment -- then you have to have it where they are
25 in prison and then can still stay connected to the 75
1 outside in some form or fashion, meaning they have
2 family, friends, and some connectivity to a life
3 that's going to go on after they leave the gates.
4 With that being said, it seems like our
5 strategy for how we calculate where we build prisons,
6 especially as we look at the projection of where our
7 inmates come from, we build them further away from
8 where their families can get to.
9 So what types of strategies are we using to
10 try to connect the research that says if we're going
11 to help these people be productive, we need to keep
12 them close enough so their family members can still
13 get to be a part of their lives while they're in
14 prison with how we do our prison construction in the
15 Commonwealth?
16 Can you tell me how you are working to meld
17 the two?
18 SECRETARY BEARD: Well, it's very difficult.
19 You're absolutely right. Most of my inmates come
20 from the major population centers, particularly
21 Philadelphia, and we build most of the prisons out in
22 the rural areas.
23 And historically, the prisons have been
24 built for economic development reasons. They're
25 built in areas where people don't have jobs and 76
1 people aren't working. And so it does make it more
2 difficult for the families to get there.
3 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: Right.
4 SECRETARY BEARD: We do a couple of things.
5 Number one, we try to keep the inmate as close as
6 what we can to where they come from.
7 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: Okay.
8 SECRETARY BEARD: Now, there's a limited
9 ability to do that when 30-some percent of my inmates
10 come from Philadelphia. I can't keep them all,
11 obviously, in that area, but we keep them as close as
12 we can.
13 We also let inmates, you know, who have been
14 moved away because of lack of space, if they do well
15 for a period of time, there's a program in place that
16 they can request to move closer to home. So as they
17 get towards the end of their sentence, we do try to
18 move them back closer to home.
19 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: Okay.
20 SECRETARY BEARD: We've done things like
21 supporting bus services from Philadelphia and from
22 Pittsburgh through IGWF funding so that families can
23 get cost-effective and cheap transportation from
24 where they are to the prisons that their loved ones
25 are at. 77
1 We have in a few of our facilities the
2 ability to do video conferencing, virtual visitation
3 programs, and that's done out of both Philadelphia
4 and out of Pittsburgh. So we're doing some of those
5 things to try to help and try to do that.
6 The other thing is that a good percentage of
7 our inmates do go through our community corrections
8 system or our group homes when they're released, and
9 those are located in the areas where they came from
10 and where their families are.
11 So part of that transitional time that they
12 spend there where we're making sure they get a job
13 and making sure they're getting after-care and they
14 have a place to live is also to try to reconnect them
15 with their families to the extent we can.
16 So those are sort of some of the things that
17 we're doing. But you're right, it is a challenge
18 when most of my prisons are built out in rural areas
19 far away from the urban centers. That is a
20 challenge.
21 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: Now, help me
22 understand. Do you have a role to play in where they
23 are selected, or is that an administration, General
24 Assembly role that selects where the new construction
25 takes place? 78
1 SECRETARY BEARD: To a large extent, that's
2 done through the capital process. These prisons that
3 are being built in the locations that are noted there
4 were approved in the capital process.
5 And members typically would have put in and
6 said, I would like to have a prison in my area. We
7 originally, I think, started with four for part of
8 that capital process, and we could build, I think,
9 eight or nine, you know, because some additional ones
10 got put on. And many of them are in areas where
11 members, folks, don't have jobs.
12 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: Right.
13 And can you help me understand, do you or is
14 there another process that determines who
15 participates in the design, the construction, the
16 contracting parts of the building of these
17 facilities? Who determines that? Is that you and
18 your administration, or is that the administration in
19 the capital process that does that?
20 SECRETARY BEARD: We basically determine
21 what we want, the type of facility we want.
22 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: Okay.
23 SECRETARY BEARD: And then the construction
24 and all the bidding and everything is done through
25 the Department of General Services, as all other 79
1 construction is done.
2 And I don't actually own the prison until
3 they complete the construction of the prison.
4 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: So DGS handles the
5 contracting part of it and the requirements of that?
6 SECRETARY BEARD: Yes. But we obviously --
7 our staff meets regularly with not only the
8 contractor and DGS people; we're constantly
9 interfacing with them so that we're sure that we get
10 what we want.
11 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: Okay.
12 Now---
13 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Representative
14 Wheatley, come on.
15 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: I'm going to get
16 there.
17 He's rushing me now. He's cutting me off.
18 SECRETARY BEARD: I see.
19 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: But I will follow
20 up -- yeah; you're cutting me off. But I will give
21 you this in writing.
22 But I think it's important -- and,
23 Mr. Chairman, I do appreciate you indulging me
24 through these hearings. But I do think it's
25 important, because what you do on the front end 80
1 especially -- and I didn't get into the line of
2 questioning around the mental health and educational
3 levels of your population of folks who come in your
4 door.
5 But there was a lot of conversation before I
6 started talking around what we do to strip away from
7 your ability to really do what you need to do,
8 meaning if you're dealing with people who have less
9 than an eighth grade education, they're coming in
10 with mental health illnesses that haven't even been
11 dealt with before they hit your doors, and they're
12 coming in with drug and alcohol issues, and then
13 we're telling you to maintain your ability just to
14 warehouse them but don't do anything to correct those
15 behaviors, then all we're doing is setting them up
16 for careers of more criminal activity when they
17 leave.
18 So there is a connection between what we do
19 in education and the Department of Welfare and mental
20 health and what we do in corrections, so---
21 SECRETARY BEARD: Let me just -- I won't
22 give you a lengthy answer.
23 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: All right.
24 SECRETARY BEARD: But let me just say that I
25 would be happy to get back to you on all of what we 81
1 do.
2 The inmates come in with very significant
3 problems, 18-percent mentally ill, educational
4 deficits, and on and on and on.
5 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: Right.
6 SECRETARY BEARD: And we assess every inmate
7 who comes in, and we're doing a lot of education.
8 We're doing a lot of vocational training. We're
9 dealing very well, I think, with the mental health
10 population. So I think we're doing things.
11 And a lot of times I read things in articles
12 and editorials that people think they come into
13 prison and we're warehousing them, and that's just
14 not true.
15 And I'd be happy to take anybody here on a
16 tour anytime and take you in and show you what we're
17 doing -- mental health, education, treatment
18 programs, and the like.
19 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: Thank you.
20 SECRETARY BEARD: You're welcome,
21 Representative.
22 REPRESENTATIVE WHEATLEY: Thank you,
23 Mr. Chairman.
24 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: I would like to,
25 by 11, finish this. I have the Judiciary, and I want 82
1 to be very respectful of that body.
2 So I'm saying to the members, I have until
3 11 o'clock. I'm going to ask the Judiciary if we can
4 have them at 11 o'clock.
5 I have Scavello. I have Kortz, Denlinger,
6 Siptroth, Miller, Reichley, and Evans. Those are the
7 ones that I have. So between here and 11, I want to
8 finish this by 11 so I can get the Judiciary in.
9 So Scavello.
10 REPRESENTATIVE SCAVELLO: Of course. Just
11 before I get on, we get the short again. What's new
12 here?
13 Good morning, Chairman McVey and Secretary
14 Beard.
15 SECRETARY BEARD: Good morning.
16 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Good morning.
17 REPRESENTATIVE SCAVELLO: My questions are,
18 first, in the media we see a tremendous amount of
19 comments made that inmates should be paying for some
20 of the costs of their incarceration, especially with
21 the medical expenses, medical care costs increasing.
22 What can be done about that or what's being
23 done?
24 SECRETARY BEARD: Well, inmates, first of
25 all, do not have much money. They do not make much 83
1 money. The average inmate probably makes $6 or $7 a
2 week.
3 We have not given them any kind of a pay
4 raise since 1997. So for 12 years, that has pretty
5 much been the same pay that they've been getting
6 despite inflation and everything else.
7 In addition, in 1998, we passed Act 84,
8 which required inmates to pay up to 20 percent of
9 anything that they earned or got towards fines and
10 costs and victims' fees.
11 At the same time in 1998, we started the
12 inmate copay for the first medical event. That went
13 from $2; it's up to $5 now. Also, if they get a
14 prescription, the first prescription on any event
15 started at $2; it's now $5. So that's coming out of
16 that $6 or $7 a week that they earn.
17 Then in 2004, the Legislature passed the
18 Crime Victims Act, and that required inmates to pay
19 anywhere from $15 to $60, because it keeps going up,
20 for every event, for every sentence that they have,
21 and that has to be paid before they're released on
22 parole. So we take 10 percent of all the money they
23 get towards that fee until that fee is satisfied.
24 There are other fees that they're
25 responsible for paying as well, and if they have 84
1 child support, they have to pay up to 55 percent of
2 anything that they earn in the prison system.
3 So we're taking somebody, you know, people
4 who have very little money in the first place, that
5 we expect them to buy their own personal hygiene
6 items, that if they do want cable TV, they must pay
7 it themselves. And then we take a lot of their money
8 away for the copays and everything else.
9 You know, the bottom line is, there isn't
10 any money to be had there unless we're going to
11 substantially increase what we pay the inmates in the
12 first place.
13 REPRESENTATIVE SCAVELLO: Okay.
14 Now I want to follow up on what
15 Representative Wheatley was talking about, and you
16 alluded to it in brief comments.
17 SECRETARY BEARD: Sure.
18 REPRESENTATIVE SCAVELLO: And that's, you
19 know, we have a prison system, for example, and I
20 bring this up because I think it's most important
21 that when they get out of the facility, that they're
22 trained -- if we can, if we have the opportunity --
23 to train them in a vocational trade, because some do
24 come with very little education, no trade at all.
25 SECRETARY BEARD: Right. 85
1 REPRESENTATIVE SCAVELLO: And when you build
2 your new facilities, if that's taken into
3 consideration. And I'm just going to throw out a
4 few.
5 For example, you know, agriculture is our
6 number one industry, promoting vocations for organic
7 farming, forestry, animal husbandry, veterinarian
8 technician care, or environmentally related jobs and
9 technicians dealing with energy or waste management
10 fields. Are we doing any of that?
11 SECRETARY BEARD: I don't know that we're
12 doing any of those specific jobs that you mentioned
13 there, but we've made a number of changes.
14 Vocational training has always been a
15 weakness in our system. But back 2 years ago, we
16 asked for some additional positions, and we started
17 26 new vocational training programs in our
18 institutions.
19 All of our new institutions are built with
20 an educational complex that has room to do this, and
21 all the new institutions will be built the same way.
22 REPRESENTATIVE SCAVELLO: Okay.
23 SECRETARY BEARD: Last year, about 4,000
24 inmates went through our programs. And at any given
25 time, we have about 4,000 inmates in those programs. 86
1 And, of course, we look at them as they're close to
2 leaving so you don't have to do them all at the same
3 time.
4 REPRESENTATIVE SCAVELLO: I see.
5 SECRETARY BEARD: Ninety-two percent of our
6 programs are certified in some way, ASE
7 certification, NCCER -- some industry-recognized
8 certificate that they get.
9 Further, all of those vocational training
10 programs we started, we worked with L&I and looked at
11 the workforce investment areas and what the jobs
12 were in those workforce investment areas when we
13 planned those new vocational programs. And ones that
14 don't meet that, we change over and go to ones that
15 do.
16 So I think we really have made a lot of
17 progress there, and I think you're going to see a lot
18 more inmates in coming years going out that are going
19 to have the training.
20 REPRESENTATIVE SCAVELLO: It's great to hear
21 that.
22 And just one last comment.
23 The energy needs. How are we doing in our
24 facilities, and especially the newer ones that we're
25 building, in reducing our energy consumption? 87
1 SECRETARY BEARD: I believe all the new ones
2 that are going to be built have to be built with
3 energy consumption taken into account. That's part
4 of that green building construction process.
5 REPRESENTATIVE SCAVELLO: Okay.
6 SECRETARY BEARD: So I think all of that is
7 going to be done.
8 REPRESENTATIVE SCAVELLO: Great.
9 SECRETARY BEARD: In our older facilities,
10 we're doing what are called ESCO projects where we
11 have people come in and change the lights and put in
12 new windows and more energy-efficient things.
13 REPRESENTATIVE SCAVELLO: Right.
14 SECRETARY BEARD: And then, you know, that
15 gets paid back over 10 or 15 years with the energy
16 savings, and then the Commonwealth after that starts
17 doing it.
18 We have one particularly good program where
19 we're going to be getting methane gas from a landfill
20 out at Laurel Highlands and producing enough
21 electricity to run Laurel Highlands and one or two
22 other correctional institutions.
23 In other words, it will go back into the
24 grid.
25 REPRESENTATIVE SCAVELLO: Great. 88
1 One last question I have for Chairwoman
2 McVey.
3 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Yes.
4 REPRESENTATIVE SCAVELLO: Based on the
5 budget numbers provided, the augmentations received
6 from supervision fees appear to be essentially a flat
7 of $3 1/2 million.
8 What are you doing to improve the receipt of
9 these fees? And do probationaries pay for part or
10 all of their drug and alcohol treatment programs as
11 part of the State Intermediate Punishment?
12 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Okay.
13 When I became the Chairman of the Board in
14 2005, I saw monthly supervision fee collections as
15 low as $80,000, $100,000 a month and very quickly
16 embarked on analyzing why that was given the size of
17 our population.
18 In the months that followed after my initial
19 year, we changed the supervision fee schedule, and we
20 basically bifurcated it to create a $10 a month
21 supervision fee. Since 1990, it had been $25 a month
22 for everybody or they paid nothing.
23 REPRESENTATIVE SCAVELLO: Okay.
24 CHAIRMAN McVEY: And we found large numbers
25 of people being exempted, not paying anything. 89
1 Recognizing that some offenders simply do
2 not have the money to pay their fees and they have
3 child support fees, other fines, fees, and
4 restitution, or very limited income, we actually then
5 created a lower bracket of only $10 a month, and then
6 we raised the $25 bracket to $30.
7 So now we have a $30 and a $10 supervision
8 fee level. And then we also enforced more clearly
9 that everyone should pay something with a very few
10 number truly being exempted from paying nothing.
11 Our monthly average supervision fee
12 collections from when I became the Chair, which was
13 between $80,000 to $100,000, runs now in excess of
14 $300,000 a month.
15 REPRESENTATIVE SCAVELLO: Okay.
16 CHAIRMAN McVEY: So we have increased our
17 supervision fees tremendously, basically more than
18 doubled them since I've been Chair.
19 In these tough economic times as our
20 offenders struggle to find work that's a living-wage
21 work, it would be very difficult to further increase
22 those.
23 REPRESENTATIVE SCAVELLO: Thank you very
24 much.
25 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Certainly. 90
1 REPRESENTATIVE SCAVELLO: And thank you,
2 Mr. Chairman.
3 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Representative
4 Kortz.
5 REPRESENTATIVE KORTZ: Thank you,
6 Mr. Chairman.
7 Welcome, Secretary Beard and Chairman McVey.
8 SECRETARY BEARD: Thank you.
9 REPRESENTATIVE KORTZ: Chairman McVey, a
10 comment. I was encouraged to hear your comments that
11 you see a future for the GPS monitoring. So do I,
12 and I would appreciate if you could push along that
13 path.
14 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Sure.
15 REPRESENTATIVE KORTZ: Mr. Secretary,
16 looking over the numbers, including the health-care
17 cost per inmate that would take us up to $39,400 next
18 year per inmate, and if I may, a trailing cost of
19 $3,300 for the parole per year -- obviously way too
20 much money, but I understand that's what it is.
21 That's the reality of the situation.
22 With that in mind, the goal obviously is
23 rehabilitation and not having the inmate to return.
24 And I want to touch a little bit upon what
25 Representatives Wheatley and Scavello were talking 91
1 about, the education and the vocational training.
2 What are you intending to spend on education
3 and vocational training? And is that an increase
4 from what it was last year?
5 SECRETARY BEARD: I think it's something
6 over $50 million that will be spent on the education
7 and vocational training programs.
8 It won't be a real increase because back in
9 the prior year, we got a real increase in positions
10 and we were able to add the 26 vocational training
11 programs I mentioned.
12 And we believe we're getting very close
13 right now to having the capacity we need to see that
14 everybody gets through. You know, we do require
15 anybody who doesn't have a GED or a high school
16 diploma to go to school. That's an absolute
17 requirement if they have the capability of doing
18 that.
19 REPRESENTATIVE KORTZ: Right.
20 SECRETARY BEARD: We had over 11,000 inmates
21 that were involved, or almost 11,000 inmates that
22 were involved in education, you know, at any given
23 time. And we have about 4,000 inmates who are
24 involved in vocational training at any given time.
25 So we have a lot of activity going on in 92
1 that area, and I think more and more of our inmates
2 are going out with a better education and more and
3 more of them are going out with some skill.
4 REPRESENTATIVE KORTZ: With that in mind,
5 where is our recidivism rate? Is it slightly
6 increasing, is it flatlined, or is it decreasing with
7 all these programs you're trying to do?
8 SECRETARY BEARD: With the 3-year rate,
9 which goes back so far that it probably doesn't pick
10 up some of the stuff that we've done yet, it has come
11 down just a touch.
12 But we see a fairly good drop in the 6-month
13 and 1-year rates, and so I'm optimistic as we move
14 forward we're going to see an increasing reduction in
15 the 3-year rate as well.
16 REPRESENTATIVE KORTZ: Very good.
17 One last question. It deals with the
18 illegal aliens.
19 Do you know how many illegal aliens are in
20 our prison systems? And once they have completed
21 their sentence, is the INS taking charge and
22 deporting these persons?
23 SECRETARY BEARD: We have about 600 that we
24 know about at any given time, and that has
25 historically been the case. 93
1 REPRESENTATIVE KORTZ: Okay.
2 SECRETARY BEARD: We work very close with
3 ICE. They have just recently put two agents at our
4 diagnostic center. So every single inmate that comes
5 in, they interview to make sure we're not missing
6 somebody that's coming into the system.
7 And we also have been for a number of years
8 using video conferencing to do the actual deportation
9 hearings, where the Judge, I think, is down in the
10 Baltimore area or something and then can do it at all
11 of my institutions since we have video conferencing
12 capability.
13 REPRESENTATIVE KORTZ: Okay.
14 SECRETARY BEARD: So we've been very active
15 with them. But that whole area is a very, very
16 difficult area, because, you know, you get somebody
17 who is ready to come up for parole, parole really
18 doesn't want to parole them because maybe, you know,
19 they don't feel comfortable with the case, and, you
20 know, ICE says we'll deport them, paroles them, and
21 then they can't get them deported.
22 And in fact we have a very troublesome
23 inmate who right now -- he did get paroled, ICE was
24 going to put him on, and he wouldn't get on the
25 airplane. So he ended up in an ICE facility, and it 94
1 looks like he may end up back in our system again.
2 So it's very, very difficult to get these
3 people out and to get them deported and out of the
4 country.
5 REPRESENTATIVE KORTZ: So you're saying that
6 the INS has trouble deporting these people that are
7 illegals?
8 SECRETARY BEARD: Yes.
9 REPRESENTATIVE KORTZ: Very interesting.
10 Okay. Thank you, sir.
11 SECRETARY BEARD: Sure.
12 REPRESENTATIVE KORTZ: And thank you,
13 Mr. Chairman.
14 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Denlinger.
15 REPRESENTATIVE DENLINGER: Thank you,
16 Mr. Chairman.
17 And good morning to you both.
18 SECRETARY BEARD: Good morning.
19 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Good morning.
20 REPRESENTATIVE DENLINGER: I want to ask
21 some questions, but I want to make sure I do also
22 convey my appreciation for the difficulties of the
23 task that you both face.
24 SECRETARY BEARD: Thank you.
25 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Thank you. 95
1 REPRESENTATIVE DENLINGER: I think my
2 question is probably best directed to you, Secretary
3 Beard.
4 SECRETARY BEARD: Okay.
5 REPRESENTATIVE DENLINGER: And that is in
6 regard to what goes on within our prison system with
7 regard to prisoner-on-prisoner violence and
8 prisoner-on-prisoner sexual assault.
9 There is a perception in the broader society
10 that there is a sentence given, which is confinement
11 for a period of time, but the real sentence is what
12 will happen to you when you get inside.
13 And my concern here is, I guess, what you do
14 to make sure those things do not occur, and how
15 comfortable and confident are you in the reporting
16 system that feeds you about this type of violent and
17 sexual assault activity within our system?
18 I'd be interested in knowing, I guess as a
19 first step, the numbers of incidents. If you want to
20 give me that over, you know, the last few years, I
21 would appreciate that.
22 Could you respond to that, please?
23 SECRETARY BEARD: Well, first of all, as far
24 as assault in general or assault rates in general on
25 inmates, we've worked very hard to make our prisons 96
1 safer. We have a lot more of these newer prisons
2 that are easier to manage and to supervise.
3 And in the last 5 years, we've seen a
4 37-percent decrease in assaults, on inmate-on-inmate
5 assaults, which means that our prisons are safer.
6 REPRESENTATIVE DENLINGER: When you say
7 37 percent, that doesn't help me with the numbers.
8 SECRETARY BEARD: Well, it came down from
9 about 700 to about 500 assaults, most of which are
10 not---
11 REPRESENTATIVE DENLINGER: And are those
12 violent or sexual in nature?
13 SECRETARY BEARD: Those are just an assault.
14 It could be any kind of an assault.
15 REPRESENTATIVE DENLINGER: It could be any
16 kind.
17 SECRETARY BEARD: Right.
18 Only about 4 percent, less than 4 percent of
19 those assaults required any kind of hospital
20 treatment. So most of them were very minor. You
21 know, two inmates have a fight or an inmate hits an
22 inmate or something like that.
23 As far as sexual assault, we've never had
24 the level of sexual assault in our prisons that I
25 think some people outside think we do. 97
1 There was a Prison Rape Elimination Act that
2 was passed a number of years ago that envisioned up
3 to 13 percent of the inmates were being sexually
4 assaulted, perhaps more than 13 percent were being
5 sexually assaulted.
6 We always believed that the rate was much
7 lower, down in, you know, the 1 percent or so range.
8 REPRESENTATIVE DENLINGER: Okay.
9 SECRETARY BEARD: But we have always taken
10 those things seriously. But more recently, we've
11 done more. We do training with inmates when they
12 come in. We do more training with the staff on
13 sexual assault issues.
14 We have a sexual assault hotline that we've
15 set up that they can call if they're assaulted and
16 don't want to report it at the institution.
17 REPRESENTATIVE DENLINGER: Okay.
18 SECRETARY BEARD: We've given special
19 training to our security officers so that they can
20 properly preserve evidence and properly move ahead.
21 And we've let the inmates know, look, if
22 this happens to you, we want to know about it. And
23 inmates are coming forward and they are telling us.
24 Now, as far as the numbers over the last few
25 years, the numbers have been small, but I don't want 98
1 to throw a number out. What I'd like to do is get
2 back to you and send you the precise numbers of those
3 actual sexual assault reports that we've had over the
4 years.
5 REPRESENTATIVE DENLINGER: That would be
6 appreciated.
7 SECRETARY BEARD: We're very sensitive to
8 that, and I agree with you. Prison is not a place
9 for people to be abused or mistreated, you know, or
10 sexually assaulted.
11 We're very sensitive to that, and we
12 aggressively deal with it. You know, we have been
13 working with the State Police and other agencies
14 actually to help us be more sensitive on dealing with
15 those issues as well.
16 REPRESENTATIVE DENLINGER: Your efforts
17 there are sincerely appreciated.
18 And I guess the second part to my question
19 was, how high of a confidence level do you have as
20 the Secretary of this agency that the reporting
21 system that feeds you this data is accurate?
22 SECRETARY BEARD: I have a lot of confidence
23 in the reporting system.
24 As I had mentioned before, we don't have
25 indirect supervision like some facilities. Our 99
1 officers are out there, our staff is out there on the
2 blocks with the inmates routinely going around,
3 making rounds.
4 REPRESENTATIVE DENLINGER: Good.
5 SECRETARY BEARD: So the opportunity for
6 that kind of behavior is greatly limited,
7 particularly in our newer-design facilities.
8 REPRESENTATIVE DENLINGER: Thank you.
9 And then one other quick question, if I may.
10 And that's another perception that the public has
11 come to hold, I believe, and that's that there is a
12 distinction between the classes of prisoners in the
13 prison population between older inmates and younger
14 ones.
15 And you hear the anecdotal about older
16 prisoners being fearful of the younger population
17 that is coming in, that they wish to be segregated
18 from them because in fact younger people being
19 incarcerated are significantly more violent than an
20 earlier generation.
21 Could you comment on that?
22 SECRETARY BEARD: Well, I think you're
23 right. I think we do have some inmates that have
24 those concerns.
25 And some of the older ones who are not able 100
1 to take care of themselves, we do have special-needs
2 units in all of our institutions, or almost all of
3 our institutions, where we can put those inmates.
4 Sometimes, some institutions have separate
5 yard periods for the older inmates or separate yards
6 that they use for them. So we are sensitive to that
7 growing population.
8 And then many of them end up in Laurel
9 Highlands or in Waymart, our more minimum security
10 facilities, and there's less risk to the older
11 inmates being preyed upon by the younger inmates.
12 REPRESENTATIVE DENLINGER: So would it be
13 correct to state that that perception that the public
14 has would be somewhat accurate?
15 SECRETARY BEARD: Well, I think any time,
16 you know, you have younger people that are more
17 violent coming into a system, you have to have a
18 concern that they may prey on weaker people. I mean,
19 that just historically has been the case.
20 I think we're very sensitive to that. We're
21 sensitive to that when we cell them together. We're
22 sensitive to that when we house them and different
23 things like that. That's why we have these different
24 recreation periods and things.
25 So we're sensitive to that as a problem. 101
1 REPRESENTATIVE DENLINGER: Very good.
2 I appreciate the sensitivity, and I
3 appreciate the challenges that you face.
4 Thank you.
5 SECRETARY BEARD: Thank you.
6 REPRESENTATIVE DENLINGER: Thank you,
7 Mr. Chairman.
8 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Representative
9 Siptroth.
10 REPRESENTATIVE SIPTROTH: Thank you,
11 Mr. Chair. I'll be very brief.
12 To pick up on Representatives Conklin's and
13 Petri's comments regarding the new construction, has
14 there been any discussion with the Administration
15 regarding the use of any stimulus dollars that may be
16 coming from the Federal Government for these
17 particular projects, Secretary Beard?
18 SECRETARY BEARD: I'm not aware of any such
19 discussions at this point. Those things are funded
20 with capital moneys. And I don't know if they're
21 looking at any stimulus moneys or even if any
22 stimulus moneys could be used for that.
23 REPRESENTATIVE SIPTROTH: Okay. Thank you.
24 SECRETARY BEARD: I don't have that answer.
25 REPRESENTATIVE SIPTROTH: Thank you. 102
1 One other question.
2 SECRETARY BEARD: Sure.
3 REPRESENTATIVE SIPTROTH: A lot of folks
4 feel that prisoners are treated even better than they
5 may be regarding the educational opportunities that
6 are provided while they're clients in the program, if
7 you will.
8 Has there ever been a thought of a student
9 loan program for individuals above the vocational
10 level that are seeking higher education programs?
11 And I know their abilities while they're certainly
12 incarcerated, but is there an option so that upon
13 parole that they would be able to pay some of that
14 educational dollar back to the system?
15 SECRETARY BEARD: There is nothing like
16 that. We used to offer college-level programs to
17 inmates back in the seventies and eighties, but when
18 the Pell Grants went away, that pretty much went
19 away.
20 REPRESENTATIVE SIPTROTH: Okay.
21 SECRETARY BEARD: And it's very
22 controversial to provide moneys for college education
23 when families are out there trying to get their sons
24 and daughters through school.
25 REPRESENTATIVE SIPTROTH: Yes. 103
1 SECRETARY BEARD: My position on it is at
2 this particular point, I don't quite have enough, I'm
3 just reaching having enough to do basic education.
4 So I really don't have extra moneys that I could do
5 even if that was something we wanted to do.
6 REPRESENTATIVE SIPTROTH: Okay. So at the
7 current time then---
8 SECRETARY BEARD: The only way they can
9 right now is if they want to sign up for a
10 correspondence course and they want to pay for it,
11 they can do it.
12 REPRESENTATIVE SIPTROTH: Okay. It's
13 private pay then---
14 SECRETARY BEARD: It's private; yes.
15 REPRESENTATIVE SIPTROTH: Okay. I just
16 wanted to clarify that point.
17 SECRETARY BEARD: Sure.
18 REPRESENTATIVE SIPTROTH: Thank you very
19 much.
20 SECRETARY BEARD: Thank you.
21 REPRESENTATIVE SIPTROTH: And Chairwoman
22 McVey, I just want to say thank you to your staff
23 concerning some situations we had in Pike and Monroe
24 Counties. They were very helpful. Thank you very
25 much. 104
1 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Thank you, Representative.
2 REPRESENTATIVE SIPTROTH: Thank you,
3 Mr. Chairman.
4 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Representative
5 Reichley.
6 REPRESENTATIVE REICHLEY: Thank you,
7 Mr. Chairman.
8 There were some statements earlier in the
9 question, I think perhaps in response from
10 Representative Lentz, that I wanted to get clarified.
11 Secretary Beard, you mentioned, I think,
12 that 65 percent of your new admittees or new
13 prisoners are for what we were referring to as
14 nonserious or nonviolent offenses. I would hasten
15 that. I think burglary and possession with intent to
16 deliver drugs are serious offenses.
17 But those 65 percent of the people, are they
18 first-time offenders or are they people who have
19 built up a criminal record so their prior -- excuse
20 me -- yeah, their prior record score puts them in a
21 guideline range so they're going to State prison?
22 SECRETARY BEARD: There would be a mixture
23 there. Most of them probably have had some prior
24 history, because many of the inmates, you know, have
25 several arrests, maybe go to the county jail and then 105
1 finally turn up with us.
2 So while some of them may be an instant
3 offense, most of them do have some type of history.
4 REPRESENTATIVE REICHLEY: There's often a
5 criticism that, I'm sure, gets conveyed to a lot of
6 the Legislators that people with marijuana-possession
7 charges or drunk-driving charges or drug-possession
8 charges are in the State prison.
9 Do you want to respond as to what percentage
10 of your inmates are there for possession of
11 marijuana, drunk driving, or just a controlled
12 substance charge?
13 SECRETARY BEARD: I would have to get back
14 to you on the specific numbers. They're not all that
15 high, but we do certainly have people in and a
16 growing number in for DUIs.
17 And as far as how many are in for just
18 marijuana charges, I'd have to get back to you on
19 that.
20 REPRESENTATIVE REICHLEY: Because as an
21 ungraded misdemeanor, unless it's been a pretty heavy
22 prior record score, they shouldn't be in a category
23 where they're looking at State prison. It might be
24 for a parole or probation violation, too.
25 I should, I guess, in terms of full 106
1 disclosure indicate that the two of you are
2 ex-officio members of the Sentencing Commission. I'm
3 on the Sentencing Commission.
4 SECRETARY BEARD: Yes.
5 REPRESENTATIVE REICHLEY: And one of the
6 tasks that that body is dealing with right now is
7 trying to develop the new guidelines and response to
8 the passage of the prison reform legislation.
9 I don't know if you want to comment about
10 the potential workload that's going to be upon the
11 Board of Probation and Parole, Chairwoman McVey, in
12 trying to formulate those guidelines and the
13 necessity for you to have an adequate funding stream
14 to respond to the Legislature's dictates.
15 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Well, we're working very
16 closely right now with the Director, Mark Bergstrom,
17 providing him a tremendous amount of information. He
18 kind of spends half his time right now over in our
19 parole offices.
20 So we're going to be working with him to
21 share the information that they need to have,
22 communicate to the Sentencing Commission what our
23 current guidelines are and how we do guidelines, and
24 work with him.
25 We do know that there will be costs 107
1 incurred, and I believe the Sentencing Commission has
2 submitted an additional budget request, or several
3 months ago consideration at least -- I do not know
4 the status of that -- to support the extra work that
5 will actually be more in his shop than our shop.
6 We'll be providing data.
7 REPRESENTATIVE REICHLEY: Okay.
8 CHAIRMAN McVEY: But under the new statute,
9 the Sentencing Commission will be responsible for
10 collecting, analyzing that data, and then reporting
11 regularly to the General Assembly the parole
12 practices and parole outcomes.
13 So I do know that there is a cost in terms
14 of data management and analysis that will be incurred
15 by the Sentencing Commission.
16 REPRESENTATIVE REICHLEY: Now, Secretary
17 Beard, you mentioned the use of the SIP program for
18 those who may have heavy drug-dependency issues.
19 One thing I've been trying to pursue in the
20 last year or so is the expansion of the use of SIP
21 for those with dual diagnosis or mental health issues
22 as well.
23 And I don't know if you can comment about
24 how much of a problem that is for your current inmate
25 population to adequately address the mental health 108
1 issues they have as well.
2 SECRETARY BEARD: Well, there's no question,
3 18 percent of my population has a mental health
4 problem. And most of them do have co-occurring
5 disorders, you know, and have substance abuse
6 problems as well.
7 About 2 1/2 percent of the population has a
8 serious disorder that has to be dealt with. So
9 there's no question that's a real challenge that we
10 have in the system.
11 I think we do a pretty good job. We have a
12 lot of resources available that we've built over the
13 years as the numbers kept going up. And I think we
14 have plenty of resources and do pretty well with
15 them.
16 But, you know, I would like to see a lot of
17 them dealt with prior to them coming to us.
18 REPRESENTATIVE REICHLEY: Okay.
19 And my last comment is that there was a lot
20 of criticism about the Giddings case. I think both
21 in fairness to the board and the department, this is
22 a situation where a lot fingers can be pointed at
23 various agencies.
24 Down at the Common Pleas level, the pressure
25 to resolve cases, sometimes without a presentence 109
1 investigation report being prepared, is a
2 consequence, which then causes you to have lack of
3 resources to adequately evaluate.
4 SECRETARY BEARD: Yes.
5 REPRESENTATIVE REICHLEY: There are a number
6 of reasons why cases may get pled. In a certain kind
7 of a case, let's say it's a case where there's a
8 child who is a sexual assault victim, you don't want
9 to have to put that kid on the stand. And so you're
10 going to work out a plea deal where, to prevent the
11 person from potentially withdrawing their plea,
12 you're going to have immediate sentencing going right
13 to the appeal stage where they're withdrawing their
14 appeal rights, waiving their appeal rights, so that
15 you don't have to worry about the person playing a
16 game with the system. That, therefore, denies you
17 the ability to having a PSI to reflect back on when
18 you're trying to do evaluations.
19 So there are a number of reasons -- we don't
20 have enough prosecutors; we don't have enough Judges
21 to deal with the bulk of the caseload that's coming
22 through.
23 SECRETARY BEARD: Right.
24 REPRESENTATIVE REICHLEY: But I don't know
25 if there's any way of -- and we have the Judiciary 110
1 coming in next -- forcing Common Pleas Judges to
2 order PSIs more often. I don't know if you have any
3 response to that.
4 SECRETARY BEARD: Well, you know, my opinion
5 would be that at least for certain serious crimes, a
6 PSI should be mandatory.
7 And I'm also a supporter of having more risk
8 assessments done presentence, because I think it's
9 important that the DA and the Judge both have all of
10 the information there when they're making whatever
11 decisions they're making.
12 REPRESENTATIVE REICHLEY: Right.
13 SECRETARY BEARD: And then, of course, if
14 that's there, it's available to us and to Parole when
15 they come into our system.
16 So I think something should be done to
17 require that for at least certain serious crimes.
18 REPRESENTATIVE REICHLEY: Okay. Maybe
19 every felony case -- I don't know -- should get a
20 PSI.
21 Okay. Thank you.
22 SECRETARY BEARD: Sure.
23 REPRESENTATIVE REICHLEY: Thank you,
24 Mr. Chairman.
25 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: Representative 111
1 Evans.
2 REPRESENTATIVE J. EVANS: Thank you,
3 Mr. Chairman.
4 Thank you very much for being here.
5 My questions will be directed to Secretary
6 Beard.
7 SECRETARY BEARD: Okay.
8 REPRESENTATIVE J. EVANS: As you know,
9 my legislative district is in Erie County, and
10 SCI Albion is in that legislative area.
11 SECRETARY BEARD: Yes.
12 REPRESENTATIVE J. EVANS: A question
13 concerning safety and security at prisons. And,
14 Secretary Beard, we've had several conversations
15 since the inmate escaped at SCI Albion a little over
16 a year ago.
17 SECRETARY BEARD: Yes.
18 REPRESENTATIVE J. EVANS: Happily, that
19 inmate has been caught and is back in the system.
20 But I wanted to have you just outline for the
21 committee some of the steps that have been taken to
22 address the issues at SCI Albion.
23 SECRETARY BEARD: Well, we made some change
24 in the staff at that institution. And we also went
25 into the facility and looked at some of the 112
1 conditions that allowed that escape to occur.
2 REPRESENTATIVE J. EVANS: Okay.
3 SECRETARY BEARD: We work real hard every
4 day to keep inmates from getting out of our
5 facilities. We see that as our primary mission.
6 And we've done a pretty good job, because that was
7 the first breach escape that we've had since 1999.
8 The biggest thing we have to keep fighting
9 is complacency. It's staff complacency. And, you
10 know, in our business, sometimes things go well for a
11 long period of time and then all of a sudden
12 something bad happens and people have left their
13 guard down.
14 REPRESENTATIVE J. EVANS: Right.
15 SECRETARY BEARD: And it's something we
16 constantly work with with our staff. I mean, they're
17 not bad people. They're like anybody. We all relax
18 when things are going well.
19 And whether it's the military or NASA or
20 whatever, bad things happen when you let your guard
21 down. So that's something that we constantly fight
22 to prevent.
23 And I think some of the changes that we've
24 made there in the policies and the procedures and
25 further assessment of that facility and the new 113
1 superintendent that's there have made some major
2 changes. I think they've dealt constructively with
3 the problems that resulted in that escape, and I
4 think the people up there should feel comfortable
5 that something like that is not likely to occur in
6 the near future.
7 REPRESENTATIVE J. EVANS: Well, thank you
8 for that.
9 SECRETARY BEARD: Certainly.
10 REPRESENTATIVE J. EVANS: And one issue
11 that greatly concerns me is the notification of
12 citizens in a community surrounding a facility, and
13 not only at Albion but at all the SCIs across the
14 State.
15 We had a situation in Albion where this
16 escape occurred over Thanksgiving weekend early on a
17 Sunday morning, if I'm not mistaken. The
18 notification was poor.
19 Not all the fault of the institution, but
20 the fact that it was a Sunday morning, the fact that
21 there's no local news on any of the stations nearby
22 in Erie on a weekend -- radio stations don't have
23 live announcers very much anymore, so it's very
24 difficult to alert the public at that particular time
25 period on a holiday weekend. 114
1 SECRETARY BEARD: Yes.
2 REPRESENTATIVE J. EVANS: Are there other
3 technologies available? Are there other mechanisms
4 that you're exploring to notify people who are
5 potentially at risk in those areas?
6 SECRETARY BEARD: Well, we have two things
7 that we do in all of our institutions.
8 Number one, we do have an escape siren that
9 we can blow at every facility.
10 REPRESENTATIVE J. EVANS: Okay.
11 SECRETARY BEARD: And we test them
12 regularly every day. They're supposed to be tested
13 at noon. So that if we have it, we know it works.
14 REPRESENTATIVE J. EVANS: Okay.
15 SECRETARY BEARD: The second thing is we
16 have a system called RapidNotify. It's a company
17 that we've contracted with, which will dial every
18 telephone number within certain zip codes around our
19 institution very quickly. They have like 200,
20 300 lines that they can quickly dial and send a
21 message out.
22 The only people that wouldn't get those
23 messages would be people with unlisted telephone
24 numbers, unless they opt in. They have to opt in,
25 and we do notify the public about that if they want 115
1 to.
2 The problem we had up there is that the
3 institution did not set the RapidNotify in place as
4 quickly as they should have. You know, it's one of
5 those things where they weren't really sure the
6 inmate was gone. They couldn't believe that he had
7 gotten out. They thought he was hiding somewhere in
8 the facility.
9 So sometimes there has to be that balance,
10 do we want to upset the public when they're not out?
11 Do we want to notify? We've gone back and made it
12 very clear to all of our institutions that if there's
13 any possibility at all, they're to set their systems
14 off.
15 REPRESENTATIVE J. EVANS: Good.
16 SECRETARY BEARD: That might upset some
17 people, but at least people will be notified when we
18 do have the escape. So I think we've rectified that
19 notification problem.
20 REPRESENTATIVE J. EVANS: Well, thank you
21 for that.
22 SECRETARY BEARD: Certainly.
23 REPRESENTATIVE J. EVANS: And my only
24 comment would be that hearing from citizens in the
25 region who initially gave their addresses and numbers 116
1 when the prison opened a little over 12 years ago,
2 those lists were not kept up to date. People had
3 moved in and out. And I think that a constant
4 updating of those numbers and those contacts would
5 be something that would be important to keep track
6 of.
7 SECRETARY BEARD: Well, we certainly will
8 make sure that that occurs.
9 REPRESENTATIVE J. EVANS: Thank you very
10 much.
11 SECRETARY BEARD: Thank you.
12 REPRESENTATIVE J. EVANS: Thank you,
13 Mr. Chairman.
14 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: I would like to
15 thank both of you, one, for what you do for the
16 people of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and all of
17 your staff.
18 I know you have very difficult challenges.
19 We need to work with you to deal with those
20 challenges, and we look forward to working with you
21 through this budget period.
22 We want to thank you again for coming before
23 this committee.
24 SECRETARY BEARD: Thank you for having us.
25 CHAIRMAN McVEY: Thank you. 117
1 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN EVANS: I want to recess
2 for 5 minutes -- we're going to take a break -- and
3 then we'll bring the Judiciary before us.
4 Thank you.
5
6 (The hearing concluded at 11:05 a.m.)
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25 118
1 I hereby certify that the proceedings and
2 evidence are contained fully and accurately in the
3 notes taken by me on the within proceedings and that
4 this is a correct transcript of the same.
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8 ______Jean M. Davis, Reporter 9 Notary Public
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