Our View

Our View

The value of ‘free’ felon labor

Utilizing non-violent and low risk felons for governmental services is certainly nothing new, and most of us have seen clean-up crews outfitted in their familiar orange or blue jump suits assigned to city, county and state agencies for such chores as picking up trash along the highways, cleaning public offices, maintaining public parks and even washing government vehicles.

Let’s face it, while convicted felons volunteering for such menial public chores are rewarded with reduced sentences, there is virtually no value toward getting these people back on track in dealing with their individual issues and family situations or preparing them to become self-sufficient and law-abiding.

The benefactor to such “free” public service are the cities, counties, public entities that take advantage of this program in Arkansas, which by the way, is commonplace in most every other state. After all, utilizing these so-called “work release” inmates allows these governmental agencies from having to use paid employees to do the chores. In theory, the taxpayers should also benefit from this age-old practice.

Now then, with this new approach to coping with recidivism rates, prison overcrowding and developing programs aimed at preparing soon-to-be released inmates for self-sufficiency and independence we are hearing about some very untraditional programs being considered. Even the larger municipalities in Arkansas are picking up on this new trend in dealing with the wayward souls among us.

For instance, the city of Little Rock has recently created three new mowing and maintenance crews made up solely of participants in its re-entry program.

It was interesting to learn that since October of last year, 367 city residents have enrolled in the Little Rock program. The city has hired 37 of its re-entry program graduates for positions at various departments, including the police and fire departments, the zoo, the Human Resources Department and even the city’s finance department.

The whole concept of the city’s program is based on the age-old idea of helping former offenders prepare for re-entry into society and to succeed in getting their lives back on track.

Little Rock leaders are of the opinion that by giving these individuals a second change the city gets the opportunity to grow a more skilled workforce.

The way the program works is the city provides employment training opportunities to nonviolent Little Rock citizens with criminal histories. Criminal convictions can range from misdemeanors to felonies, and incarceration is not a requirement.

The whole idea of this program as well as what state department of corrections officials are attempting to address is the more than two-thirds of state prisoners being re-arrested within three years of their release.

This in turn results in a high rate of recidivism, more crime, more victims and more pressure on an already overburdened criminal justice system.

In theory, employment training has become a crucial part of rehabilitation which leads to these individuals being able to obtain a good and stable job.

With all that is being done to reinvent the wheel, we’ll be interested to see if the financial investment with the city’s tax dollars and the man-hours spent in training pays off and the percentage of those individuals who fail to live up to the expectations.