 This is house corrections and institutions. We're now shifting gears to our work for the scheduled work that we had today. One piece that we're going to start working on today is going through what parole is parole 101 is what I'm calling it and working with the board, the parole board for the committee parole is on the reentry piece. Someone's incarcerated sentence. We've talked about probation we talked about furlough we talked about parole and I know there's always confusion between those statuses. Probations on the front end probation comes from the courts. Furlough comes from corrections they're serving an incarcerated term they've reached their minimum they could qualify for furlough. It's under the control of doc. They could qualify for parole parole is under the control of the parole board. So furlough and parole are for folks re entering from an incarcerated setting. So I thought it would be really good to bring in the chair of the parole board in the executive in the director of the parole board as well. We'll go through what the parole board does its structure and how it approaches parole, what's involved in parole, and when someone is eligible for parole, when the hearings are. So that's my goal today for the parole issue. Later on, we're going to shift gears to s 45, which deals with probation, which is something completely different. The parole under our belt, it will help us understand probation. So we have with us the chair of the board Dean George and for folks who don't know Jane Dean welcome. And Dean is a former member of the house. Dean was here as a member from Middlebury. And I can't remember when that was was it nearly a long time ago. It was in 2001. Thanks. And prior to that Dean was a state police officer. So he's retired state police trooper. And I want to welcome you Dean it's really good to see you it's always a pleasure to have you in committee. We have new committee members this time around. So we're really starting from ground zero. So I'll turn it over to you as well as Mary James worth who is the director of the parole board. Thank you very much. It's good to see everybody. And before you continue just a minute there is a document on our web page. Good as well. So Mary Jane put together, I think a really good outline in fact we're going to review it at our staff meeting coming up later this month so it really kind of encapsulates everything that's going on and talks a little bit about some of the changes that have had to take place this year. And which I think are important to sort of highlight. As we've mentioned before, and as you've asked madam chair I'll just quickly review the process at the board use one. And if you look at the hearings section of that right after the listing of the members. The types of hearings at the board conducts parole hearings are hearings for folks that are eligible for parole. Sometimes it's at their minimums. Sometimes it's beyond their minimums if they were not granted parole at their minimums, which can happen a number of different ways the the board reviews each case that is not someone who is not on parole annually thanks to the changes in the justice bill last year we wanted to clean that up because some offenders were being seen every two years and someone and some were seen once every two years and then couldn't be seen again for two and so it was very confusing and now the statute allows for a review of every case that's not on parole once a year. So we've taken an extra step this past year, as it looks at the review which is a written parole report that gets submitted annually for someone not on parole. If we take a look at the report and there doesn't seem to be any reason why we should not be having a hearing, then we would request the OC to schedule that person for a hearing where in the past we would just kind of look at the record review, and we would just go on from there. So in some cases where someone looks like either doing well they're on track. There seem to be no reason why we shouldn't see them then we would request to see them. So that process has helped us this year. We have our presumptive parole reviews and know your committee has worked a lot on that bill and so we're just getting underway with that. We have a pretty good process that's in place for it so that for any case that is eligible for presumptive parole, the information gets forwarded to the board and we plug it into our schedule for whichever site that particular offender comes from so we would hear them during that month. We're not having the hearing but we review the case if there are no victim issues and the parole board completes the parole document and sets the conditions for that person's release and moves on from it so there's no hearing conducted. If there are victim issues then the board would immediately schedule a hearing for that person and invite the victims to participate as we do when there are victims of record that want to participate in the hearing. We haven't had a lot of those cases yet I think MJ and her note on there said we've had five thus far. I expect that number to continue to grow. In our work with corrections we've we've taken a hard look at the number of cases that are going out on furlough and they are beginning to try to reduce that number of furlough cases. And begin recommending those people for parole hearing so we're starting to see more offenders coming before us while they're incarcerated, not on furlough, which I think is the goal of part of this process. Beyond record reviews the board also conducts a parole violation someone who's on parole who violates conditions of their parole and is charged with violating their parole agreement by their parole officer is entitled to a parole violation hearing which has due process portions of it where they are represented by attorneys if they choose to be and one is provided for them by the prison's rights office. And the Department of Corrections sometimes uses attorneys from the Attorney General's office to help them with their case and the board would conduct the violation hearing way the evidence that present that's presented to them make decisions on that and then ultimately, if there are violations of conditions decide whether to continue the person on parole, revoke their parole, or give them some incarcerative sanction or change their conditions for parole to allow them to hopefully continue on parole successfully. One of the things we're seeing more of this year are parole violations which have become very challenging in many respects, because the criminal courts are are so backlogged and nothing is moving forward in terms of trials and so forth. Offenders who are on parole who have committed no offenses are coming before us and in many cases and yesterday was a good example we had one in St. Almond's that lasted between two and three hours because we're literally having many trials of this case. The offender has no timeline yet when their case is going to be seen in the criminal courts, so we're dealing with that upfront as opposed to in the past. Many times we would hold off on our hearings until the courts decide what they're going to do with the new criminal charges. So this is, this is creating some problems because those cases are typically confronted by the defense attorneys there are a number of witnesses that are coming in. And that challenges to the evidence and so forth so those cases are are being more challenging for us and take a lot more time. Reprimand hearings, this is an option that we have provided to parole officers if they have a violation of parole which they think is fairly minor and they can continue this person on parole without any need to go through the due process violation hearing. And they can recommend to us a reprimand hearing where we would hear the case and decide yes that's suitable to be handled as a reprimand. And they would continue on parole and hopefully not have any other issues, or the board could determine in its review of the reprimand that this really needs to go forward as a violation. And then send it back for a violation hearing before discussing it with the offender and they would then meet with their attorney and it would be scheduled the following month. For the most part I think the vast majority I can't think of too many cases where those come before us where they are simply handle as a reprimand and and we move on. Early termination of parole. These are cases where we get recommendations from the Department of Corrections so we have set out some guidelines. The Department has the authority to terminate someone's parole agreement and release them from that sentence. And we do a number of these cases every month I think we had somewhere near 90 of those last year. And we have changed our policy on that one of the small concerns that we are experiencing this year is because of the good time section of the new law. We're experiencing good time while they're incarcerated and on furlough and in some cases there, we're finding that offenders are reluctant to go on parole because they lose that good time earning ability. We're pretty careful to explain to them that, you know, they could be eligible for early release if they are successful on parole, and we have a number of examples of that for them so that they would still have that potential for parole if they're not early. Maybe less guaranteed but if they're successful on parole then we certainly entertain those and conduct those on a regular basis. Condition modifications if someone's on parole and the parole officer feels that there needs to be a change in their conditions for parole they can request a hearing to consider changing the parole conditions. That's to remove certain conditions because they no longer apply to the individual, or if they're having some struggles with them, maybe a curfew issue or something like that. Then we can hear the case and make a decision whether or not to amend their parole agreement and change those conditions. We don't have very many of those and I think part of that is because we're pretty careful about assigning conditions based on the individual's risk and based on their offenses and for the most part that works out pretty well. We did revise our conditions again this year we worked with the Department of Corrections and part of the goal was to have the conditions for furlough become more like the conditions for parole so that when we put someone on parole versus furlough there wouldn't be a difference in how they're being supervised. Hence more opportunities for people to get on parole rather than be on furlough which is the goal. And so we put those in effect, first of February and that's been, that's been working out well. So in terms of hearings we're seeing fewer and fewer of those we I think we only had three or four of them last year to provide as community sentence hearings where the court essentially put someone in a parole status called SCS status and then what happens beyond that is up to the board when they reach their minimum, if there are no issues, typically they get terminated from that agreement and they're, they're done with that scent. And finally, those were sort of created around the border part of the state where people were traveling back and forth to New Hampshire or New York and for work purposes and if they are on furlough they couldn't do that, but on SCS they could and obviously on parole they can. The last one are probable cause and bail hearings which board members conduct individually for folks that are arrested on violations, and they're not able to be seen by the board within the time period that's permitted by statute which is 20 days. So if we're not going to have a parole violation hearing available to them at their location within 20 days and we would conduct a probable cause hearing to determine if there is probable cause to hold them and then, if their attorney requests which most of the time they do can consider a release bail hearing to release them pending the violation hearing. So that's kind of an overview of the types of cases the board handles. On that the process is I is sort of spelled out by MJ in terms of who's eligible for presumptive parole who's eligible for their initial parole and then subsequent considerations for parole. And then medical parole which the legislature changed a couple of years ago, allowing us to consider serious medical conditions, medical conditions, as opposed to just terminal types of illnesses and diseases. We still have had very few of those. We're looking at changing a rule that has been in place since 1998 surrounding medical parole to sort of mirror the new statute which it currently does not do. But that process takes a bit of time but we're still trying to work through that. I think some graphs that Mary Jane has put in here that show the number of hearings at each level by year so you can sort of compare what's been going on and I know I'm going through this quickly and I'd be happy to spend some time answering any questions. I think we do have some questions here. I think it would be good. I wanted to interrupt but my printer was going so it would be a problem. So, you went through, you know, your hearing process which is very important and that's how an offender and inmate goes before the board and also do see can give a recommendation as well if the person would be a good candidate for parole or not. And the ultimate decision of whether someone is paroled or not is done by the board. Correct. And the conditions on that parole status, any of the conditions that are set are set by the board. Yes. Correct. But the inmate offender is still under the custody of the commissioner corrections. Correct. They are supervised by the by the Department of Corrections while on parole. One of the important changes that has taken place this year, which has helped us tremendously is that the Department of Corrections is now supervising offenders in the community by their risk status, not their status of being either on probation parole or furlough. So in the past we would know that if someone was on parole they were supervised less formally than if they were on furlough. And so we're when we had concerns about their safety being in the community, based on how they were being supervised, we may not grant parole because we knew on furlough they were going to be supervised more closely. That has changed, which again is part of the Department of Corrections attempt to move towards having fewer and fewer people on furlough and more on a parole status or probation status where they're entitled to do process. They're supervising them in the community based on their risk and not their status. And so we continue to in our interview process talk about that with the parole officers that are bringing them forward because this is a change for all of them as well to make sure that that's what's going to happen. And for the most part of this, which is good. When you say they're evaluated on their risks, is it their risk to reoffend? Is it their risk to violate their conditions? Right. It's it's based on, for example, if someone had a number of violent crimes that were assaulted in behavior, their risk would be different than someone who had just been convicted of property crimes. This is somebody who was a sex offender. Domestic violence. Each one of those has a specific risk area that we try to protect the community while they're being supervised on parole. So if, for example, it was a domestic violence offense, we have special conditions for domestic violence offenders, which is geared towards them being successful in the community but also protecting the victim of the domestic violence incident as best we can. So, yeah, their risk areas are different depending on the nature of their offenses. That's helpful. Thank you. So we have some questions here. Sarah and then Marsha. I think, Mike, it's nice to see you, Dean. I can always use a review of parole. So I just wanted to ask, and you may have answered it. You said you were working with DOC to align parole and furlough. And is that what you're talking about with in terms of risk? People are being supervised based on their risk rather than your status? Maybe a little different, Sarah. What we did is we have a set of parole conditions, both standard conditions and special conditions, which apply to individuals as we determine their risk is needed. In the past, our parole conditions were much different than conditions for furlough. Furlough had a host of conditions that were long and pretty cumbersome and someone on furlough and they weren't designed to be some applicable to someone for long periods of time. They were for somebody being transitioned into the community going to be closely supervised and then put on a different status for all being the number one. So what we've done is we've reviewed all of our conditions for parole. The Department of Corrections has reviewed all of their conditions for furlough and we've closely aligned the list of conditions. So that when someone goes out on furlough, the conditions that they would be on presumably would be pretty similar to the ones that we would set for parole. So rather than send someone out on furlough, the Department of Corrections is putting people before the parole board more often than they did in the past. As you may recall in the past, the vast majority of people we see would be on furlough in the community. So they sort of had a track record of how they're doing and then we could put them on parole. So now we're beginning to transition to having people go from their incarcerated status directly to parole and setting the conditions along with the conditions. We worked out some applications which are guidelines for the Department of Corrections to use when they're putting someone on furlough which are similar to what we use for guidelines to establish the right risk and put the right conditions on them so we're not over conditioning them so that they are set up to fail. So it's getting us closer together and when someone's in the community, what they have to worry about and be conscious of it are similar, not much different. When we heard, you know, somebody getting pulled back into a facility because they stepped off their porch or something, you know, like, kind of like hearing about things like that. But can you tell me really, I'm a person who gets grounded by concrete examples. Can you just like a couple of quick examples of what those conditions look like so I can better understand the whole. Sure. Well, I mean furlough or parole. Either. So, just let me know which one. Okay, so well, well now they're very similar which is a good thing, but in the past they were quite different. So someone on furlough, if, if they have a condition for example that they have a curfew from 6pm to 6am and they're out after 6pm. That would be a violation of their furlough agreement, and the Department of Corrections could sanction them for that. It's fairly minor it's not a significant one. But if it's combined with other things for example if they're out at 2am in the morning and they get picked up for DUI that's a whole different scenario. So then you've got two conditions violated one is they've committed a new crime and one is they are out after their curfew. So, as that progresses, the Department of Corrections if the person's on furlough could remove them, they don't need to go through the parole board this is a process that they use to put them back into a correctional facility as a sanction for a period of time. If the parole board if those same conditions were violated then they would request a violation of parole hearing. They could be held until that violation hearing on a hold without bail warrant. And we could conduct a bail hearing to release them or the if the parole violation hearing was going to be scheduled fairly soon and we would have the parole violation hearing. It would be a due process hearing with an attorney representing them going forward and then ultimately the parole board would decide whether to revoke their parole continue them on parole, or some other sanction we can do a brief incarcerated sanction we could strengthen some of their conditions to try to control them better, or just recommend them, you know if we understood that this was a one time thing and should be rectified. Yeah, it's basically we have a handful of standard conditions you can't violate laws and court orders and you must report to your parole officer when you're directed and that sort of thing. The special conditions that we apply are specific to the risk of the offender. As I said earlier if they were a domestic violence offender we have special conditions for domestic violence offender if we have someone who has substance abuse issues and needs to be in treatment. We have a condition that says that they shall be in counseling or treatment until such time as the counseling service or the treatment provider has determined that it's no longer necessary. And they're supposed to allow them to tell us how they're doing in that program that they're attending and participate. Those kinds of things. Okay, so we have no questions here. Marsha Scott and Karen so Marsha. Hi Marsha. You told us that 90 cases, but early termination of parole could you just give us kind of a quick overview of what kind of cases. They were some of them are sure. The vast majority of them are people that are within six months of maxing out their sentence. And so, if they're within six months of their sentence and they've been doing really well on parole and their parole officer. They're supposed to give them credit for that. They can request that we conduct an early release hearing and the board would take a look at how they've been doing while they're on parole. And if in fact they have been doing well and things are going good for them they're working their family situations been rectified. You know they're, they're completed their counseling. They've addressed their substance abuse issue whatever the issue is seems to be taken care of. But it could determine that their sentence is over. And so we would grant them early termination from their parole agreement and their sentence ends on that day, which is a fun thing to do because you're rewarding people for really doing well. And a lot of times they bring their family in with them and that sort of thing and it's just, it's, it's, it's nice to see. In the beginning they might have been struggling and they've gone through a number of different things and here they are sort of at the end of their sentence but you're giving a reward for doing well and they move on and hopefully we never see them again in that context. That's the goal. Yes. And then the public is safer. Thank you. You're welcome. Scott and then Karen. Thank you. You can tell Dean, I'm new to this committee and use of this topic. I think you said at the beginning that you review that the parole board reviews every, every case every or every incarcerated individual every year. Is that correct. We review everyone who has been sentenced. That is beyond their minimum that is not on parole every year. Everyone who's been sentenced was beyond their minimum is not on parole. Okay, so if for example, we see everyone, at least at their minimum unless they choose to waive their hearing. And we try to encourage them to be seen because I think it's important for us to meet with them interview them and if they're not being granted parole we can give them some guidelines about what needs to be done in order to be ready to be moving forward with parole and most of the time that's required treatment program that they have to complete first. So, if we don't grant parole at their minimum, then we will see them again, whenever the Department of Corrections is satisfied that they've completed that whatever needs to be done, they can bring them back at any time we don't give them a timeline. Or if we don't see them within the next year, then we will review their case one year from that time. And reviewing the case means actually interviewing. No, it does not. What happens is the Department of Corrections at the record review date will submit an updated parole summary report which gives us the data as to what's going on with their case. Obviously if they're doing a record review they're not recommending them for parole at this time but we take a look at that if we determine that. For example, their treatment program is completed. Things seem to be going well but we're not sure why they're not being recommended, then we will report back to the Department of Corrections that we want to schedule an interview with this person. And then we will interview them and make a decision again whether or not to parole. Okay. This sounds even more complicated than filling out tax form. It's working really well I think in the past what was complicated was if you were convicted of a crime that got a sentence of more than 15 years you couldn't be seen but every two years. And once during that two year period so sometimes it went as long as three years before the board. And now with the change of the statute everybody is reviewed once a year. Yes, I guess I'm sort of in general wondering how much discretion is in the system and whether, what the balance is of discretion and sort of hardwired rules is and if you think that's that we're at a good balance or should we be moving. I think we're at a, we're at a point where we are in my time on the board, we have moved progressively towards getting more people back in the community safely, but many more by percentage and we have in the past. And we're looking at things a lot differently than we originally did. A lot of times it was all based on, you know, whatever their crime was they needed to be punished for blah blah blah and so forth where now we're looking really carefully at the risk for this person to be in the community if there's no reason risk wise for them not to be in the community under supervision and we try to get them there. Sometimes there are cases obviously where there are significant pieces of treatment programming that needs to be completed before that can happen. The sex offender is a good example of that and we're not going to release them until we know that's completed. And then we'll move on from there. And then there are other times where we have serious victim impact issues to consider. And we try to include the victims, especially the ones that want to be. The ones that don't we always have the parole officers at least check with them to see if they want to participate and invite them to participate. And for those that are really concerned about this person being released we try to include them in the process and have them when we're ready to pull somebody. Work with us to determine what's the safest way to release this person what are the things that you're most concerned about that we can address by releasing. And that's really helpful, particularly to the victims. And you said, and I know, but I remind me how long you've been doing this 15 years, 15 years, 15 years. It sounds like you're getting pretty good at it. It's a, it's a, the, the group that I work with on the pro board are very committed dedicated people which makes the job that much better for us that that are doing it, as you can imagine. Yeah. Great, thank you. Karen, and then Michael. Yes, thank you Dean for being here. I have a couple of questions. And I'll say I looked ahead in the PowerPoint we provided which I say is wonderful so. Thank you for that. So I looked ahead at some of the graphs and it. I don't know from my perspective it looks like things are really heading in a positive direction so thank you for all the work that you're doing. One question. I guess two questions. You kind of answered this, how do you value or how do you hold victim input in DOC input into the decision to grant parole. So, like, does it ever happen that DOC doesn't recommend the role but then you do, like, how often does that happen you could share that. Yeah, and it's happening. I want to say less than it has in the past and part of that is because we've been sort of moving towards having the Department of Corrections, not make a recommendation but rather just present us the information. And our decision is not impacted by while they're not recommending that maybe I better be careful here and not release this person, but rather, okay, here's what this person's been doing since you last saw them or prior. This is their minimum sentence. Here's what they've done up to this point. And, and then let us continue the interview with the individual. And based on the offense, make a decision to release them without getting input negatively or positively. And we still get recommendations that are based on the Department of Corrections policy. And for those we know it's not a personal thing they have a policy that X can't happen until Y happens. But we can certainly override that if we choose to, and many times we do. Especially for those and they're getting away from that somewhat where they don't recommend for parole until they've had us this epic period of time of good behavior 90 days 180 days depending on the sentence. We see somebody who's been saying they're waiting for that 180 days but for the past three months they've been doing great. We're not going to let them wait another three months before. But that has changed. And we also use the risk instruments that have been provided we have our own risk instrument which we are one of the things I was going to mention this morning we are phasing out. It's been in play for a number of years it helps us bring consistency to our decision making, but in working with the council of state governments, one of the things we're scheduled to do later this year is some training on how to utilize the risk instrument that our corrections provides so that if we look at their risk instrument analysis we can see from that specifically how this person's doing and what their risks are going to be without having to use our separate one, which probably isn't as detailed as theirs is. So we thought this was a good opportunity for us to be able to take a look at the results of their different risk instruments they use several. We've made it part of our parole summary report so when we get our parole report we also know what the risk instrument results are for each of these individuals when they were done. So that's that's a helpful piece as well. And it makes the interview go better for us. When it comes to victims that was the other part of your question. That's always the tricky part. Many times as you can imagine the victims have some very strong emotional ties to the case and concerns and we recognize that and, like I said part of our process is to include them as much as possible. If we have people who are victims of say domestic assault and they want to provide us information we give them the opportunity to talk with us privately without anyone else being present and give them the confidence that their information is not going to be shared. But we need to know what their concerns are and then we can address that in the interview with the individual. And if we are granting parole we can set conditions that protect that specific issue for the victim, without making it look like it's the victims issue coming up. And it's interesting because a lot of times when you have victims participate they they become involved in the process and it helps them get through that. Thank you. My other question was again looking ahead at some of the graphs which are wonderful, seeing how it's by year and look like in 2020, you had 553 parole hearings and 384 of those hearings were granted parole, and I appreciate how you put it by risk level so it looks like the majority of folks that were granted were lower risk. And out of all of those granted, do you have a ballpark figure of how many were those their first hearing. A small amount a large amount. I'm going to say it's the vast majority MJ do you, do you know that percentage I'm going to say it's probably close to 75%, but I don't have a ballpark off top of the hand. I know we had to have a lot repeats but I'm not. I, we don't track that specifically. Yeah. I think that would be interesting to see how many folks are granted parole on their first hearing versus. So, one of the things using using our risk assessment that we're phasing out. We know that 90% approximately 90% of those low risk offenders are granted parole at their minimum. So, and then at the moderate risk approximately 65% and 25 to 30 of the high risk people are granted parole, and most of those are at their minimum. I will say we are starting to track that data and 20 in 2021 as part of our report out to the Council of State governments. So as we get further into 2021 we will be able to provide some of that data. Thank you. My last question, hopefully this or is just how has, you know, the pandemic impacted the work because everything by whom are, you know, are you seeing things change and that they're going to be long term shifts or anything you want to shed light on. Well, thank you. From a personal standpoint, I hope it's long term. I appreciate even I have talked about this. So you don't have to travel. Yes, since March, we've been able to do everything we use teams and MJ and her staff to great people who work for. I mean, they get a lot done in a short amount of time. I've been able to move all of our documents on to an electronic format so we're completing everything during the hearings electronically and being able to process our paperwork much quicker and more efficiently. As far as the hearings themselves go. We do have some glitches as you do probably on zoom with teams occasionally one of the bigger problems is people wearing masks are hard to understand unless they're right directly in front of the computer. But what we're seeing for the, the vast amount of what we're doing is it's being handled just as efficiently if not better than when we were there in person. We're not missing anything we're able to be there we have more flexibility if for example, someone can't make it to a hearing on a particular day we can bump them off to another day at another site because it's just a matter of getting them to dial in or be on the computer. So, it gives us some flexibility in that regard. Obviously, the big thing is the board members are not having to travel stay overnight, several times a month for the distances that we have to travel around the state as everybody knows. So, for me it's been great not having to be on the road so much and be able to handle the hearings directly from our homes a couple of our board members miss not having the personal gatherings but, and I understand that we're hoping that we have monthly staff which are done by teams as well and we're hoping that, at least in the near future we can maybe begin to have our staff meetings as a group and it's safe enough to do that. But aside from the requirements of the open meeting law of having one person there when this gets relieved I don't see us getting back to the way we were or the need to see the need to have that additional huge expense of paying everybody mileage and expenses. Or something that we're accomplishing just as efficiently if not better using teams. Okay, so we have another question here Michael. Hey, good morning Dean and Michael. I'm glad to see. I kind of like the fact that I think that you bring a good mix and the fact that you're on the other end of the spectrum when you're a state policeman and having that unique perspective of kind of seeing. I suppose they're resting in versus the now on the release end of things so I think that gives you a unique perspective so I'm glad to see that. So, what, you know, I asked this one a lot to people and I it's kind of all over the map the recidivism rate that were you seeing are these people you got you have a rough gouge on that number and just I'm just kind of curious and then I've got a follow on. I mean, the risk, the recidivism rate is not something that we specifically track Michael, but we do. We average somewhere around 200 violations a year. And I don't know what the current numbers are MJ but it's probably between 800-900 people on parole that sound about right. We have about currently today we have just under 1000. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. I just want to be a little clear on that 200 cases of violation may not feed into a recidivism rate. Right. But what I want to say too is that the majority of those that we revoke parole for are because they have committed new offenses. And that obviously 200 violations is in 200 revocations. Correct. It's probably much a much lower percentage that I would hope. So last year I provided some data we had 104 parole violation hearings last year. And that 54 were continued and on parole and 50 were revoked. So it's about just over 50%. And I also did break down how many involved new offenses and how many involved technical offense that were technical. The one thing I didn't break down is out of those revoked how many were for technical and how many were for new offenses. I didn't break down. So a 50 were revoked. So you've about 5% then. So that's pretty decent. Yeah. Okay. And the other big one and I'm a brand new I'm a brand new guy this year that I've gotten already because there's been I represent six towns and there's been a couple of releases of sex offenders into the communities and that is a hot potato topic as I'm sure you know. And it's tough to answer those folks constituents when they say, you know, they're popping up and down mad that, you know, Mr. John Smith is going to be released to them at a neighboring address. What would, in my shoes, what do you tell those folks what do you know what assurances can I give them that the due diligence has been done to make them feel because you know these are people that have five, six year old kids and I have to assure them that the due diligence has been done. So, sex offenders are tricky you're absolutely right and as I was mentioned earlier a lot of times when we have victim issues, they're directly related to sexual assault in one form or another. Okay. And so one of the clear things that we focus on is the victims issues and how can we protect them and so forth. Okay, offenders it's much different than it is with domestic violence offenders because there is treatment programming that is required. So before we even consider them for parole. They have to complete the incarcerated portion of the sex offender treatment program. And then 90% of the cases they have to complete the community based program while they're on furlough before we would consider them for parole. The few that we don't are because they may be going out of state. So we may be granting supervision through the icons process which is the transfer to another state. And if that state has accepted their supervision, and we would make sure that that receiving state knows that this is a sex offender who is required to have community based sex offender treatment. And that that would be one of the conditions going forward in that state once they're being supervised in another state for the Vermont offense. It's up to that department of corrections to make ultimately the decision as to how they're going to supervise it. But we always follow up when we know it's a sex offender that needs the second component which is the community based treatment program that they are going to get that. They are, you know, it's very rare that sex offender would be granted parole from a correctional facility when they are granted parole it's in the community after they've completed the various programs that are required of them. We've addressed the victim issues, and we're moving forward at that point. And it kind of be, for lack of a better term a tighter leash then, then again they're being supervised by risk and I would suspect, Michael that the ones that you're talking about probably ones for the most part that have maxed out and aren't on parole or for okay, that's not their sentence. Yeah. Yeah. And those are dangerous. Those are very dangerous because exactly and they want to treat you know, and if they refuse treatment they're not going to get the benefits of it. Yeah, we just got to hope they don't re-commit. Yeah. Okay. All right, thank you sir. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, I was looking at these charts and they're impressive. It's good to see the numbers coming down and I'm wondering whether you anticipate that as continuing and how your role is changing with the changes that we've made in statute. Do you find that you're getting door to anticipate especially after we get through when and if we get through COVID will there be a, will it come back up? Are you expecting more cases in the future or not? No, I'm not. I think the number will continue to decline. Someone I mean we've seen a significant reductions as you know, from when we were just a few years ago and the numbers of people incarcerated and so forth. The biggest challenge right now is that the criminal courts are not acting on pending cases and it puts us in a tough situation as to there are people that we revoked parole that have committed new offenses that are going to remain incarcerated until that offense is resolved. And who knows when that's going to happen. There's no schedule of that taking place. That's one of the downsides to this. But it's not anything that we have any control of at this point. As we go forward, I think we're going to see more presumptive parole cases. Well, I think that's a good thing in the long run. It allows people to sort of automatically get on parole. We set the conditions based on their risk. And again, my biggest concern is the number of violation hearings that we have and are going to have and the challenges and none of us are attorneys and we sit there across from two or three attorneys. Having debates and pressures put on us to make decisions about evidence that make it a challenge for us. I appreciate it and I anticipate with fewer parole hearings will be able to have more time to spend on the violation and things and prepare ourselves adequately for that. Okay, good. Also now when you as a condition of parole. Require some programming or treatment for drug abuse or domestic violence or so. Who pays for that treatment. You know, it's it's different with the individual some have insurance and the insurance pays for it. There are some programs that are paid for by corrections. And aside from that, the individual would have to pay for as far as I know, MJ, do you have any information on that. I think the vast majority it's up to the individual there is a fee for most programs, but I'm not. I'm not sure how the risk reduction programs, you know, the outpatient programs would either the insurance or the offender would potentially be paying for those. Okay, a lot of them qualify for insurance for that. But we do see people that come before us in a violation hearing that stopped attending because they can't pay for it, you know, and so we try to figure something out on that, just to keep them involved in the program. Exactly. Now also I'm sure you know that I have this age 59 to trying to give a little boost to your salary I don't know whether you know about that or not but I'm concerned that. Well, I mean you've been at it for 15 years. I want to make sure that should you decide not to do this anymore. It would be the pool of people who might come in would be able to handle the job and things like that do you have any. And I'm concerned also when you the changes from for COVID where people are not getting per diem and they're not getting well I might be getting some per diem but they're not getting travel. This is sometimes seen as as income by people. And can you go a little bit into the finances of the parole board and whether you think that's a problem or not. And that's a good question and thank you for that because that is a big concern we have. As I mentioned earlier, I'm very grateful to have the colleagues that I have in this business but it's a challenge when one leaves to find the right person who wants to commit to that, or very little financial reimbursement. And in our discussions with the Council of State Governments. They have mentioned a couple of times that they see down the road that there be a full time parole board at some point, which, when the state decides to do that if they ever do it's going to be a huge impact financially on how they pay for that service to have. And at the same time, it is a challenge to find people for this. We have one member who moved away a couple of months ago but it's still acting for the board while we find somebody I recommended a couple of people that have inquired about participating on the board to the governor's office and they in turn have been looking around with more diversity and have not found anybody and one of my biggest concerns is in order to find the right person who has a temperament, the commitment, the understanding that's willing to learn and do the work. They almost have to be retired. Because as you know this, we go to these places every month, there's 14 sites and obviously not every board member goes to every site we only have three of us at each one but for that period of time and the preparation time. You have to be committed to doing that you can't. One of the individuals I interviewed at one point was working full time and wanted to know what can we do these hearings at night and said, No, we really can't you know it's not just us it's the parole officers, the Department of Corrections and so forth and this is when they're scheduled to be heard and when we have to do them. So that's a huge challenge going forward and you know we've talked about this I've talked about it with the governor's office to and I think a lot of what they're doing this year is focusing obviously on COVID issues and when they don't have problems in other areas not going to spend time focusing on that I understand that, but in the meantime, we've got to be thinking ahead I certainly like to think that there's somebody to ready to step in as chair and do the work when, you know, I get done, or choose to and, and I'm not sure that's the case right now. And, and do you think how much of that is a question of remuneration how much of it is a question of other resources could. Now the other members are just getting our are getting per diem and expenses is that that's it for the members. Yes, and the per diem hasn't changed as none of it has since 2005. But it's, you know, they're like I said they're doing because they really enjoy the work and, and you're, they're being compensated for their time they're obviously not making a lot of money out of this $100 a day for their per diem that's going to be it now because there's no travel. But, you know, there's a lot of preparation work that goes into each hearing that we send out all the documents electronically ahead of the hearing so they get reviewed. We review all the offenses that affidavits and court work and so forth so we're familiar with the case before we do the interview, because we only have a few minutes for each interviews we want to be as prepared as possible for that. So that's, that's a huge challenge and you know we're lucky right now that this one member has continued to work with us and he can do it electronically but in the meantime. It's been several months, almost six now that I haven't been able to get somebody on board that we can start training and ready to take his place. Okay, thank you. So the quick thing I just wanted to mention I think is important we went in our work with the National Institute of Corrections we were selected this year to participate in a process called, excuse me structured decision making. And right now there are three or four states that have been through this program and Vermont was selected for the coming year so we're going to begin that later this year with the National Institute of Corrections. And they pay for the training the programming the travel any of the expenses that go with it so we're pretty excited about being chosen for that and report, getting into that. You're a mute Alice. Sorry. John was talking in the background. We've got one more question and then we're going to have to finish it up because we have commissioner Baker, your former colleague. And to be talking with us about the vaccination process within folks who are incarcerated. So, Sarah has a question and then I just have a quick question too. It's pretty quick. I just, I'm just this presentation and the prepared presentation is so helpful for all of us and you know sometimes when we're having this earned good time or earned time conversation questions come up about, you know, you know, and to me I think, you know, you going through this really confirms that there's a really thoughtful process with that includes the victims, and that you hear all sides and that you don't. Somebody is not guaranteed to get out early at their door to go on to parole at their minimum. And I think, you know, this is really helpful and timely, considering some of the legislation that we've considered so I just want to say a big thank you to both you and to Mary Jane because this you do such good work and appreciate it. Thank you. And I think that's fair to say that Sarah speaking for the whole committee on that. So thank you. And one thing Dean, I would just like your perspective. I know I'm commissioner Baker has presented this to us many times but I would like your perspective in terms of coming from the law enforcement arena. For for a length of time and then you became a legislator, and then you moved on to this. Has that changed your perspectives has that you look back in terms of your law enforcement profession and your work that you did there. Now you're on the other end of that. It is. Is there anything that has struck you or that you could share with us shifting roles and obviously I was in the state police for 30 years. And the last 10 or so I was in the command structure so not dealing directly with people. You know the other perspective that I had I was on our select board for 20 years in the town and that's a whole different arena but some of the same issues come into play, as you can imagine. And I think with my time on the pro board, it has given me a different perspective on what happens after law enforcement completes its work. You're done you've made your conviction, you moved on to the next you don't see what happens beyond that. And this gives us the opportunity to say okay now that this person has been convicted of this crime, what happens to them. And so we're seeing them from the day of their conviction to first interviewing them when they're eligible to be seen by us what have they done since then. How are they trying to help themselves how can we direct them. And so we, we play a huge role as this Department of Corrections and getting people back in the community, being successful so they don't go through this again and have to deal with this again with that. Obviously not everybody makes it the first time. But I think, for what Vermont does where it should be very proud of how progressive we become and how successful in protecting people, and I know that our crime rate is much different than other states that have to deal with other issues but we still have some very dangerous people that come through our system and I think we deal with them very effectively. So I'm, I'm pleased with what I've learned through this process and glad to be able to see those numbers going down, as far as incarceration and hope it continues. Great. Thank you so much Dean. Laura spoke very well about the document that was submitted Mary Jane thank you so much for putting that together it's really really informative and I would have a hunch will probably have you back at some point once the committee can go through that document and there'll be a lot more questions that arise. And we can do a deeper dive, particularly as we start to roll out the presumptive parole piece. I would look forward to it. Yes, so it'd be great to have you back so thank you both.