Proactive
Policing vs. Reactive Policing in Corrections
By
Carl R. ToersBijns, former deputy warden, ASPC Eyman, Florence, AZ
In most cases, the Arizona Department of
Corrections Officers and administrators have to react to a variety of critical
incidents, situations and scenarios in an ad hoc manner due to lack of planning
or preparation for such events. What we have when such events occur is total
havoc of organizational resources misused and abused rather than efficiently or
effectively deployed and able to manage the situation in a calm and orderly
fashion.
Thus it is fair to say that there are minimal
efforts made to avoid a proactive approach towards the prevention of criminal
activities within the prisons and lack of effective measures implemented to
prevent such criminal acts to occur. Although there are common approaches [best
practices] available to deal with this issue, the ADOC chooses to manage by
crisis as this is their main and only ideology to ineffectively manage crime,
their prison’s security functionality, technology and the majority of their
incarceration policies.
Rather than being proactive this current
administration chooses to be reactive in nature and frequently fail the
public’s trust in their efforts to aid both the public’s safety as well as the
safety of those incarcerated and assigned to work inside of our state prisons
today.
In Arizona some things remain constant since 2009.
In policing there is no change. The Department of Corrections is not a focused
group as it fails to learn from lessons in the past and continues to mishandle
major flaws with little or no change in management styles. Only in those areas
where there is a federal grants involved do they improve their services in
order to gain access to this dangling carrot that provides them funding for
essential services.
However, even in those federally funded programs
there is room for improvement as it is merely set up to meet minimum standards
and often weakly enforced to show nothing but the desired results on paper rather
than making an intentional or practical change in operations or behaviors.
The PREA Act is one example as the ADOC continues
to punish those who report sexual abuse or misconduct and allows the
victimization of both lesbian and gay prisoners’ rights to be violated and
ignored by staff. Not only is there a need for policy change but in a cultural
change as well.
Another example of mismanagement is the manner the
ADOC handles the severely mentally ill persons. It allows and condones a high
number of suicides, self mutilations and death inside its prisons with no
effective counter plan to intervene, reduce or prevent these events as it
ignores the problem rather than handling it with today’s technology and
methodology used by other states to create safer and more orderly therapeutic
environments for those needing stability and programming for mental health
treatment.
This agency has been unsuccessful particularly in
learning and adapting to new correctional techniques and behaviors. Instead of
focusing on a reduction in prison population, they plan for expansion of beds.
Instead of hitting the bricks for prisons corrections, they ask for more
prisons to be built.
Talking to people working inside these prisons, it
is obvious that there is no priority in reducing spending and reducing the
violence that is occurring on a daily basis by inmate gangs that are running
open yards and charging taxes and other levies to those that are doing their
time but have to either join a gang or pay to coexist on one of these yards. To
refuse payment is a sentence for excessive physical punishment that often
results in hospitalization or medical treatment for injuries often not reported
for fear of relations.
Policies haven’t changed and it’s likely they
won’t until the death count exceed those tolerable limits set by the directors
in Phoenix as manageable and normal. In the meantime, drugs rule the yards and
run amuck. Assaults are increasingly common and more severe as correctional
officers risk being harmed or killed by those that enforce the gang rules
inside our prisons.
This agency could be more successful if it adopted
the guidelines of the S.A.R.A model that is considered to be a process that is
workable and logical when applied to problem solving measures and it works. The
main obstacle of this concept is the resistance by those who refuse to “buy in”
on the concept and insist on doing it the old way of lessons learned and taking
reactive measures to avoid dealing with it again but not taking into
consideration other variances of other major problems that may occur.
The ADOC needs to implement a proverbial buy in
order for it to work. Without this embracement of change policies will remain
ineffective and antiquated in content and unable to provide guidance to those
working the line and keeping the peace.
The bottom line is if you want the ADOC to be
successful, the department has to implement this model in all their prisons and
allow the process to exist, grow and expand to the levels it can reach if fully
integrated into the policy making process that is lacking the right elements to
fulfill effective policy making today.
The SARA Model
A commonly used problem-solving method is the SARA model (Scanning,
Analysis, Response and Assessment). The SARA model contains the following
elements:
Scanning:
- Identifying
recurring problems of concern to the public and the agency.
- Identifying
the consequences of the problem for the prisons and the agency.
- Prioritizing
those problems.
- Developing
broad goals.
- Confirming
that the problems exist.
- Determining
how frequently the problem occurs and how long it has been taking place.
- Selecting
problems for closer examination.
Analysis:
- Identifying
and understanding the events and conditions that precede and accompany the
problem.
- Identifying
relevant data to be collected.
- Researching
what is known about the problem type.
- Taking
inventory of how the problem is currently addressed and the strengths and
limitations of the current response.
- Narrowing the
scope of the problem as specifically as possible.
- Identifying a
variety of resources that may be of assistance in developing a deeper
understanding of the problem.
- Developing a
working hypothesis about why the problem is occurring.
Response:
- Brainstorming
for new interventions.
- Searching for
what other communities with similar problems have done.
- Choosing
among the alternative interventions.
- Outlining a
response plan and identifying responsible parties.
- Stating the
specific objectives for the response plan.
- Carrying out
the planned activities.
Assessment:
- Determining
whether the plan was implemented (a process evaluation).
- Collecting
pre– and post–response qualitative and quantitative data.
- Determining
whether broad goals and specific objectives were attained.
- Identifying
any new strategies needed to augment the original plan.
- Conducting
ongoing assessment to ensure continued effectiveness.
November 18, 2012
No comments:
Post a Comment