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St. Lawrence County jail taking new approach to corrections programs

Posted 3/12/19

By ANDY GARDNER North Country This Week CANTON -- Drug and alcohol problems are leading to the vast majority of local incarcerations, and in response a local jail official is trying to steer …

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St. Lawrence County jail taking new approach to corrections programs

Posted

By ANDY GARDNER
North Country This Week

CANTON -- Drug and alcohol problems are leading to the vast majority of local incarcerations, and in response a local jail official is trying to steer correctional services toward true rehabilitation.

Rodney Votra, St. Lawrence County Correctional Facility Director of Inmate Programs, told the county Opioid Task Force that he no longer sees their work as “babysitting” and believes inmates gaining skills while locked up will reduce recidivism.

"A lot of people who come to our facility don't necessarily belong in our facility, but we don't have the mental health facilities, the rehab facilities,” Votra said. "The majority of our population is there for drug and alcohol addiction issues. If somebody is there for a burglary, it's probably because of their addiction issues.”

Part of the shift on how corrections handles inmates is getting everyone who works at the jail to understand that crime and recidivism for the most part aren’t an issue of moral deficiency.

"How do we train our staff to understand there's a much bigger picture ... than housing inmates, make sure they follow the rules and let them go when their sentence is up?" Votra said. "We want people to realize there's a bigger picture here ... the addiction issues ... the mental health issues."

He said the first step for new inmates is a medical and risk analysis screening. They will ask the inmates if they have a chemical dependency problem, and the inmate will often freely admit it.

"They let us know what they're doing, they let us know what they're on. It's for their safety and that's how we present it,” Votra said.

He said they are offering inmates a new drug designed to ease drug cravings -- Vivitrol. It is a shot administered by a physician once per month. It’s an alternative to self-administered medicine like Suboxone or methadone.

"This is a great product,” Votra said. “So many times we're putting drugs into the hands of addicts and letting them try to manage those drugs to try to get over their addiction."

He said they are trying to get inmates started on them months in advance to help ease their cravings, since some will invariably not be able to get them on the outside because it’s expensive without insurance coverage.

"Once they get released, they’re at the mercy of their health insurance provider,” Votra said. "In some cases we're starting three or four months before they actually get out.”

"The longer they go through these shots, the less and less the cravings are. The more shots they're getting, the better their rate of success is,” he said.

Since the program is new, he said they don’t yet have hard data on its long-term effect on recidivism.

They are also training inmates, corrections officers and jail staff on the use of naloxone, a drug to reverse the effects of an opioid overdose. It’s sometimes marketed under the brand name Narcan. All inmates are given a naloxone kit when they are discharged, and they are available free for officers and staff to take home.

While inside, Votra said they are trying to get a variety of vocational and life skills programs so that inmates will have an easier time reintegrating upon release, and hopefully staying out of trouble.

Taxpayers don’t pay for the program. The inmates do through their commissary purchases. Money from the commissary account is set aside, and when they get an idea for a new program, Votra calls the state corrections commissioner to make sure they are allowed to fund it with the commissary account.

"To date, all the programs have been eligible,” he said, adding that inmates who cannot afford to buy commissary products are still eligible to participate.

He said they don’t have hard data on which programs are the most successful, since most of them have only been offered for a few years.

"We're just getting to a point now where we'll be able to measure that.” He said they have never been able to provide the programs to this degree.

BOCES offers a program to help those without a high school diploma get an equivalency diploma. They also send a teacher to help with life skills, résumé writing and job interview techniques, which he said is so popular there is a waiting list due to limited classroom space. They also offer occupational education in carpentry, electrical work, plumbing and blueprint reading, and inmates can get a certificate after completing each.

Alcoholics Anonymous and non-denominational chapel service providers come in for spiritual guidance. Step By Step comes from Ogdensburg for peer support. St. Lawrence Valley Prevention Council offers recovery coaching for addicts. Cornell Cooperative Extension sends a horticulturalist who helps inmates grow a garden and teaches them about nature. Inmates earn certificates after 25 hours in the program. The vegetables are used for inmate meals, and surplus is donated to community organizations. The jail also has a chicken coop where inmates can learn how to raise chickens.

"That whole rehabilitation process, teaching people how to do things for themselves ... that self sustainability is important,” Votra said.

And the outdoor activities are not offered to just anyone. The inmates have to be serving a sentence, which means one year or less, and not awaiting trial or transfer.

"We're not taking the hardened criminal out there,” Votra said.

Local colleges send professors and students to teach courses, some for credit and others not, or do activities with the inmates. They bring in fitness classes, book clubs and a game night.

One program through SUNY Potsdam has been a big hit, the Seventh Step Program. It connects formerly incarcerated inmates with those currently serving sentences. When they were about to lose the program, a group of inmates got together and came up with their own, which Votra said he approved after they submitted a formal plan and parameters.

"They call it CTI, or Changes to Incarceration,” he said.

CTI includes taking a life inventory and analyzing what “triggers and factors” may have put them on a path to end up behind bars.

"They are putting together release and relapse prevention programs … it includes their very first memory as a child to what got them there today,” he said. "They are the ones responsible for why they're there ... they are the ones who are ultimately going to be responsible for where they go from there.”