Police, lawmakers pitch changes to reentry for people leaving prison or jail

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An APD prisoner transport vehicle sits in front of the Bernalillo County Public Safety Center in Downtown Albuquerque in late August, 2021. (Photo by Shelby Kleinhans for Source NM)

Almost everyone who goes to prison in New Mexico will return home at some point, but the support provided to them on their way out depends largely on where they were incarcerated.

That conclusion comes from a report published by the New Mexico Justice Reinvestment Working Group last November.

In state prisons, New Mexico Corrections Department policy establishes that each prison form its own reentry committee, and members of those committees say reentry planning depends on whether someone is being released under state supervision.

In county jails, reentry practices depend on local priorities and available resources, the report found, because not all jails staff positions that are devoted to reentry planning.

In an attempt to fill this gap, a legislative proposal, Senate Bill 54, would consolidate and standardize reentry practices across the state, rather than rely on the existing patchwork of differing policies.

In an interview with Source NM, San Juan County Sheriff’s Capt. Kevin Burns, who chairs the working group, said its 19 recommendations to state lawmakers focus on reframing substance use disorder and mental health issues away from the criminal legal system and into the healthcare system. He said the largest share of criminal sentences impact people with convictions for third- and fourth-degree felonies, most of which are drug-related.

“Once you start to get those individuals plugged in with resources, then it allows law enforcement to then focus more on violent offenders,” Burns said.

Burns said police are overwhelmed by calls for help related to property crimes, drug use and mental health issues. The report notes that the overall crisis call volume in New Mexico increased by 73% between May 2022 and May 2024, with most of those calls dealing with suicide or substance use.

SB54 is sponsored by Sen. Katy Duhigg and Rep. Janelle Anyanonu, both Albuquerque Democrats and members of the working group. The bill is the result of “the majority of the policies that came out of” the working group’s meetings, Duhigg told the Senate Judiciary Committee in January.

The bill adds two new duties to the New Mexico Sentencing Commission, a research institute at the University of New Mexico created in 2003.

The first, Duhigg said, requires the Sentencing Commission to coordinate reentry efforts for people being released from prisons and jails; foster collaboration among stakeholder groups working on reentry issues; and establish minimum standards for reentry, including pre-release assessments, behavioral and physical health continuum of care, employment, housing and basic needs.

“We want to have statewide standards that, when people are being released, are going to set them up to be productive members of our communities, rather than folks who are going to be unproductive members who go right back into detention,” Duhigg said.

The bill also requires the commission to create a public crime data dashboard on its website in conjunction with the state Department of Public Safety. Making the Sentencing Commission a central repository of data is another important part of the working group’s recommendations, Burns said.

The Senate Judiciary Committee on Feb. 28 voted 6-3 along party lines to pass a substitute version of SB54, with Republicans in opposition. The legislation awaits a hearing in the Senate Finance Committee.

At the suggestion of the New Mexico Association of Counties, the substitute requires county jails to provide medication-assisted treatment (MAT) to incarcerated people experiencing withdrawal, Duhigg told the committee.

It also makes the requirement contingent on local, state or federal funding. Duhigg said counties need money to start MAT in jails where it isn’t already being provided.

Helping people going home could reduce recidivism

According to Duhigg, the state tasked the Crime and Justice Institute, an offshoot of the federal Department of Justice, with helping to develop data-based public safety policy, and they convened the working group.

Burns said some other bills going through the Roundhouse this session have similar goals around recidivism, including House Bill 514, which would require the Corrections Department to implement a system of graduated sanctions as alternatives to incarceration for parole violations.

The working group report states that in 2022, approximately half of community supervision violations occurred within the first four months of release from prison or jail. Burns said more staff at drug courts in New Mexico, along with appropriate monitoring and accountability of defendants, could help prevent them from returning to jail.

“That’s where we feel like our recidivism is coming from,” Burns said. “We would really like to see these individuals receive skills training so that when they re-enter society, they’ve got different skill sets on top of a more tailored and more structured approach to support them, to prevent recidivism.”

HB514 was scheduled for a hearing in the House Consumer and Public Affairs Committee on Tuesday.

Burns said New Mexico’s high crime rate isn’t just a criminal justice issue, but also a socioeconomic one.

“It’s going to take our communities to help individuals avoid being involved with substance abuse, to avoid them going down that road of property crime to support their drug habit,” Burns said.

This post was originally authored and published by Austin Fisher from via RSS Feed. to get your news feed on Nationwide Report®.