The Daily Citizen, Dalton, GA

Local News

Discussion

Welcome to our online comments feature. To join the discussion, you must first register with Disqus and verify your email address. Once you do, your comments will post automatically. We welcome your thoughts and your opinions, including unpopular ones. We ask only that you keep the conversation civil and clean. We reserve the right to remove comments that are obscene, racist or abusive and statements that are false or unverifiable. Repeat offenders will be blocked. You may flag objectionable comments for review by a moderator.
comments powered by Disqus
December 15, 2009

Day reporting center goal to ‘tackle recidivism’

Mark Millican

Officials with the Northwest Day Reporting Center in Dalton know they face a daunting task — finding jobs for their clients here. The program, new to Georgia, tries to help criminal offenders with substance abuse problems get their lives back on track.

“It’s going to be mighty difficult,” said Rod Weaver, the new administrator over Whitfield and Murray counties who will be working to “tackle recidivism” among probationers and parolees. “We’ll be working with the Department of Labor and with (temporary job) services, as well as beating the streets to find employment for our people.”

Weaver and around 80 other attendees from public safety, law enforcement, the court system and corrections programs attended a ribbon cutting at the suite of offices at 307 S. Hamilton St. Tuesday afternoon. The non-residential program targets “low to moderate risk” offenders and allows them to stay with their families. It has three phases: 30 to 45 days of detoxification and behavior stabilization; two to six months focusing on sobriety, job training and “mandatory” employment (including surveillance by officers); and after care including drug testing.

State Department of Corrections commissioner Brian Owens agreed that finding jobs in the two-county area — racked with double-digit unemployment — is “going to be a challenge.”

“We have probation officers and employment specialists,” he said. “If (the clients) are trying hard and there’s no jobs available, they won’t go back to jail. But they have to put in an effort.”

Roger Waldrop, a board member of the Department of Corrections, said Dalton’s facility will be one of 13 in the state after Thomasville opens its office on Monday.

“With the economy the way it is, it’s not the popular thing to do to spend money on prisons,” he said. “The main thing the public wants is to keep (parolees) out of sight ... but there needs to be an alternative to hard prison.”

Waldrop said it takes $15 a day to put a person through a day reporting program, but costs taxpayers $50 a day to house a prisoner.

“One in 31 adults in Georgia is in prison or jail, or is on probation or parole — we like to overachieve in Georgia,” Owens joked, then turned serious when he said the correction system in Georgia is a $1.1 billion expense.

“There has to be a better solution,” he said, “and this is one of them.”

Along with employment and counseling, day reporting also pulls together mental health resources, the judicial system, Department of Family and Children Services and law enforcement.

“It’s one of the most effective (prison) sentencing alternatives available,” said Joe Baden, the statewide manager.

George Shirilla with the Conasauga Drug Court, a program that is open to first-time offenders in the judicial circuit, said day reporting may “inter-mesh” with his agency on a referral basis.

Text Only
Local News