POLITICS

Why Vermont could close St. Johnsbury prison work camp

April McCullum
Free Press Staff Writer

ST. JOHNSBURY – By mid-afternoon, most of the day’s work is done at the Caledonia Community Work Camp.

About 56 men have returned to their bunk beds and lockers after cutting wood, clearing snow from downtown St. Johnsbury, picking up trash along the highway or dozens of other tasks. The men are nonviolent offenders, and working allows them to whittle down their prison sentences — an option unavailable at the medium-security prison next door.

“It’s teaching them life skills that they haven’t been taught, and it’s nice to see these guys progress,” said Gary Guyer, a work crew leader.

But the work camp is facing an unusual dilemma: Vermont can’t find enough inmates to fill the beds.

Fewer and fewer inmates have the kind of low-level, nonviolent convictions that make them eligible for the work camp. Last fall, the state shuttered one wing of the building and now uses just half of the 112 beds.

Gary Guyer, who is a work crew supervisor at the Caledonia Community Work Camp in St. Johnsbury, is opposed to a proposal being considered by the Legislature that would close the camp. Seen on Friday, March 4, 2016.

The empty space has become a test of how Vermont will adapt to the shifting demands on the state prison system.

Gov. Peter Shumlin wants to respond by closing the whole building, a controversial budget proposal that would save money in the short term, but send 56 more inmates to a private prison in Michigan.

Another option would be to keep the work camp open, but get creative with the types of people who are allowed to live there. If Vermont filled the empty work camp beds with different classifications of inmates, the state could bring dozens of inmates home from Michigan.

Lawmakers are weighing the governor’s idea and alternatives, and a key House policy committee is expected to make a recommendation in the coming days.

Changing times

“Things have changed over the years,” said Alan Cormier, superintendent of the Northeast Correctional Complex, which includes the work camp and the medium-security prison. “When this facility was built in 1993, nonviolent, non-listed misdemeanor crimes were coming to jail – your DWI twos and threes, people writing bad checks, your petty larceny kind of stuff.”

Vermont relies now on other programs to keep nonviolent offenders out of prison, or release them sooner.

“The population the camp was built for are no longer going to jail,” Cormier said. The state is bending over backwards trying to find nonviolent offenders they could move from other prisons into the work camp.

Inmates at the Caledonia Community Work Camp in St. Johnsbury are housed in barracks rather than cells.  The Legislature is considering a proposal to close the camp to save money. Seen on Friday, March 4, 2016.

That’s good news, if you ask state officials.

Lisa Menard, Vermont’s corrections commissioner, called the empty beds in St. Johnsbury “an unfortunate consequence of success.”

Rep. Butch Shaw, R-Pittsford and a member of the House Corrections and Institutions Committee, said the state’s dilemma shows that Vermont’s prison population is “refined” to mostly violent offenders.

Vermont would save approximately $2 million by closing the camp -- mostly by eliminating 22 jobs -- but would need to turn around and pay about $1 million to send additional inmates out of state.

Shumlin says the net savings would help pay for a free semester of college courses for low-income and first-generation college students, a proposal he calls Step Up.

“Let’s use our tax dollars to educate, not incarcerate,” Shumlin said in his January budget address.

But the plan faces plenty of pushback.

Work camp inmates have heard about Shumlin’s plan to shut down their program, said Cormier, the prison superintendent.

“They’re not real happy,” he said.

The Legislature is considering a proposal to close the Caledonia Community Work Camp in St. Johnsbury. Seen on Friday, March 4, 2016.

Guyer, the work camp supervisor who would lose his job if Shumlin's proposal passes, believes Vermont should think twice about shutting down the facility.

Guyer said he heard someone say that work camps are becoming obsolete.

"I wanted to ask him what magic ball he was looking into, because as far as I’m concerned when it comes to seeing the future, it’s nothing but a snow globe,” Guyer said.

And Suzi Wizowaty, who opposes the use of private prisons as executive director of Vermonters for Criminal Justice Reform, is concerned that the governor's proposal would send 56 people out of state.

“The work camps are the best part of corrections," Wizowaty said. "The idea that we would close the work camp and send more people to a private prison -- it's going from the best to the worst."

Al Cormier is superintendent of the Northeast Correctional Complex in St. Johnsbury, which includes the Caledonia Community Work Camp. The Legislature is considering a plan to close the work camp to save money. Seen on Friday, March 4, 2016.

Work camp conversion?

The empty bunk beds rest in darkness at the Caledonia Community Work Camp. If state lawmakers reject the governor's proposal, their next question will be what to do with the prison space.

A number of alternatives have been discussed:

  • St. Johnsbury Police Chief Clem Hood wants the state to consider filling the beds with some nonviolent offenders in the community who seem to need more support to stay out of trouble. “What once used to populate the work camp is now living out in the community, and we're dealing with those folks," Hood said.

  • The Department of Corrections has considered loosening the work camp eligibility criteria so that more of Vermont's prison inmates would qualify. The state could allow people convicted of arson or caught with contraband to join a work crew, for example. But the Department of Corrections has yet to find a reasonable eligibility standard that fills 56 additional beds.

  • Vermont could save more money ($1,263,192) by using the beds for inmates with felony convictions or inmates who need medication-assisted drug treatment, who would not participate in work crews. “We would certainly prefer to see the work camp full than to see 22 people without jobs, quite frankly,” Menard said. “And it would save the state more money to have those beds full." But this plan requires approval from the Legislature and a new agreement with the town of St. Johnsbury.

    St. Johnsbury officials, who receive about $100,000 in free labor from prison work crews every year, would rather close the work camp than save it by filling the beds with felons. They are concerned about more friends and families of inmates moving to the area to live near the prison.

    “Is it going to have a negative impact on the demographics of our town? And true or not, that’s the public perception,” said Chad Whitehead, the town manager for St. Johnsbury in his first year on the job.
     

    The House Appropriations Committee and the House Corrections and Institutions Committee are trying to find a solution for the empty space that works for everyone, including the local community.

    “There’s a lot of emotion, there’s a lot of fear,” said Rep. Cynthia Browning, D-Arlington. “I think that if you don’t address that fear, you’re not going to get anywhere.” 

  • Chittenden County State's Attorney T.J. Donovan, who is running for attorney general on a platform of ending the state's use of private prisons, believes the answer lies in reducing Vermont's overall prison population. The state should examine its population of people held for lack of bail or lack of housing, Donovan said, and bring out-of-state inmates home.

Contact April Burbank at 802-660-1863 or aburbank@freepressmedia.com. Follow her on Twitter at www.twitter.com/AprilBurbank