Community custody is the portion of a person's criminal sentence served in the community under the supervision of the Department of Corrections (DOC) following release from confinement in a state correctional facility. While on community custody, a person is subject to conditions imposed by the DOC and the sentencing court. The Secretary of the DOC may issue a warrant for the arrest of any person who violates a condition of community custody. A person who violates a condition of community custody may be subject to sanctions.
The DOC must toll a person's term of community custody for any time the person is absent from supervision without prior approval from the supervising entity.
If a person is serving a sentence for a sex offense, the DOC must toll the term of community custody for any time the person is in confinement for any reason. If a person is serving a sentence for any other type of offense, the DOC must toll the term of community custody for any time the person is in confinement, except for:
The Department of Corrections (DOC) must toll a person's term of community custody, irrespective of the category of the underlying offense, for any time the person is:
The requirement to toll a person's term of community custody for any time the person is absent from supervision without prior approval from the supervising entity is eliminated. The separate tolling requirements and exceptions for different categories of criminal offenses are eliminated.
The substitute bill requires the Department of Corrections to toll any term of community custody while the offender is confined for a subsequent felony conviction, including pre-sentence confinement.
(In support) The Department of Corrections struggles to accurately calculate end dates for terms of community custody because the law governing tolling is complex. Corrections staff utilize a variety of sources, including electronic jail records and the Judicial Access Browser System, to manually calculate end dates because tolling information is not readily available through centralized data systems. This inevitably results in mathematical errors where some offenders are supervised for too long and some are not supervised for long enough. This bill eliminates most of these errors by simplifying tolling requirements. Clear and articulable end dates will provide better transparency and help ensure that any administrative resources saved by eliminating complexities in end-date calculations will be reinvested to provide better services, increased programming, and more effective supervision. This bill will likely reduce terms of community custody for some offenders and reduce caseloads for community corrections officers, but it should not affect the number of community corrections officers employed to supervise remaining caseloads.
(Opposed) Community custody should be tolled any time an offender is confined for a subsequent felony conviction, including any pre-sentence confinement. Community custody should also be tolled any time an offender is confined for a subsequent misdemeanor or gross misdemeanor conviction, although doing so may introduce some complexities. Recent changes to state law, such as the presumption of concurrent community custody, already provide offenders opportunities to combine or reduce terms of community custody. This bill further reduces terms of community custody for approximately 1,200 offenders, giving community corrections officers less time to affect positive change. Reducing community corrections officers' caseloads this drastically will result in job loss for corrections staff. It is inappropriate to force a choice between affording technology to accurately calculate tolling or having a sufficient workforce of corrections staff.
(Other) Community corrections officers need sufficient time to affect positive change in their clients and reduce the risk of recidivism. Some treatment programs, such as treatment for domestic violence offenses, take a substantial amount of time to complete. This bill will hinder community corrections officers from having an opportunity to provide adequate supervision of their clients through lengthier treatment programs.
A null and void clause was added, making the bill null and void unless funded in the budget.
(In support) Tolling information is not readily available through data systems, therefore manual calculation of scheduled end dates requires significant staff and resources. Sentence calculations are complex, and they change throughout a person's time while under the jurisdiction of the Department of Corrections. Short stays in incarceration create even more difficulties in calculating end release dates. In addition, the department cannot distinguish jail time related to felony convictions from other jail time. The policy change in this bill was a recommendation from the Sentencing Guidelines Commission and the Criminal Justice Task Force. This will help to simplify tolling and supervision times to provide greater clarity and transparency.
(Opposed) The problem with this bill is that it provides credit for a person being on community supervision when they are neither in the community nor on supervision. It is suggested that the bill be amended to continue to toll supervision while a person is incarcerated in jail for a new offense. In the addition, the savings from this bill should be used for reentry services to assist offenders in successfully reentering the community.
Furthermore, this bill reduces community corrections staff by 51 by the year 2027. Those assumptions are based upon a workload study done back in 2007. Most of these reductions will be record staff and we all have seen what happens when record staff are underfunded. It is suggested that an updated workload study be done considering the changes that have occurred over the last several years. There is concern that the cumulative impact of these collective changes through tolling will reduce the likelihood of reducing criminal behavior through programming.