Albany program to offer alternative sentencing

ALBANY — In an effort to cut recidivism rates and to help Municipal Court offenders gain skills that can be put to use in a search for permanent employment, city of Albany officials are preparing to implement an Albany Works program.

City Business Process Improvement Specialist Debra McFadden-Bryant and Human Resources Director Dwight Baker outlined plans for the program at Tuesday’s Albany City Commission meeting.

“This program will take a look at alternative sentencing in the city’s Municipal Court, offer offenders support in self-sufficiency and reduce the recidivism rate,” McFadden-Bryant said. “Using very conservative numbers that we’ve rounded off for simplicity, there were 10,000 citations issues in Municipal Court during a specific snapshot in time (from July to October) by 8,000 offenders. Twenty percent of those offenders had multiple offenses, and there was a 50 percent recidivism rate.”

The Albany Works plan allows Municipal Court judges to sentence offenders to short-term and temporary work projects that the city typically outsources, saving the city money and teaching the offenders “soft skills” as they work off their time.

Chief Municipal Court Judge Willie Weaver gave the Albany Works plan his approval at the meeting.

“I think this program is a good place to start (when it comes to alternative sentencing),” Weaver said. “It may not even turn out to be 100 percent workable, but I believe it will be worth the effort.”

Commissioners B.J. Fletcher and Bobby Coleman offered to lend their support to the program.

Baker said partners in the Albany Works plan, which is set to be implemented in January, so far include the city, Albany State University, Albany Technical College, Aspire, Open Arms, WorkSource Southwest Georgia, Paxen Learning Service, Strive2Thrive and the Municipal Court.

Other action taken by the board at the meeting included:

— Approval of an alcohol license transfer at JMD Food Store at 1800 E. Oglethorpe Blvd.;

— An OK on contracts with Hansen Technologies for annual licenses and software support at a cost of $63,372.27 and with Trees Unlimited for right-of-way clearing and power line maintenance at a cost of $89,000;

— Adoption of an ordinance to increase fines in the city and in Municipal Court to the maximum amount allowed under state law ($1,000 from the current $500);

— Changing of the commission’s annual organizational meeting date from Jan. 9 to Jan. 8. The meeting will be held at 8:30 a.m.;

— Approval of an additional 6-foot-wide easement for utilities at Townplace Suites by Marriott at Kensington Court.

At the conclusion of the business portion of the meeting, Mayor Dorothy Hubbard said the final order of business was to enter into executive session to discuss appointed officials’ evaluations. A motion was made to enter into the closed session, but the motion died for lack of a second. Hubbard was left with no choice but to adjourn the meeting.