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SALT LAKE CITY — With more people out on parole in recent years and more people going through the court systems, paperwork backlogs have prevented parole agents from helping those they’re assigned to adjust to life away from bars.
That’s what Utah’s Department of Corrections Adult Probation and Parole officials say, and a portion of Gov. Gary Herbert’s 2020 budget proposes $1.8 million for 22 new hires to address it. The hires wouldn’t be for more certified peace officers; rather, the division is seeking to add civilian employees to do paperwork and allow agents more time in the field with their supervision assignments.
“There’s considerable workload for agents across the state (right now),” said Dan Blanchard, adult probation and parole director at the Department of Corrections. “The more people we’re supervising, the more work that becomes. It kind of has a compound effect.”
When fully employed, there can be upward of 316 parole agents that cover people throughout the state, according to Blanchard. Agents are assigned “the role of police officer, court adviser, mentor and social worker,” the Department of Corrections states on its website. A portion of the job includes presentence investigation reports for the court system that are used to help determine a person’s court sentence, for treatment programs and other internal uses.
At the same time, Herbert’s proposal states Utah’s parole agents supervised about 19,000 offenders in 2018 — a 19 percent increase over the previous five years. Adding in the thousands of reports for new offenders, there are a lot of people agents are assigned to keep track of.
“We’ve seen an ongoing growth in the number of people on both supervision and the number of requests for presentence investigations,” Blanchard said. “It takes a substantial amount of manpower to complete those reports.”
So the division’s plan is to hire people to specifically to work on reports. The new hirees would research someone found or has pleaded guilty of a crime, look into background information (such as employment history and education), their previous criminal history in the state and elsewhere, and look into risk factors for reoffense. They’d take all that information and put into one document.
The use of those reports is wide-ranging. While not the only source of external input, they help a judge impose a sentence, help parole agents figure out how to supervise them and the conditions of supervision to help them succeed post-conviction.
The reports also help Utah’s Board of Pardons decide conditions for a person’s parole. Blanchard explained the reports are the “foundation” for the plan on how persons will meet requirements set up from a parole board.
If approved during the 2019 legislative session, Adult Probation and Parole would likely start hiring the 22 new employees July 1 — which is when the new budget takes effect, Blanchard said.
It’s a challenge for them ... People succeed through supervision, but the more that’s on an agent's plate, it’s more difficult for an agent to meet all those needs an offender may be having.
–Dan Blanchard
The division’s hope is that will free parole agents to spend more time in the field, helping the 19,000 Utahns meet their probation or parole requirements through supervision.
“We’re looking to see people successfully work through supervision and meet their conditions to be released and to move forward without (parole and probation involvement). But there are times where we have to follow up on violations,” Blanchard said. “It’s a challenge for them and part of the challenge is — we’re focused on helping people succeed. People succeed through supervision, but the more that’s on an agent's plate, it’s more difficult for an agent to meet all those needs an offender may be having.”
Herbert’s proposed $19 billion state budget has Utah’s Department of Corrections in mind for other reasons, too. One of Herbert’s largest talking points in the 2020 budget recommendations is $125 million in new one-time funds and $23 million in new ongoing funds toward the new Utah State Prison, which is under construction in Salt Lake City’s northwest quadrant.
The reason for that money is Utah has a “working rainy day fund” that has amassed $750 million and the extra money helps the state pay for the project without putting together a bond on the project, Herbert’s camp wrote in the proposal.
Other points in the budget are money directed to peace officer training, investigating restricted persons trying to buy firearms and more DNA sexual assault kit testing. Those proposals combine for nearly another $2 million.
