Governor Honors Intake and Assessment Team

Governor Janet Napolitano recognized the Arizona Department of Corrections Intake and Assessment Team at her monthly cabinet meeting for revamping the agency’s intake and reception process at the Arizona State Prison Complex-Phoenix Alhambra Unit.

ADC Director Dora Schriro assembled a work group to review the existing intake practices and improve the efficiency of the process. Members with expertise in their respective disciplines engaged in a review of available assessment instruments to identify the bases of individual inmate’s criminal behavior and lay the foundation for the development of inmates’ Corrections Plan. The result, a smoother, smarter system to classify inmates and a cost savings to the department of $1.2 million.

A main contributor to the cost savings has been the department’s new fast track program, which reduces the number of days an inmate, serving a sentence of six months or less, spends at Alhambra. The fast track process has freed up Alhambra beds, eliminating a backlog of 15 to 20 inmates per day at county jails. These inmates, waiting to be transferred to ADC, were costing the department an average of $46.50 per inmate per day.  

Under the new system, inmates are now being transported from county jails to the Alhambra Intake Center the day following notification from the county.  This has saved ADC approximately $100,000 per month for Fiscal Year 2005.

“The team has put together terrific processes to tackle the many challenges that faced us. There isn’t anything that they can’t do together to admit and classify unprecedented numbers of inmates in record time. This group shines! It’s partnered with sheriffs’ departments whose buy-in was critical and saved taxpayers over $1 million every year in the process," said Schriro.

According to Audrey Burke, Administrator for the Offender Services Bureau, the new intake process is a win-win situation for ADC and county jails.

“County jails don’t have to house inmates for an extended period of time after adjudication, and ADC doesn’t have to pay for it,” said Burke.

The new fast track program was initiated to identify and classify all inmates serving six months or less and and prepare inmates to be transferred to their permanent housing location in 2 days.  The inmates are moved to another ADC facility on the third day. 

Other improvements at the Alhambra Intake Center include:

• Unauthorized property is no longer accepted for incoming inmates at intake.  This has reduced the staff time required to inventory incoming inmate property, and has cut the amount spent on postage by approximately $1,600 per month.
   

• The assessment process has now been automated for literacy testing. The impact of this automation provides an immediate update to AIMS, which allows for staff to begin planning and implementing the inmate’s correction plan.  Automated testing for Substance Abuse, IQ and other assessments will be implemented in July 2005.  ADC has never had an automated system for Substance Abuse; it has previously been a subjective manual review of the Pre-Sentence Investigation Report by the CO III and CO IV’s. The automation has saved money on paper, pencils and staff time.
   

• Cash is no longer accepted at the intake centers for new arrivals from county jail.  The counties now send a check with a list of inmate names for posting to each inmate’s account.  This has eliminated the requirement to count and inventory money, which has resulted in a substantial time saving for staff.