So far, four Republican lawmakers have filed LSRs (Legislative Service Requests, the first step in drafting a bill) to amend the new parole law next year. Two of these—filed by Sen. Peter Bragdon (R-Milford), one of SB 500’s original sponsors, and Rep. Jennifer Coffey (R-Andover)—specifically call for “excluding persons convicted of violent crimes from early release on probation or parole.”

Today wraps up Front Door Politics’ weeklong series of reports on SB 500, in which we’ve tried to dig deeper than campaign rhetoric in order to understand the full context of this very real public safety issue. We hear a bit from the two men fighting for the governor’s office, and we report on the practices and lessons learned in Ohio, Kansas, and Texas—three states that have already walked down this road.

Candidate John Stephen’s take

Republican gubernatorial candidate John Stephen has criticized the SB 500 for mandating the early, supervised release of prisoners nearing the end of their maximum sentences. Stephen spokesperson Greg Moore says that Stephen has three top concerns that led him to call for the bill’s repeal and to start from scratch:

1) The mandatory early (9-month) release of offenders, particularly violent and sexual offenders, who would otherwise “max out.” These are the worst criminals, he explains, including many who have refused treatment or been bad seeds in prison.

2) Removing the discretion of the Adult Parole Board over parolees who re-offend.

3) A lack of infrastructure support in the community to deal with these new individuals.

“If those issues were addressed,” Moore says, “(Stephen) would want to have a collaborative discussion about corrections policy and moving toward more community supervision.”

Incumbent Gov. John Lynch’s take

Pamela Walsh, a campaign spokesperson for Gov. John Lynch, says that many of the same legislative leaders who helped develop SB 500, which had broad bipartisan support, are now trying to change it.

Walsh says Lynch would work with lawmakers “on any changes that are necessary and helpful.” But she points out that the minority of prisoners who have been targeted as part the campaign debate — any inmate coming within nine months of reaching their maximum sentence — will be released no matter what.

“The question is whether or not we want to have some kind of supervision before they are fully released to the public,” Walsh says. When prisoners are released after having served their maximum sentence, the state has no authority over them, no way to keep track of them, and no way to monitor their progress in the community.

A State-by-State Take

While the N.H. Legislature continues it debate over SB 500, Front Door Politics has spoken with corrections commissioners and lawmakers in other states that have moved forward with similar guidelines. All of these states have enacted or are considering ‘justice reinvestment’ initiatives and were also advised by the Justice Center, which New Hampshire worked with.

In Ohio, it’s specifically the violent criminals and sex offenders for whom supervised release is mandatory, according to Ernie Moore, Director of the Ohio Dept. of Rehabilitation and Correction. Felonies in Ohio are rated on a sliding scale of one to five, with one being the worst, such as murder, and 5 being just above a misdemeanor. “For felony 4 and 5 and nonviolent felony 3,” Moore explains, the post-release supervision is discretionary to the parole board. This has been Ohio’s practice since 1996, the last time major corrections reform was passed there.

Now, lawmakers are looking at ways to make their sentencing and probation practices more consistent throughout the state and use risk assessment tools to make sure they’re assigning the most effective type of supervision or incarceration to each inmate.

Texas did not pursue changes to their sentencing or release guidelines when they took on prison reform in 2007. “We didn’t need it, and I’m not sure we would have gotten the votes for it,” says the self-proclaimed conservative Republican Jerry Madden. He is perhaps the biggest cheerleader of justice reinvestment work in his state, and a leader of criminal justice reform nationwide.

Madden explains that in the Texas parole system, all inmates are eligible for parole (except those sentenced to life without parole). “Some of the violent ones may very well parole at some stage. Sex offenders are less likely, but based on what’s happened in prison, some do get paroled.”

Adopting data-based risk assessment practices were key, he says. Inmates are evaluated when they’re brought into prison, when they leave, and while they’re on probation. The Texas Legislature also established a maximum number of caseloads for parole officers, introduced “progressive sanctioning” to keep people on parole rather than send them back to prison, invested in educational and treatment programs within the prisons, and built out their mental health, drug and specialty courts to reduce the likelihood of minor criminals re-offending.

“Public safety has continued to improve and we have saved the taxpayers money,” Madden says. He points out that every state will handle their corrections policies differently, and encourages each state to “look at your system and do what makes sense.”

In Kansas, post-release supervision has been mandated for decades.

“A planned (release with supervision) is going to be in the best interest of public safety and we think it’s going to have the most positive impact on the chances of that inmate post-release,” says Roger Werholtz, Kansas Secretary of Corrections. “Having someone come straight from prison out to the community with no oversight is in our view probably the least desirable way for someone to exit the prison system.”

Recent justice reinvestment work in Kansas has been a matter of changing the nature of the supervision, Werholtz explains.

“Traditionally, (parole staff) would monitor the offenders and when they screwed up, you sanction them and that usually meant sending them back to prison.” The goal now is to intervene “before they screw up,” Werholtz says. “It’s a lot more work and it requires a whole different skill set for the staff, and it was one that frankly made a lot of people uncomfortable initially, because you never get criticized for sending people back to prison—almost never.”

Werholtz also said it requires patience and a different, more long-term method of calculating success and failure.

“But if an offender screws up and hurts somebody, you know who that victim is. It’s easy to say, ‘Had you not changed your policy, that person would not have been hurt.’

“What we talked about is, ‘Don’t judge us on individual events, because parolees hurt people regardless of the supervision. You need to judge us on the ability to influence the trends and make it less likely for them to hurt somebody.’ Then it puts the pressure on agencies like mine to deliver. And I think you could say, if we were able to hold the re-offense rates at the same level and cut costs, that would be a success. But we were able to reduce both, and I think that’s an even bigger win,” he said.

The score in Kansas: “Back in 2004, we were returning about 203-204 parolees to prison every month. For the most recent fiscal year that ended June 30, that reduced to 90,” Werholtz said.

>> Front Door Politics will return to our regular, shorter Daily Updates on a variety of topics next week, and we’ll keep an eye on developments with Senate Bill 500 as the next legislative season progresses.

This Daily Update was written by Michael McCord, with contributions from Hilary Niles.

This talk centered most recently around an attempt to change the provisions that would require post-release supervision for virtually all inmates. A group of lawmakers tried—and failed—to exclude violent criminals and sex offenders from that parole program, aiming to have them complete their sentences behind bars. An attempt to change the new protocol for parole violations also failed, both of them largely along party lines with Democrats preferring to leave the bill as-is for now. For more details on this part of the story, we recommend the Concord Monitor article “Changes to parole law fail,” published Oct. 14.

Horner wrote a letter to lawmakers earlier this month saying that repeal of SB 500 would be “short sighted.” He said he saw numerous examples in prison of inmates on the verge of release who had served their sentences but were not prepared for life outside prison walls. He maintains the mandatory supervised release program of SB 500 is necessary.

“The prisoners who most need SB 500 are those who have lost everyone and everything while incarcerated,” Horner wrote. “Frequently these men and women burned their bridges by the crime they committed. Often they were running with the wrong crowd or dealing with addiction or mental illness prior to their incarceration. Their release back into the community is fraught with danger. Without the guidance of a watchful parole officer, their chances to succeed are slim.”

Horner told Front Door Politics he believes that if you get past the “demagoguery” about being tough on crime, “you will see that (SB 500) is one of the most well-studied and thoughtful laws” made in New Hampshire. It has the potential, Horner believes, to save money on corrections costs while providing a better way to reduce recidivism and help prisoners make the transition to outside housing, employment and stability.

Horner said he was helped in his transition from prison life with the support of family of friends.

“Do you want to just dump them on the street? These prisoners are going to be released back into the community one way or another,” Horner said. “The program gives them nine months lead time to transition … It gives them an opportunity to succeed.”

>> Four pieces of legislation to amend Senate Bill 500 have already been drafted for the next legislative session, which starts in January. We’ll wrap up this week’s coverage of the new parole law tomorrow by looking forward to the new law’s future.

This Daily Update was written by Michael McCord, with contributions from Hilary Niles.

>> Horner’s full letter to newspapers and to lawmakers in Concord follows:

There has been much said about the Republicans’ effort to repeal SB 500, the new law that gives every inmate a period on parole with supervision and help in rejoining society. Repeal is a bad idea. Here’s why:

I spent eight years in the New Hampshire State Prison. I have been on parole for 2 ½ years now. Reentry into the community has been hard, but I had a wife and supportive friends and family on the outside to help in the process. The prisoners who most need SB 500 are those who have lost everyone and everything while incarcerated. Frequently these men and women burned their bridges by the crime they committed. Often they were running with the wrong crowd or dealing with addiction or mental illness prior to their incarceration. Their release back into the community is fraught with danger. Without the guidance of a watchful parole officer, their chances to succeed are slim. Repealing SB500 to appear “tough on crime” is short-sighted and contrary to the best interests of the State of New Hampshire.

Let me tell you a true story. I met a man in prison. I will not tell you his name because he could be easily located through the sex offender registry.

He was in his 50’s at the time. He had been convicted of incest. One of the requirements for his parole was the successful completion of the prison’s sex offender program. But, he has Asperger’s Syndrome. He keeps to himself, will not make eye contact, and finds interpersonal communication difficult. He flunked out of the sex offender program and was denied parole.

The problem was; he didn’t know how long he had to serve. One day, after more than 15 years in prison, he was called to the unit counselor’s office and told that he was maxing out in one week. It was January. He had no one on the outside. He had no skills. He had no plans. He had no place to stay. The local homeless shelter would not take him because he was a sex offender. I heard through the grapevine that the unit counselor drove him to a boarding house and paid his first week’s rent.

Is this really how the State of New Hampshire wants to handle such cases? Is this wise, or even safe? SB 500 assures that people like this will get released into the community gradually under supervision and will be helped to find appropriate housing and employment. Everyone benefits. Please, whoever you vote for in November, tell them you want to keep SB 500.

Philip Horner

Parole laws aren’t just changing in New Hampshire. Senate Bill 500 is part of a national trend toward “justice reinvestment.”

“New Hampshire joins a lot of states in ensuring there is some form of post-release supervision,” says Michael Thompson, director of the Council of State Governments’ Justice Center, which provided research assistance to the New Hampshire team that crafted SB 500. The Justice Center has advised at least 13 other states, to date, on similar initiatives to address growing incarceration rates—and costs—that don’t seem to be improving public safety.

Thompson clarifies the meaning of post-release supervision: “That’s not early release, which suggests that someone is done with their sentence. Post-release supervision is the person in the system. In this case, intensively.”

Thompson say’s he’s fascinated when inmates talk about not wanting to be released to supervision. “They’d rather max out,” he says. “Isn’t that telling? They want to be done with this stuff. They want to do their time—of course they do. It’s hard to be supervised in the community. That’s why they’re mandating it.”

Remember “truth in sentencing?”

That was the trend before justice reinvestment. Federal grants were created to help states pay for new prison construction. Those new prison beds were needed because states were getting tougher on crime, including drug offenses, and truth in sentencing laws (which states had to enact in order to qualify for federal funding) meant convicts were serving a higher percentage of their sentences behind bars.

The focus was on confinement.

Today in the U.S., over 2 million people are in prison—more than 1 in 100 American adults, according to an Oct. 8 speech by U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder in Washington, D.C. “One in 28 children has a parent behind bars,” he said.

Only about 5 percent of the prison population stays behind bars, Holder said. At some point or another, the remaining 1,900,000 inmates get out.

Now, the focus has turned to “re-entry.”

The truth in sentencing federal grants ended in 2001 after awarding $2.7 billion to states since 1996. A fraction of that cost, but significant, is the $100 million in grants the Dept. of Justice awarded this year through the Second Chance Act, which then-President George Bush signed into law in April 2008.

The grants go to government agencies and nonprofits that provide services like “employment assistance, substance abuse treatment, housing, family programming, mentoring, and others—that can help reduce recidivism,” Holder said.

Second Chance funds also support the work of the Justice Center.

“These people are getting released no matter what,” says the Justice Center’s Thompson. “And nobody likes that fact, but it is what it is. We can let them drop off the radar, or …” Thompson feels safer helping them transition.

>> Front Door Politics will continue our reporting on Senate Bill 500 the remainder of the week with more perspectives, more context, and more fact-checking.

This Daily Update was written by Hilary Niles.

Accusations in press releases, television advertising, and direct mail to New Hampshire citizens has put the spotlight on Senate Bill 500—criminal justice reform legislation that passed with resounding support last spring and suddenly lost many supporters this election season. After yesterday’s Primer on SB 500, our weeklong series on the bill now turns to fact-checking.

Today, we investigate the television ad “What are John Lynch’s priorities?” It was released by the group Americans for Prosperity on Sept. 30 and ran for five days. Though not mentioned, the ad is a thinly veiled reference to SB 500.

The ad’s script is in bold and in quotes. Our fact-check follows each section.

“Budgeting is about setting priorities and cutting wasteful spending, not public safety. John Lynch’s Priorities? Urging lawmakers to pass a bill mandating early parole for prisoners—violent criminals including sexual predators.”

As noted in yesterday’s Daily Update, this change in the parole and probation laws of the state had broad bipartisan support in the House and Senate. It’s not known how much if any political “urging” of lawmakers Lynch had to do. The study that resulted in the bill was commissioned by Lynch along with then-Attorney General Kelly Ayotte and then-Supreme Court Chief Justice John Broderick, along with House and Senate leaders. The bill itself was co-sponsored by leading Republican and Democratic members of both chambers (see the list of sponsors), below).

Senate Bill 500, which passed last year and is now in effect, mandates that:

• non-violent offenders serve 120 percent of their minimum sentence before being released to parole
• all prisoners be released to parole for nine months before the end of their maximum sentence

This law applies to all inmates, including sex offenders, but not to those sex offenders being considered for involuntary commitment. If a sex offender in the end is not committed involuntarily, then “he or she shall be released on parole for the remainder of his or her sentence.”

“Today sexual predators are being released into New Hampshire communities.”

Technically, this is true. It’s also true that sexual predators were released into New Hampshire communities “yesterday,” or pre-SB 500. The difference is in the percentage of a sentence prisoners serve behind bars and the amount of supervision those prisoners get as they transition back into public society.

Before SB 500 changed New Hampshire’s parole laws, any sexually violent offender who completed his or her maximum sentence behind bars was directly released into the public without any supervised transition. Under the new guidelines, these inmates are released to society with a minimum of nine months parole supervision.

“Lynch says New Hampshire is ‘safer.’ Safer? Why would John Lynch sign a law giving sexual predators and violent criminals early parole?”

New Hampshire is a relatively safe state already—its crime rate is low compared to the national average and has remained stable from 1999 to 2009. But if there is any level of crime, a society can always be safer. Supporters of SB 500 maintain that supervised transition back into society, rather than direct release from prison or inconsistent periods of supervision, will improve safety.

In addition to the new parole guidelines, SB 500 requires investing in expanded drug treatment and mental health services programs “to ensure that probationers and parolees can have access to treatment that can reduce their likelihood to reoffend.” The funding for these investments would come from the money saved by having fewer people in prison.

The legislation also introduces a risk assessment process for every person placed on probation or parole. Felons and those convicted of misdemeanors, alike, will be gauged as low, medium or high-risk. The bill states that community-based supervision will be focused on high-risk individuals.

An “intermediate sanction program” is also introduced with SB 500. The bill defines this as “a community-based day or residential program that is designed for use as a swift and certain sanction for a parole violation,” rather than outright revoking someone’s parole.

“Call John Lynch. Tell him to balance the budget without raising taxes, or compromising public safety. Americans for Prosperity is responsible for the content of this advertising.”

According to its website, Americans for Prosperity is “an organization of “grassroots leaders who engage citizens in the name of limited government and free markets on the local, state and federal levels.” They include “restoring fairness to our judicial system” in their express goals to support.

According to a recent article in Forbes, the organization derives much of its support from oil billionaire David Koch, does not disclose its donors and targets almost exclusively Democratic candidates.

The Justice Center of the Council of State Governments, which the New Hampshire lawmakers mentioned above sought out for assistance with prison reform strategies, has worked with 13 other states to date on similar initiatives. Their reports indicate a wide that a range of policies and practices are explored and adopted from state to state.

Front Door Politics has been speaking with some criminal justice leaders in those states, and will report tomorrow on how these initiatives are playing out for our neighbors.

This Daily Update was written by Michael McCord, with contributions from Hilary Niles.

SB 500 Sponsors:

Senate President Sylvia Larsen (D-Concord)
Sen. Robert Letourneau (R-Derry)
Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-Exeter)
Sen. Peter Bragdon (R-Milford)
Sen. Deb Reynolds (D-Plymouth)
House Speaker Terie Norelli (D-Portsmouth)
Rep. David Welch (R-Kingston)
Rep. Stephen Shurtleff (D-Penacook)
Rep. Neal Kurk (R-Weare)

Signed into law on July 1 by Gov. John Lynch, the bill—and the people who stand behind it—have come under fire in the recent weeks of heated campaigning before next week’s mid-term elections.

This week, Front Door Politics digs into the story of SB 500 to separate the truth from the campaign “mud” and figure out what it really means for New Hampshire.

We start today with the legislation’s background to get anyone up to speed who didn’t follow the genesis of the law last year. (The background is what makes today’s controversy about SB 500 so surprising.) We’ll continue our weeklong series with fact-checking of campaign ads and national context from other states that have implemented similar measures. We’ll also talk with the candidates, and get citizen perspectives, too.

Now, the background:

Changing parole guidelines, as Senate Bill 500 does, and shifting more attention and money to community supervision of inmates started with this finding: Though New Hampshire has had a relatively low rate and stable rate of violent crime over the past decade, the state’s prisoner population has increased 31 percent, recidivism rates are at 57 percent and corrections costs have doubled from $52 million to $104 million.

As reported last year by Front Door Politics, SB 500 came into being after an eight-month study process that included the creation of “a Justice Reinvestment Leadership Team, including Attorney General Michael Delaney, Chief Justice John Broderick Jr., corrections officials and lawmakers.” This group got extensive research from the Justice Center of the Council of State Governments, a nonpartisan forum for all three branches of state-level government. The research included examples of corrections reform in other states, including Texas, Connecticut, Vermont and Rhode Island.

In practice, SB 500 created new parole and probation guidelines that vary depending on the nature of a crime, an inmate’s history of recidivism, and his or her behavior in prison. It’s important to notice the difference between “may” (being optional) and “shall” (being mandated) in how these guidelines are to be followed. The three categories of protocol are below, and Front Door Politics will continue to explain what this legal-speak means in our reporting this week.

(a) A prisoner may be released on parole upon the expiration of the minimum term of his or her sentence.

(b) A prisoner convicted of a nonviolent offense shall be released on parole upon serving 120 percent of the minimum term of his or her sentence.

(c) All prisoners who have not been previously paroled, or who were recommitted to prison more than one year prior to the expiration of the maximum term of his or her sentence, shall be released on parole at least 9 months prior to the expiration of the maximum term of his or her sentence. This provision shall not apply to any prisoner who is the subject of a pending petition for civil commitment pursuant to RSA 135-E [this means involuntary commitment of sexually violent predators]. In the event that the prisoner is not civilly committed, he or she shall be released on parole for the remainder of his or her sentence.

It is section C, above, that seems to have sparked political controversy. The campaign of Republican gubernatorial candidate John Stephen and at least three political action groups have criticized SB 500 for endangering public safety by mandating early release of eligible inmates, particularly of sex offenders.

The bill’s supporters maintain the merits of the supervision that goes along with that early release. This is where SB 500’s “active supervision” standards for parole and probation come in:

II. Any person placed on probation for a misdemeanor shall be subject to active supervision for up to the first 9 months and thereafter be placed on administrative supervision unless the probationer has been designated high risk or has been adjudicated by the court for a violation of the conditions of probation during the first 9 months under supervision.

III. Any person placed on probation for a felony shall be subject to active supervision for up to the first 12 months and thereafter be placed on administrative supervision unless the probationer has been designated high risk or has been adjudicated by the court for a violation of the conditions of probation during the first 12 months under supervision.

IV. Any person placed on parole for a felony shall be subject to active supervision for up to the first 18 months and thereafter be placed on administrative supervision unless the parolee has been designated high risk or has violated the conditions of parole during the first 18 months under supervision.

On Sept. 30, Senate President Sylvia Larsen (D-Concord) said, “It is critically important to provide a high level of supervision for our worst offenders when they are released back into the community. Senate Bill 500 ensures those offenders get at least nine months of supervision. Under the present system, we cannot track most offenders’ whereabouts after their prison sentence is up.”

The bill’s supporters say that by releasing inmates to supervision before their maximum term is served, the state can save money on incarceration and in turn “reinvest” that into community-based treatment programs, which can help make the transition from prison to society more successful.

“The lack of community treatment options is reflected in our excessive recidivism rate,” Larsen said.

The state parole board opposed SB 500’s changes, saying they decreased the board’s case-by-case flexibility. But the process by which the bill was created was hailed at the time by co-sponsors such as Sen. Peter Bragdon (R-Milford). He said in March before voting for the final bill, “It was a great commitment, bipartisan, and I think it’s resulted in a great bill and I’d just like to thank them for their time.”

Bragdon has since called of repeal of at one least one of the bill’s measures—the mandatory release into active supervision of all prisoners nine months before their sentence maximum has been reached.

>> If you’re concerned by or confused about what SB 500 might mean for you, let us know. We’ll do our best to address your questions in our SB 500 series this week, and in our continued coverage of justice issues in New Hampshire.

This Daily Update was written by Michael McCord, with contributions from Hilary Niles.

The House and Senate teams working on the budget agreed on how to fix $270 million of a nearly $300 million shortfall, but neither is budging on the final $30 million. Gov. John Lynch has said he’ll keep lawmakers working until the job is done.

Lynch has also said he’ll refuse to sign any legislation that calls for expanded gambling before regulations are in place to manage it. The Senate has taken a very strong stance in support of new gaming ventures this session, while the House has voted it down three times.

Budget aside, there’s still more at stake on Wednesday, with final votes due on more than 60 bills that went to Committees of Conference two weeks ago to find a compromise between House and Senate positions.

In the meantime, several bills relating to health insurance, family law and the criminal justice system have already made it through the Committee of Conference process and await Lynch’s signature.

health insurance
Health insurance providers will have to include both hearing aids and certain autism treatments in their coverage plans, thanks to House Bills 561 and 569. They were sponsored by Rep. Susan Emerson (R-Rindge) and Rep. Suzanne Butcher (D-Keene), respectively.

Mandated coverage requirements like these apply to Health Maintenance Organizations and Health Service Corporations, but not to any self-funded health insurance policies, such as those the state operates for its own employees. Therefore, the state would not necessarily take on any increased costs if these bills become law.

But some skeptics still have concerns.

Rep. Neal Kurk (R-Weare) spoke during a brief floor debate on the hearing aid bill.

“In the past, even though by law (mandates like these) don’t need to apply, they get adopted,” he said.
Kurk and Rep. Sherman Packard (R-Londonderry) both questioned how much these requirements would cost the state in that case, and Packard also asked how much they will cost policyholders whose plans will be subject to the mandates.

The answer: up to $17 per year per policy for the hearing aids, according to Rep. Edward Butler (D-Harts Location). He delivered both bills’ Committee of Conference reports to the House. The potential increase to premiums under the bill mandating autism treatments would be a bit lower, at $9 to $10 per member per year, according to Rep. Susi Nord (D-Candia), who assisted Butler with the reporting.

Dollar limits to the autism benefits were added by the Senate and ultimately agreed to in the Committee of Conference. These helped keep the projected premium increases down to about .2 percent, Nord said, as opposed to a potential .4 percent increase.

“It’s minimal to the amount of benefit for families who are paying the premiums but not getting the benefits for their children,” she argued. Butler also maintained that the benefits could ultimately save schools and communities millions of dollars because children with autism would get more health care from insurance.

Nord said an independent study suggested 300 to 350 families would benefit from the mandate, which includes a treatment approach called “applied behavioral analysis.” The practice is said to produce significant improvements in functionality with life skills, communication and socialization. Prescriptions and counseling, as well as speech, occupational or physical therapy, would also be required under HB 569.

family law
Divorced parents will no longer have to go to court to recalculate child support when one child in the family turns 18, provided Gov. Lynch signs House Bill 1420. Sponsored by Rep. David Bickford (R-New Durham), the new law will allow child support to be automatically recalculated for remaining children when an older child becomes an adult.

“(It) keeps people from having to go to court as much and takes some of the burden off the courts,” Bickford said.

The House and Senate also have voted in a new task force on work and family. Proposed in House Bill 1271 and sponsored by Rep. Mary Gile (D-Concord), this will replace a similar task force that was created in 2007. The new 29-member body will try to identify ways the state can help citizens attend to both work and family in a productive way.

The task force will hold a series of public hearings throughout the state to get feedback on the issue from workers and employers, as well as state agencies and interested organizations.

The task force will also collect data on employers’ family-related policies and practices, develop an incentive-based program to reward employers for offering family-friendly benefits, and offer public education on how such policies can help the state’s economy prosper.

criminal justice
The Justice Reinvestment Initiative that passed the Legislature this spring has potential to bring comprehensive changes to criminal justice codes. It aims to simultaneously lower recidivism rates and save the state money by reducing jail time and increasing community supervision for nonviolent criminals. Senate Bill 500, sponsored by Senate President Sylvia Larsen (D-Concord), benefited from wide support in both the House and Senate.

The Parole Board, however, expressed grave concerns about public safety if current practices change. According to John Eckert, executive assistant to the Parole Board, who spoke out against SB 500, it would be a mistake to grant parole according to a formula. He says the Parole Board should instead be allowed to exercise judgment regarding whether or not an offender is safe to release.

The Parole Board itself will be the subject of a special study created by House Bill 1167. Sponsored by Rep. Laura Pantelakos (D-Portsmouth), the committee will compare New Hampshire’s Parole Board to those of other states to gauge its effectiveness. They’ll look particularly at the board’s make-up and procedures for hearings, with a report due in November.

If Senate Bill 500 passes, nonviolent criminals would be released to community supervision after serving 120 percent of their minimum prison sentences. All prisoners would be paroled at least nine months before their maximum sentence expires. And parole violators would face 90 days back in jail in a special program designed to re-engage them in their parole plans.

Supporters say the shift in corrections could save the state money and help reduce recidivism at the same time. The Parole Board, however, fears for public safety if their authority is usurped.

Senate President Sylvia Larsen (D-Concord) sponsored the bill, along with eight other state senators and representatives from both parties. After passing the Senate last week, it received a public hearing in the House Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee April 1 and is expected to get a vote in the House sometime this month.

Justice Reinvestment Initiative

SB 500 was developed with help from the Council of State Governments’ Justice Center (www.justicereinvestment.org). The CSG is a nonpartisan forum for all three branches of state-level government, and the Justice Center is a data-driven research and policy development program.

What that means, in this case, is that the state of New Hampshire assembled a Justice Reinvestment Leadership Team, including Attorney General Michael Delaney, Chief Justice John Broderick Jr., corrections officials and lawmakers. They’ve spent eight months working with the Justice Center to figure out how the state’s corrections costs could be lowered while keeping the public safe.

According to the team, New Hampshire’s crime rate has stayed low, but the prison population has grown by 31 percent and the corrections budget has nearly doubled in the last 10 years.

They say this is mainly because inmates released on parole or probation cycle back into prison for failure to get treatment for substance abuse or mental illness. As many as 59 percent of parolees who return to prison have committed no new offenses, Larsen says. They go back to prison simply for parole violations.

That’s a good thing, according to John Eckert, executive assistant to the Parole Board, who’s recently spoken out against SB 500 on behalf of board. He disputes claims that parolees are re-incarcerated for minor violations like showing up late to a meeting, and says they’re returned to prison as a last resort.

“Consider this,” Eckert says. “Maybe by bringing people back before they commit new crimes, we prevent crimes from being committed.” After all, he says, a heroin addict who refuses treatment time and again will likely turn to crime to support his habit.

“The lack of community treatment options is reflected in our excessive recidivism rate,” says Larsen. By releasing inmates before their maximum term is served, the state can save money on incarceration and in turn “reinvest” that into community-based treatment programs. The hope is that more supports and supervision for the transition back into society will help make that transition more successful.

But it’s not just about hope, according to Michael Thompson, director of the Justice Center. He says they’ve already found ways for states—including Texas, Connecticut, Vermont and Rhode Island—to save money and make communities safer. The only other option is to build more prisons to accommodate the growing prison populations, Thompson says.

Minimum Sentencing

“Corrections has become an anchor dragging the entire state down,” says Rep. Daniel Eaton (D-Stoddard). He is a former police chief and gun seller who is now vice-chair of the House Finance Committee (Division II). “Modeling on this has worked in Texas,” a state that’s known for its hard line on criminal offenders, he points out. “If they’re letting these people out in Texas, what the hell are we keeping them for?”

A move toward mandatory minimum sentencing is one reason. It was a nationwide trend in the 1980s (think “three strikes” laws), and one that Eaton got behind.

“Thirty years ago, judges were letting people out so early it made a mockery of the system,” he says. The mandatory minimum sentencing laws were intended to tighten up accountability, according to Eaton, but ended up swinging to an unintended extreme. He sees SB 500 as a way to restore balance and finally achieve what he and other lawmakers tried to accomplish years ago.

Further Study of Parole Board

A separate bill to study the parole board is also in the pipeline. Sponsored by Rep. Laura Pantelakos (D-Portsmouth), House Bill 1167 would establish a committee to compare the functioning of New Hampshire’s parole boards to those in other states. It passed the House, and a public hearing in the Senate is not yet scheduled.

“I’m not happy with the way the parole board works,” says Pantelakos. She says the volunteer members do an “excellent” job, but she wants to compare New Hampshire’s parole structure to that of other states to see what improvements can be made.

As for the board’s resistance to SB 500, she thinks it’s “sour grapes” about losing their authority.

So does Eaton. “I give no credibility to anything that comes out of the parole board,” he says. He calls their record “abysmal” and conjectures that any resistance to SB 500 stems from an unwillingness to give up their power.

© 2008-2010 Niles Media “Front Door Politics” all rights reserved.

A Committee of Conference has pieced together a compromise $3.2 billion general fund plan for the next two years, starting July 1.  These select members of the House and Senate reached the required unanimous approval for their report, but nothing guarantees their colleagues will go along with it. The full House and Senate are scheduled to vote on the budget—and dozens of other Committee of Conference reports—on Wednesday, June 24.

Meanwhile, a new lawsuit filed on the final day of budget negotiations seeks an injunction that would keep the Legislature’s hands off a critical $110 million it has claimed.  Gov. John Lynch and legislators plan to tap surplus funds from the NH Medical Malpractice Joint Underwriting Association. But over 200 JUA policyholders (healthcare providers and facilities) say the insurance money is rightfully theirs.

If the Belknap County Superior Court were to grant the injunction before the budget passes, the lost funding would send budget writers back to the drawing board.  That’s also where they could end up if either the House or Senate vote down the Committee of Conference report next week.

Shaping Up

More contentious than how to spend money in this debate has been how to raise it.  The Senate’s casino-style video slot machines were shot down by the House, which in turn lost its bet on the “gas tax,” and new levies on capital gains and estates.  A new tax on refinanced mortgages was also killed late in the game, and proposed suspension of the Business Enterprise Tax credit was defeated.  The NH Business and Industry Association claims a notch on its scorecard for the latter.

But the BIA is still licking a wound from a “mystery” amendment that it says amounts to double taxation.  This development, which was not revealed to the public in advance, passed the committee easily and is expected to bring in at least $15 million in new taxes from the state’s Limited Liability Companies.  According to Dept. of Revenue Administration Commissioner Kevin Clougherty, it merely closes a loophole that lets LLC owners off the hook for a 5 percent interest and dividends tax paid by other businesses.

Major spending cuts also helped close the $190 million budget shortfall. Some of what fell was a surprise to the NH Hospital Association.  Funding was lowered for medical education, which, coupled with the resulting loss of matching federal funds, will result in a $5.4 million hit for four teaching hospitals.  Another $6 million came from limiting Medicaid caseload growth to 1 percent.

More cuts will come from state employees.  The Legislature is not empowered to issue furloughs on its own, so Gov. Lynch will have to do that work, instead.  In addition to the 200 layoffs already approved, Lynch is now directed to negotiate layoffs and/or furloughs totaling $25 million with the State Employees Association and other unions.

The state will also scale back its contributions to municipal employee retirement accounts, from 35 to 25 percent in two years.  Those workers won’t lose money, but the contribution responsibility will shift to towns.

The Rooms and Meals Tax has also been bumped up from 8 to 9 percent, affecting customer tabs at restaurants, hotels, and now campgrounds. A similar style tax was proposed for all entertainment purchases, such as concerts, but that measure failed.  A new 10 percent tax on gambling winnings did make it through, along with a 45-cent tax increase on cigarettes.  Car and boat registration fees will double under the new plan, but toll increases stalled.  The committee also approved the sale of liquor at eight grocery stores in the state.

It wasn’t nickels and dimes that really balanced this budget, however.  A last-minute revision to expected tax revenue eliminated no less than $75 million in the budget shortfall.  And a move to bond $87 million in school funding took that much out of the operating budget, for a cost of $14 million in debt service per year.

Shaking Down

All in all, the $3.2 billion general fund is only about a third of the overall state budget.  With money from the federal government, education trust fund, highway fund and other sources, New Hampshire’s tab will come to about $11.6 billion in the next two years, combined.  Since those other sources are mostly dedicated funds for pre-determined spending, it’s the General Fund that gets the most attention.

The lion’s share of General Fund spending—nearly half—goes through the Dept. of Health and Human Services. General government costs follow at about one-fifth, with education and justice expenditures not far behind. The committee’s compromise budget includes a change that allows the Dept. of Corrections to implement a program designed to reduce criminal recidivism, thereby lowering inmate numbers and reducing personnel needs. Plans are already underway to close the state prison in Laconia.

A proposed 850-student cap on public charter schools has also been repealed, thanks to restoration of $6.6 million in aid to those schools.  The two-year moratorium on approving new charter schools remains in place, and state officials have been directed to investigate how future cuts in state aid to charter schools may affect New Hampshire’s standing with the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

New Hampshire’s Constitution requires a balanced budget. There’s no law, however, against using old numbers if you can’t figure out new ones.  If the conference committee’s budget fails, the Legislature would work off of the current (2008-09) biennial budget until a new compromise is reached.

The Senate will vote first on Wednesday, but opposition there remains strong among Republicans. This numbers game could last into summer.

Should the state lower spending, or start bringing in new money to balance the budget?
Share your thoughts below.

And remember, our online learning center and a complete list of proposed laws for 2009 is available here at Front Door Politics: from the State House to your house.