 Hello folks, this is House Corrections and Institutions and we're going to shift gears again this morning though we're always talking about corrections. I thought it would be good before we get into S-45 which is relating to discharge from probation. I thought it would be good for the committee to have probation 101 to figure out we did parole this morning, parole if you remember is on the back end it's folks re-entering after an incarcerated sentence and it's through the parole board. Probation is on the front end of the criminal justice system. Probation is determined by the court but DOC does the supervision for folks who are on probation. So we have Dale Crook with us today to go over what probation is and I'll turn it over to Dale and then after that we have Brynn coming in to give us a walkthrough of S-45 which deals with probation. So Dale welcome back his second time today. Just for the record Dale Crook I'm the director of field services for the Vermont Department of Corrections. I did was able to watch a little bit of the parole 101 today and really for the department it's very similar with probation. So as with parole with probation the court is the appointed authority and what that means is that they are the deciding decision makers. So they determine conditions, they determine what happens with a violation, they determine if the probation is revoked. The department supervises the case, the probationer for the court and then makes recommendations up to the court when they're found in violations or when we recommend discharge or modifications of probation. That's the main kind of crux. I mean for the department the appointed authority with probation is the court's parole, is parole board, and with furlough it's the department and they're really around the decision makers of what happens with that case. As far as supervision goes with the probation officers meeting with their probationers it really depends on the risk level and how we're supervising them. So we have what is called, we have two big tiers of supervision for probationers. One is administrative supervision and that is in essence telephone monitoring is for our low risk offenders where it's really around a probationer coming in and completing the tasks or the special conditions that were imposed by the court. It could be something such as pay a fine, do some community service for whatever it is to satisfy that condition. These are cases that we spend very little energy on. These are cases that we have larger caseloads and are really monitoring them to complete their tasks. On the higher end of the cases we have what is called risk management supervision and that is the case where we are managing the risk. These are for your more serious offenders. Sex offenders, all sex offenders are in the risk management category. Domestic violence offenders begin in the risk management category. We do have an assessment when a probationer comes over from court that helps sort between administrative probation and risk management supervision. The more serious the offenses, the most likely it will be in the risk management category. For example, murder automatically goes to risk management based on the severity of the offense. So that's how we break down the supervision. On the risk management side, then we start looking at risk assessments to determine the level of supervision or the frequency and intensity of supervision that's imposed upon the probationer as far as our context. What we can require a probationer to do is really based on the conditions of probation. So the conditions of probation is what drives the case as far as either success or violation. So that is how the department supervises. So we can't have a probationer do any activity that is not directed on a probation order. So we can't say you need to go do mental health counseling if we don't have a condition that directs the probationer to complete mental health counseling. You know, there's other topics going on with probation right now as far as doing assessments and sitting conditions, which really blends in well with this. So I know this is part of S45 and that will be talked about later, but really the driving of those conditions and the offender completing those conditions is what determines how the department will end that case if allowed to. So we can at any time the department other than sex offenders or some special language around sex offenders, for non-sex offender cases the department can recommend a discharge at any time. Generally, we have criteria laid up for the administrative side. It's basically if you complete your conditions, we'll recommend. It does not mean that court will accept that recommendation for a discharge or not. For the risk management side, we have different criteria set based on the offense and risk. So for domestic violence offenders, there is the ability for us to discharge, but they will have to complete all their conditions of supervision, have a period of supervision without incident be determined to have addressed their risk to the public before we look at doing a discharge of that nature. When I could sit here and probably talk a long time about probation, I guess it's like what questions does the committee have that might be able to better focus your interest and your time. So I have a question I started asking and I was on mute. You just talked about the risk management piece and the other part of probation and the discharge. Who does the discharge from probation? Is it DOC or is it the court? So we make a recommendation. So the court is a decider. So this is the court's case in essence. That's what probation is. Probation is a sentence that has been suspended. So if the probation gets revoked, the offender could serve what that sentence is. But the judge and the court is the one that makes a determination. The state's attorneys will argue on one side for the state. The public defender will argue or the defense will argue on the other side as to guilt or not guilty. But it's really ultimately down to the judge that will make that determination. The department will make recommendations. So when we file a violation of probation, it's a recommendation and a notice to the court that a probationer has violated their conditions of probation and we may or may not make a recommendation as to resolve that. It could be anywhere from a partial revocation, addition of added conditions to help better supervise, or it could be a full revocation. As far as discharge, it's the same thing. We will indicate that the offender has completed the following conditions of supervision and we would make a recommendation for discharge. And that's really, and it goes off to the originating court to make a determination. And that's where the state's attorneys and the defense attorneys may get involved to either argue that the state's attorneys could argue the discharge, they could accept the discharge, and then the courts would make the final determination. So it's all under the jurisdiction of the court in terms of someone is released from probation or not. I've got two more questions. What are you seeing for the average length of time that someone's on probation? Is it a two-year probation? Is it ten years, five years? It depends. I do know there's caps for misdemeanors. I believe there's a cap for a two-year term. And I think for a felony, it's a four-year term. But there is the ability for the courts to go outside of those time frames. If they have justification, I think if the ends justifies the sentence, the courts do have the ability. For example, someone on for a very serious offense with a very long max, a 25-year max or a life max, four years may not be appropriate. They may have until further order of the court, which there is no set term. So how many folks right now are on probation? Do you know? Yeah. Not at the top of my head. I just had the numbers a little over 5,000 under supervision. I can get that. I can email that to you pretty quickly. I would not be surprised if someone's shooting me a text right now with that information, hopefully. I think that's important for folks because when we say people who are under supervision of the Department of Corrections, at times the numbers were as high as 12,000. They were brought down to 10,000 and then about eight or 9,000. But the bulk of that are folks who are on probation. I believe rough numbers would be a little... I just heard the parole board say they had almost a thousand on parole. I think we have around 800 give or take on furlough and then 4,000 give or take on probation. So the bulk of our community supervision is on probation and about half of those cases are probably on administrative probation. So our numbers have been in decline for the last 15 years. A bunch of different reasons for that for probation. Some of it is pre-trial type activities and services. Monica is going to be sending me the numbers. So how many folks around furlough? Was that around 500? I think around 800. Monica Weber is shooting me the number. She's watching on YouTube. Just so people can put it in context because I think everybody thinks that for folks who are under supervision of corrections, they think they're all incarcerated. And the incarcerated population is pretty small compared to what's out being supervised in the community. And I think people need to keep that in perspective here. And another issue that we come across is our authority is really driven by the conditions that are imposed. So a lot of times we'll get complaints saying so-and-so probationers doing X, Y, and Z. And I don't want him to do that. He's creating noise, causing problems, drinking. And we may not have the authority or the ability to respond to that because we don't have conditions prohibiting that activity. So that does sometimes the general public may not understand. It's really driven by the conditions from the court about how we can respond to behaviors. And also to lead in, and I know we've got a question here, but also to expand on that a little bit, as legislators, you'll hear from constituents, well, so-and-so is under corrections. And what are they doing out in the community and they're violating this? The first thing you need to ask what's their status? Is it probation? Is it furlough? Or is it parole? Because everyone thinks in the public that they're under these one status, whatever it might be. And there are different conditions that are set for the different statuses based on the risks and also who has jurisdiction. Where probation's the court, furlough is corrections, parole is the parole board. And everyone thinks that it's furlough, everyone thinks it's corrections. I've got somebody at the door. So Karen. Yes. Hi, Dale. Thanks for being here. And I appreciate the comparison to parole, since we just heard that. So it's easy to kind of put them side by side. And so I can see how their similarity and folks have this status and then they're monitored, you know, if they can maintain it or not. I guess for me in hearing it like for folks with parole, in order to maintain or get to that status, they need to meet certain criteria. But there within a fixed setting of being incarcerated where there's kind of a guarantee that programming is going to be available. Different offerings, supports are going to be available in the facility. So they can meet those. I am curious if our communities across Vermont have that same equal access? Is all of the state covered well with programming supports opportunities? So somebody who's on probation in, I don't know, some town here, is it kind of different for them to be able to maintain their probation status versus in another area of the state that might not have the same supports in programming? I'm wondering if you could speak to that. Can I interrupt just one second, Dale? Can you take over? I've got someone at the door that I have to take care of for a little bit. Okay, thanks. So we do have a rural state and there are some areas of the state such as Burlington that have much more offerings as far as services available. Every district office we have has a designated agency in their district and it really determines on what is the capacity that they had to offer the different services. And generally speaking, most sites will have access or working on access to sex offender treatment will have access to domestic violence education or batters intervention program. One thing that we are starting to explore now with our departmental risk reduction programs is tele, I think they call it telemedicine, but tele-treatment where as we're not having in person, we are working not just the department, but other providers with a virtual sitting as far as delivering services. That could be beneficial as things start opening up and what that does is it allows smaller, more rural counties to offer more services. Just the fact that we try to specialize in the treatment that we have and a lot of that's based on numbers. So sometimes it's hard to have a woman's program and Newport or a very small county because we just don't have the numbers as opposed to Burlington, which may have the numbers to accommodate a group. So we have two sections of services. One is departmental and it depends if those probation conditions address us to do those specific risk reduction programs or there's also the community providers and those are going to be at different levels across the state depending on their ability to meet the needs. So there is a disparity between the areas. Thank you for sharing that and it's also helpful to hear that you are doing some things to address it and I just think that's something for us as a committee to be aware of too. Thank you. Great. Thanks, Karen. Kurt, you had your hand up. Yes, I understand that the probationer is supervised by DOC, but the decisions are big decisions are made by the courts. At what point or is there a point where the probationer is under the care and custody of DOC or not? So a probation sentence can be partially suspended. So for example, someone has a two to 10 year sentence. It's all suspended but one year. That suspended part that all but one year will be served in a correctional facility. So they would serve one year in a facility and then come out to probation. So they would be released onto probation not on furlough and then they would have the remainder of that probated sentence to serve. So the two to 10 would in essence be a one to nine as you already would have a year of credit for the time served in that facility. But so that person would be under the custody of DOC for the 10 years. Yes. While they're in probation, they'd be under the supervision of the department. A person who comes straight from court to probation is also under the custody of DOC. Correct. Okay. All right. Another question on the community services and the risk reduction programs. Are they, are there wait lists now for those or are they adequately staffed such that you can get people into those if they do exist or not? The COVID situations have kind of impacted that. And so I'll try to speak in a non COVID way, if that makes sense, because everything has been kind of thrown out the window right now with COVID, everyone's trying to manage the best they can. One of the pushes from our commissioner, Commissioner Baker, has been that there has not been the adequate level of services in the community provided to address the needs of our population. You know, I can give you examples. There are services out there, but a lot of times they're either not focused or geared toward dealing with people that are criminally justice involved. They may or may not be best situated to deal with mental health, personality disorders, situations of that, of that nature. There could be a capacity issue where they cannot get enough providers in a certain area. This is generally speaking across the state. You know, for example, we don't have any long term residential treatment facilities, as some other states do. So one of our biggest pushes to the justice reinvestment, and I think CSG has also kind of indicated this as well, is that we're kind of lacking some of the capacity out in the community. And do you have any suggestions on the solution to that? Is that a question of money or is it a question of labor or what can we do to fix that? Well, I think justice reinvestment is starting the state down that path. There are a series of trainings and recommendations from CSG as far as networking better with the community providers, better assessments for the population that we serve to hook them up in better situations out in the community. Part of it is probably going to be a resource issue, where we need to expand the capacity of our designated agencies and other services and treatment providers out in the community to better match the needs of our population. You know, and generally our risk management population, we have very high needs individuals. Some of them are high risk, but the risk is really not the situation. It's the needs that need to be addressed. Everything from housing to mental health, the substance abuse, the medically assisted treatments, and to other cognitive behavioral treatments to address their criminal thinking and behaviors. I don't think there's an easy solution. And certain things have impacted that over time, where I'm not exactly sure how the designated agencies hire and retain staff. I mean, it's tough work. And not everyone is situated to work in this environment. So I don't think there's an easy answer to this. I don't think just throwing money at it is always going to work, but I think there is a resource need. There's a few things out there. I think there's a lot of different things. I think CSG has done a pretty good job of kind of identifying some of them. I think the justice reinvestment legislation is kind of leading us down that way. We have a series of trainings for the department staff for some of our community providers we're looking at as far as some of our investments. We'll be working with local providers to see how to match the needs of our population. Okay. Yeah. I'm really interested in the community supports, but that's kind of not probation 101. So we can get into that some other time, but thanks. So I know Alice is back, but I have a question. This morning, it's when it rains, it pours, right? So I had a question. It's kind of to follow up on something that questions that Representative Dolan, Representative Taylor had, you know, we, it's the work that the working group within the that's been working with the Council on State Governments has really been mapped, you know, has identified the geographic disparities around these services. And I'm just so glad to hear your active involvement in that. And do you know when the next report is scheduled to come out? I'm just wondering. And the Council of State Governments? Yeah, just with that working group, because to, you know, what I think you're hearing in the committee that there is, we see the connection between, you know, the success of people on probation, you know, is linked to the supports and services in the community that can support that work. So I think they are kind of inextricably linked. So I'm just curious when that next report is coming out. I'm not sure, but I do believe that CSG is on later today. Okay, that's right. You can probably directly ask them. I do, I think we do have the big group will have meetings, additional meetings, I don't know, but I can't remember when the JRI team is meeting again. Yeah, it's been, they've been, your group has been doing really great work. Thank you. And Madam Chair, I do have the numbers. Monica, so on furlough, we have about 549 individuals on furlough right now. Per roll, we have 899. We have 2,900 individuals on probation. So the total field count is 500, 5348. And that includes about 577 that are on work crew, which is kind of stagnant right now because with COVID we have closed on our work crew programs at this time. And then we also have a couple of hundred interstate compact cases either out or end. So those are a little harder to track for us how we have it set up. Those are the numbers and they have really have diminished greatly over the past year, but also over the past 15 years, there's been a steady decline. You know, we were at 12,000 individuals under community supervision about 15 years ago, give or take, and do other activities through legislation and changes and processes and you know, repressive boards taking direct referrals. A lot of cases have been deflected from the department, very appropriately have been deflected from the department. Unfortunately, the more serious cases don't get deflected in those ways. So you've seen a lot of our shrinkage with the department and the population on really on those less severe cases that can be managed without having them come into the supervision of the department corrections, where community justice centers can can deal with them or repressive boards and other activities that really deflect them diversion that deflects these cases coming to the department. So really the number that we have, you know, the 5000 or so individuals, we would have had them 15 years ago, but we'd have another 5000 more lower risk cases involved with it. So really, so, you know, the harder cases haven't really gone away, so to speak. So one thing that we did a lot of conversations about a number of years ago there was really looking at folks who are very low risk. And the testimony that we always were receiving that the longer a person stays within the control of corrections or probation with the courts, if they're a low risk, you're really in the longer on doing more damage to them because they're constantly under supervision. Is has that is that really true? I mean, is that what you've seen in the world? Absolutely. For so a low risk offender, talking about reoffending doesn't mean it's the appropriate decision because there's victims and there's other impacts in those decision making certain factors. But as far as recidivism, low risk offenders, for the most part, the department will probably make worse because they will be interacting with higher risk individuals. You take a low risk individual and you put them in jail surrounded by a lot of high risk individuals. Peer pressure and peer support is a real thing. And we would only increase their risk. It's, you know, our department, in my opinion, we should be focusing on the moderate risks and above, where we can really make an impact in someone's behavior doesn't mean we don't supervise, you know, someone, you know, there's a lot of people on for really serious offenses that are low risk and that need to be supervised and monitored and held accountable. So I'm not saying that. But as far as as dealing with low risk individuals, the department may not always be giving you the best outcomes. And I do know we've had historically have had had done studies on that. I do know, like, for example, for the low risk or repetitive board has had tremendous success in diverting these cases from the department and had better outcomes going through the reparative process than through the traditional probation process. There have been studies from other states where they don't even supervise low risk offenders unless they're on for a listed, I don't know, listed but a sex offense or a domestic violence offense. They won't even supervise them on probation. So, so there's a lot of evidence and research out there. And I think CSG has done a good job of trying to bring some of that forward as to really the impact that supervising low risk offenders can do. That's kind of essence when we have an administrative supervision is for those low risk offenders, those low severity offenders, you know, most of them have jobs, most of them are able to go out and do things. They don't need to come in and see a PO and possibly miss a day of work. They don't need to do other certain things. We can monitor them remotely. And we have really good outcomes with those low risk offenders because they'd be successful anyway. You know, an example would be we take anyone on this committee meeting right now something God forbid something happened and he got in trouble. There's not a lot of departments, most people I would assume were going to be low risk with minimal issues. Putting you in heavy structure environments is may or may not change that behavior. You know, so. So for some folks throwing the book at them may make it worse. Well, make it well. I mean, the evidence has laid out that that it will make individuals that will reduce their risk to reoffend. So we have some couple more questions. Curt and then Scott. Yeah, I'm wondering if you could just give a couple of quick examples going from what would be what you would do on minimum, the very minimal supervision for the lowest risk up to the high ones. What's the difference in the supervision, the actual behavior of the person who is supervising? I can tell you about the supervision. So for the administrative supervision, we use an automated telephone monitoring system where they check in once a month through an automated process. And it's really it's it's it's sit up where the offender calls up and basically answers questions. Have you done? Have you paid your fines today? Have you completed this assessment? And then they send in the documentation and you verify that. Those are for heavy caseloads. Does it mean that they don't reoffend and pick up new charges and things of that nature? So it's really hard to kind of categorize their behaviors. But is that an automated thing? Or are they actually speaking with a person when they're calling in? No, it's telephone monitoring. It's to an automated system where they call in at a certain time and they answer some questions that are pre-programmed in this system. It's designed to manage large caseloads such as this. We have a very high call on rate. I mean, it's like in the 90% call on rate, which which is I think is absolutely amazing that we have our population calling in at a very high rate because it's in a 90% tile. I mean, I don't think I make 90% of my meetings on time. So I mean, so that's really good, right? And it addresses a lot of the evidences as you apply your resources and your energies into those that are the highest risk and the most risky. And that's what we do. For someone that is at our highest level of supervision, we may or may not have them on electronic monitoring. We may or may not have on an alcohol monitoring system. We will have fuel checks at their residence. We will see them weekly. We will have just more intense and frequent contact with them. And so that's kind of the spectrum. So your higher your risk, the more attention you get from the department. And that's what the evidence tells us how we should address it. And by activities, it's not necessarily just pure supervision. As you put them in the right programming, you focus your resources on that population to address the behavior. Okay, good. Thanks. Also, can you give me a rough idea of how many people a field officer is managing? So we do have case law caps set in statute and they range from for the administrative. It's kind of this, it's not really a set number. It's as much as administrative system can handle. We have that around give or take 300 around the cap. That depends. We have a lot of flexibility with that. When you get over to the risk management side for youthful offenders or for individuals that are 25 and under is capped at 25, 23 and under is capped at 25 to one for listed offenders, which are your sex offenders and domestic violence offenders and anyone convicted of a listed offense. It is 45 to one for a non lifted risk management case flow. It's 60 to one. We try to keep our case loads under the 45 to one, just because the case would just sit up in a way that a lot of times the non listed population can be the most intense needed. They could be your substance abuse and the very, you know, high needs group and and and just because or not for a non listed, the energy needed to supervise on can be a lot higher. So generally, most of our case loads are are under the 45 to one cap for the risk management population. Good. Thank you. Thanks. So you said earlier that do you prefer us not to manage the low risk people, but but administrative management is that's what that is, right? I'm trying to understand. Right. So administrative supervision is really the focus of that is the completion of the probation conditions that have been assigned by the court. So there's not a lot of case management involved. We don't do a lot of higher level assessments with them. They get screened and they'll have a handful of conditions. They're generally on for for low and property crimes, not low end. I mean, there may be property crimes or some other non violent offenses of that nature. And then we would address it, either whatever the conditions are set by the court. And that's what the focus is on. When someone is in the risk management side, we focus on case management and and with conditions allowing address the behaviors and the risks that put the individual under a custody to begin with. That's that's a big difference. That's why it's important for probation conditions to best address the the needs of the of the population. And that way, we can focus our attention to behavioral change much more driven in that way and sort of just condition completion. Behavioral change being with the medium and high risk groups. Yes. Yes, okay. And then you also seem to be making a distinction between low risk and and and low severity or of the of the offense. Correct. So can you talk about that a little bit more? So so risk scores. So we we do risk assessments, which are actual tables, which would indicate that someone with the similar scoring would reoffend at a certain rate. So high risk generally would have someone that would have substance abuse issues may have unstable living environments, bad social economic friends, negative attitudes and beliefs. So so those so the risk scores are really driven to the the that set categories. Probability of reoffending. So someone that is high risk or very high risk could be in the 7080 90 percentile to reoffend. So that is reoffends is around risk. It also drives the needs. So high risk most likely would have high needs and certain domain areas of those risk assessments, mental health, substance abuse, housing, etc. that would be addressed through services to to reduce that risk of the individual. Severity is the impact is the offense. For example, a bad check is a very low severity offense. Homicide is a very high severity. So we, you know, as far as our supervision levels assessment that we do for probationers determine if they go to risk management or are administrative supervision, offence severity has a huge component to play on that. And there are just certain offenses that no matter how low your risk is, you go to risk management. You know, there are some there are some crimes that are kind of in the middle that have a moderate severity. But if the individual is very low risk, we don't need to supervise them with all the resources we can address that behavior through the administrative supervision. So it's kind of a scale between the two is determines where we slot them as far as kind of what bucket we put them in as far as risk management or administrative supervision. So it's a combination of risk and a combination of severity. That helps. So it's possible that somebody would be there, their offense would be a bad check. But the likelihood of them of them doing it again is about 100%. And you'd be careful with that person somehow. It depends how they we do have some ability for over an underwrite. Sorry to say that again, we do have some ability with our assessments for it over to underwrite. So someone that may be on for a bad check, but the last five times you supervise them, they have ended ended with new reoffenses or that we couldn't move them into risk management. It's really about trying, you know, the goal with those sorters and those screams is to make sure that we are applying the right level of intensity to the case that's appropriate. Okay, great. Thank you. And I think that's also true when you become looking at incarceration and this low risk to reoffend, low severity of crime, moderate risk to reoffend, high severity of crime, all of those different gradients was all being looked at and started to be put in place back in the late 90s under Commissioner Gorchick. And we were incarcerating a lot of folks taking up a hard bed at that time was like 30, 40,000 a year for low risk, low severity of crimes. They were taken up a hard bed. And Commissioner Gorchick at that time said those folks should be repairing the harm back home in the community. They should not be taken up a hard bed. The hard beds should be taken up with those folks who have moderate risk, high severity of crime, high risk, high severity of crime. Those are the folks who really should be taking up a hard bed. The other folks, let's deal with them in a separate way. So it's more restorative and more repairing the harm that was created back in the community. So those initiatives and that shift really started in the late 90s. And that's why now for folks who are incarcerated, we're dealing with the toughest cases. We're not dealing with those late DUI cases, so DUI one or DUI two. We're not dealing with those who are incarcerated now. As some folks from DOC said last year, it's going to take a lot for somebody to become incarcerated. And I don't remember who said that within DOC, but that was the testimony we received last year. So that's some of the history here in terms of what's happened within our correctional facilities. And Dale, you've been here for a lot of that. Well, here's now I've been in this position. Right. So Kurt has a question. I have to scoot out because I'm due for my second shot today at 10 of 12. So I have to scoot out. So Kurt has a question. We just had Bryn come on. Bryn is going to give us a walk through a best 45, which is very similar in a way to earn time sort of for folks who are on probation. Is there an opportunity if they're really doing well on probation to allow them to shorten their term on probation if they're complying with all the requirements? And this is a follow up from last year for the folks in our committee. We did a lot of work on this. And then we had council state governments weigh in on it. And this is as 45 as a result of that work. So I'm going to shift it over to Sarah. Okay. Kurt, you have a question. And I will see you all on the floor at quarter after one. And then we'll go from there with the floor amendments. Okay. Thanks, Alison. We're just going to do the walkthrough and we'll be getting into a deeper afterward. Come off the floor with the folks from the council and state government. So okay. Walkthrough best 45 and Dale will be helpful if you could also stay on just in case. It'd be great. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. So go ahead, Kurt, you. You what? You had your hand up. Sorry. Yes, I do. Okay. What you've described this using the risk of reoffending and the severity of the fence to kind of determine the level of supervision. You've kind of spoken to that with regard to probation. Is it mirrored in parole and furlough? Is that all work pretty much the same? So with justice for investment, January this year, we've changed our supervision practices to be more geared based on risk and less on legal status. So we have supervision levels and risk management one through four. So level four individual will be supervised the same regardless of the legal status. So a furlough, a probationer and a parolee would be supervised at the same intensity. We used to separate with illegal statuses. Our furlough is at a higher level, but based on some of the recommendations and working with councils of state government and making determinations and making decisions that would impact on justice for investment, we made it more of a risk-based how we apply our intensity. We're trying to make the legal statuses less of a variable on how the department supervises. Okay. Good. Thank you. Well, Dale, thank you so much. I think I don't see any more questions and I think our friend here, legal counsel is here. So if you can stick around, if you are able to, we'd love to keep you in the room. But if not, we understand a few other things to go. So I think we're going to shift gears here. And Bryn, great to have you here. And I think what we're here now, we're going to do a little walk through of S45. And have you sent this to us or are you thinking that you'll share it on the screen? What is your preferred method? So it should be posted on your committee information page, but I'm happy to share my screen. That's what I typically do in this committee. So that's a good idea. Okay. Yeah. So I'll turn it over to you and we'll let you do the walk. How do you want to do it? You want to walk through the whole thing or take questions along the way? I'm happy to do and here at the committee's pleasure. So however you'd like to handle it is fine with me. Okay. So why don't we do this? Like if people have questions, raise your hand. But I think it's helpful to let Bryn get through the draft or the language and we'll let you take it from here. Okay. Sounds good. So good morning committee for the record. Bryn here from legislative council. I'm going to share my screen so that you can see the bill. Let me know if that works. Yes, we can see it. And usually I zoom in a little bit so people can see it better. Is that better? Okay. That's great. Thanks. Okay. So the chair introduced this bill a little bit. I'll just say a few more words about that. The members of the committee who were on this committee last year will remember that this was originally a part of the justice reinvestment to bill. You've heard a lot of testimony about this particular idea. So in 2019, the justice center recommended that Vermont reform its probation discharge process as a part of that justice reinvestment to bill. And really what happened was the stakeholders couldn't come to an agreement about how to move forward with a policy for early discharge from probation if probationers didn't pose a risk to the public. So this the policy that's set out in S45 really reflects a compromise that was reached by the stakeholders for a process to presumptively release probationers at the midpoint of their probation term if they don't pose a risk to the community or to the victim. And if they're compliant with their programming that has to do with risk reduction and rehabilitation, that's required as a part of their conditions of probation. So that's just a preface. I'm going to jump right into the bill now. Section one sets out a new purpose of probation section at the beginning of the probation chapter that really puts forward the policy of the state of Vermont with respect to probation. So it provides that the purpose is to rehabilitate offenders, reduce the risk that they're going to commit a subsequent offense, and to protect the victim and the community. So that's pretty straightforward policy language there. And now the next two sections of the bill really get into how the policy is implemented, and I'm going to do something a little strange, which is that I'm going to jump from section two to three, and then come back to section two. Because what section two does is that it talks about how the court has to respond when DOC files a motion to discharge a probationer early. And section three deals with how the Department of Corrections is supposed to make that decision. So they kind of happen in reverse order chronologically, so I think it'll make more sense to the committee. If I talk about section three first, hopefully that doesn't confuse anybody too much. So I'm just going to scroll down to section three. So this is the section of law that requires the Commissioner of Corrections to review the record of every probationer that's serving a specified term of probation during the month prior to the midpoint of that probationer's term. If the probationer meets the criteria, I'm going to scroll down to where the criteria are. So here we are, review and recommendation for discharge. So this is existing law that says Commissioner has to review these records the month prior to the midpoint. And current law says that they may file a motion requesting the sentencing court to dismiss. So the change here is that they still have to make that midpoint review the month prior to the probationer's midpoint, but now they shall file a motion if the probationer meets the criteria that are set out in these subsections A through C below. So if the probationer meets these criteria, the Commissioner has to file a motion requesting that the court discharge the remainder of the probation term at the midpoint. So subsection A, these are the conditions that if a probationer is to be eligible for a midpoint discharge, they must meet these three criteria. The first one is that the person has not been found to have violated a condition of their probation within the previous six months. So they can't have been adjudicated as violating their conditions in the six months prior to the midpoint review. B, the person cannot be serving a sentence for a certain set of specific crimes. Those crimes include sexual assault, domestic assault, or lewd and lascivious conduct with the child. So those are the three categories of offenses for which a person cannot be eligible for early discharge from probation. And then finally, sub C, the person has to have completed any risk reduction or rehabilitative services, the duration of which are set and knowable at the outset of probation and that they're required as a condition of probation. So this specific language was talked about quite a bit in the Senate. And the idea here is that, and I'm sure that Dale can jump in if he wants to, but there's all kinds of conditions that are placed on a person that may be ongoing. So for example, like drug treatment, AA meetings, attending AA meetings or something, that could be an ongoing requirement that could be seen as rehabilitative. But the idea here is that any finite duration services that are assigned and required as a part of the person's probation at the outset of probation have to be completed in order for a person to be considered for a midpoint discharge. I hope that's clear. Nope, I have a question on that. I don't know. You wanted to wait till we go all the way through it? Go ahead, Kerry. Why don't you ask the question? Can the conditions of probation change such that there would be new conditions added after the initial time that they were set and knowable? This is probably a question for Mr. Crook. They can't be modified. The court can modify conditions after they originally have been set, but generally it will take some type of action for that to happen. For example, a violation of probation could result in an amendment of the conditions of supervision. The court sets those conditions, so they would have to go back to court in order for them to change. And so, but that doesn't cause a problem with this paragraph when it says set and knowable at the outset of probation. I do not believe so because I believe what would happen after violation, they would reset the term of supervision. Or they could reset the term of supervision. Okay. Okay. I think I know we're going to come back and revisit a good amount of this, but, but Kurt, did you have your question answered for now? Yeah. Yes, I'm fine. Thank you. All right. Okay. I'm going to keep going then. So the next subdivision is D2. And this language here provides that if this is this sets out what happens if the person doesn't meet those criteria, or if the court declines the person for an early discharge and we'll get to that part when we get, when we go back to section two. So if those criteria aren't met, or if the court denies that motion to discharge that's filed by the department, then commissioner has to file a motion requesting the same thing that the sentencing court discharge the person or discharge the probation term once the probationer does meet the criteria set up in subdivision one that we just went through. And then lastly in this section subdivision three, this requires the prosecutor's office to make a reasonable effort to notify any victim of record of any motion that's filed to reduce the probationer's term at the midpoint. And then it defines reasonable effort as contacting the victim by first class mail at their last known address and telephone at their last known phone number. Okay, so now I'm going to scroll back to section two and talk about what happens once that motion is filed with the court and what the court's determination is. So here we have the, this is the section of law that directs the court to presumptively terminate a person's probation term. If the commissioner files a motion to discharge pursuant to that section three that we just went through. So you see that language in B one, so upon the commissioner's motion to discharge the sentencing court shall terminate the period that's the presumptive termination and discharge the person at the midpoint of their probation term unless two things the prosecutor seeks a continuation of probation within 21 days of receipt of the commissioner's motion to discharge and either either one of the following factors is true either a the court finds by a preponderance of the evidence that termination and discharge will present a risk to the victim or to the community or the court finds both the first thing that has to happen is the prosecutor has to seek a continuation and the court finds by clear and convincing evidence which is a higher standard of evidence that the probationer is not substantially in compliance with those conditions of probation that are related to their rehabilitation or to victim and community safety. So you can see this is kind of a mirror reflection of what the eligibility criteria is for the commissioner when they're doing their review. So this is kind of a second check that the court is going to take a look at this as well and if the court finds that based on these standards of proof that either the victim or the community will not be protected if the probationer is discharged early or if the probationer is not actually substantially in compliance with those conditions then the court can deny and then you see here in the language and subdivision two if the court does deny grant the prosecutor's motion deny the motion to discharge it can continue probation for the full term as it stands or for any portion of that term and then this next sentence says that the court as a part of its as a part of its looking at this case reviewing this case it also has to review the conditions of probation and remove any conditions that are no longer necessary for the remainder of the term. So Bryn let me I have a quick question myself in subsections A and B that this is really like another layer or like you said a second check on what DOC is doing like DOC will recommend with this this this piece of legislation DOC would recommend somebody to be their conditions of unparallel B what is it terminated rescinded what is the right term right it provides that their their probation is discharged at the discharge okay and so this is just like another say another safety check right another layer of protection yeah because that language you can see that the language is really quite similar the requirements are the same that you're and it goes back to section one which is laying out the policy for probation which is to protect the victims and the community and also to make sure that an offender doesn't reoffend and that's where the rehabilitative and risk reduction services and programming come in. Okay great thank you for that I see that Representative Morgan has a question as well so why don't you go ahead Michael? Okay uh maybe I'm not sure if I'm getting ahead of you Bryn but I'm just looking at to see am I getting ahead of you? That's right where I am so okay okay so it talks about that and you speak ineligible for just do if they haven't paid that back right so the idea is and you know going back to what what um we were just talking about the the policy of probation what the point of probation is. Yeah I just I guess I just I just kind of just missed that um that's why I'm re-asked and sorry but I don't know I haven't I haven't gone through that part yet oh okay okay that's important I couldn't tell if you'd actually addressed it or not because I'm just reading that and it made me scratch my head a little bit with what um what would be the hammer I guess would be the term I would use to see that that is made whole or made good I guess. Right are you talking about the restitution piece? Yes. Yeah subsea provides it if a person hasn't completed paying their restitution or um fees or surcharges that that alone shall not make them ineligible for that early discharge um and so I imagine you're going to hear from some witnesses about this um there was some conversation in the senate about it um and I the conversation in the senate really came back to the idea that the the the purpose of of probation is to protect victims and to reduce recidivism and not to keep people on supervision um for failure failure to pay so um there is there is a person can be held in contempt if they don't pay their restitution there are um by removing the supervision that doesn't remove all um means of ensuring that a person pays their restitution I'm just not convinced that that may happen would be my concern but all right thank you Michael Michael I know we're going to be discussing a lot more of that yeah yeah yeah no we'll we'll get into it deeper I I just yep got it all right thank you all right thanks friend I'm going to let you okay here we go on all right so I'm going to skip section three since we looked at that already sorry about the jumping around here um and go down to section four so this is a report that's required by the department of corrections this summer beginning this summer I'm sorry so starting on July 1st of this year it requires the department to collect certain data about this point review process requires them to collect data on the number of probation discharge or probation term reduction motions that are filed by DOC um keep track of the number of probation terms that were reduced or terminated as a part of this midpoint review process and keep track of the amount of time it's actually reduced from probation terms as a result of um this presumptive mid probation term reduction um by the court and then they're required to report uh to justice oversight in August of next year and the following year with the data that's been collected and any recommendations for further legislative action to improve the probation midpoint review process and then lastly um there's a directive to the sentencing commission during the 2021 legislative interim to review the probation statutes and also review the 2020 report of the Pew charitable trusts um that found that states can shorten probation and protect public safety and to consider whether or not should limit the duration of probation terms for misdemeanor offenses to two years um currently that we do not limit um probation terms for misdemeanors to two years and then it requires that in October of this year the commission um come back to justice oversight committee with its recommendation on whether or not um misdemeanor probation terms should be limited to two years okay and then the effective date um is July 1st okay well thank you so much for doing this walk through with us um I see in section five work I think this afternoon the committee is going to hear from the council and state governments about the that December 2020 report so just so the committee is aware that's happening today um so um maybe we could um we have a few questions I see and see representative Dolan has her hand up yeah thanks and um I apologize if I missed this um but just wondering if there's any piece in this that is around victim notification or I'm just thinking about our current bill S18 with earned time um and that is a piece of it of making sure victims know up front like this is how it's all going to play out I don't think I heard any of that but did I miss that is that a piece of this at all it is so it's in section three that um the prosecutor's office is required to make a reasonable effort to notify victims of any motion that's filed for an early discharge a midpoint review discharge um the language is right here at subdivision three and then it defines what um reasonable effort means um for the prosecutors and that's once somebody's being reviewed but it's not let's start letting victims know at sentencing or in plea bargaining how probation could unfold right so I think that the senate um and you may hear this testimony the senate did hear testimony that that's happening that um prosecutors when they're talking to victims about uh the sentence that um they're talking about the midpoint review process and the possibility that a person could be discharged at that at that time so I believe that that's happening you will hear a testimony that that's happening um okay great thanks that's an important question Karen thank you for asking that one um are there other questions that the committee has at this point uh represent Taylor uh yes another probably another well I'm beginning to wander off the parts that were actually underlined but um I think my first question sticks with that so um my understanding is that this and this is a question more for mr crook than than um counselor here the uh my understanding is that the midpoint review has not been heavily used or in the past and this is kind of to bolster it up and get it to be used more I'm wondering if there's any um if you see any problems with uh the impact of that increased work or is or is there that much increased work uh on the go ahead not for the department uh so this was actually one of the recommendations that the department made around looking at midpoint review and making it more of a presumptive process um as with the certain processes every county can be a little bit different how they view midpoint reviews um our language we that was a original midpoint review that this is replacing the department shall review um but there could be a lot of um resistance upstream so what this does it makes it so that it really doesn't change the department's processes a whole lot we review the case at the midpoint we'll make the recommendation based on the criteria set where there's going to be a difference as it falls in the court and probably more the the state's attorney is to look at the case and object and then find based on the the levels do they meet the criteria for the discharge this is to make it more presumptive than what it currently is okay um also uh the in the section three the conditions probation um and it much lists woman from my my quick being it's may and it's this is the limit so the only ones can use for conditions um probation is that jive with your understanding of what can be used for conditions of probation or there any that need to be needed or taken away or what um sir you broke up through the first chunk of your question so I got every other word I got so I'm not quite sure what you're asking I think we all missed you a little bit okay but in the interest of time I'll skip every other word and that way you can know I'm curious as to uh it lists the in section three the conditions of probation and it says that it includes these it doesn't say and any others that you want to add do you think this list is comprehensive enough or there's some that you think need to be added or taken away with conditions this supervision or really um there's a lot of case law around conditions of supervision for probation uh that have to meet certain uh thresholds they're really at the discretion of of the court and generally done through plea agreements um uh so whether maybe some standardized uh language and and the statute it's it's really the conditions can be um very tailor made for the individuals and through the individual court processes so truly it's that might be a better question for uh Judge Gerson or the Matt Valerio or uh John Campbell uh okay also I would just point out that number 18 does provide that um the court can require any other conditions that are reasonably related to the person's uh rehabilitation okay there's a catch all good thank you well Bryn this is really helpful and I think I know I would encourage um the committee we're going to be this is the beginning we're just beginning to dive in and take some time um reading through this and I know that we're probably going to be we'll have more questions and we'll be hearing um some testimony this afternoon after we're off the floor um but Bryn maybe you could just give us another kind of overarching framing of this when you say the stakeholders who were involved um needed to come to an agreement um well or they didn't come to an agreement when we passed um I guess Act 148 and this was a remaining piece can you just define in this with this legislation who those stakeholders are from your perspective sure so Dale Kinchemin because I think that they worked um they they worked together during the crafting of S45 too but my understanding is that it was the department and the state's attorneys and um the defense the defender general's office um were the primary people who got together and please Dale let me know if there and I believe the rights people also yep I believe the attorney general's office was there I believe uh Mr. Shearer was here and I do believe there was input from um and I uh uh uh Farnell from the victim's advocate Chris Bennell so there was a was a group um that chimed in on this that representing the victims uh the correct that and most of their languages around the notification and then we had and that's where the reasonable attempt to notify the victims of the record before an early discharge great all right that thank you for that um so you know I think if if there aren't any other questions I think um I'd like to wrap up because we have a bill on the floor and I want everybody to have lunch and um and people can uh maybe take some time and read over read over this um and I know I'm sure there'll be more questions so um unless there are other questions I want to thank you Brynne for joining us it's always lovely to have you in our virtual committee room my pleasure thank you for meeting all right thank you thank you Brynne all right so I think we can I think we can wrap up off on off of YouTube we'll be back our depending on how long we're on the floor um we're scheduled to be back in here I think it's at 2 30 um we'll be having um some folks from the council and state governments um uh present the their two um documents that have been posted to our web page that they'll be working through with us