Alabama reentry commission reorganizes into quarterly task force, adopts working-group approach to cut recidivism

The Alabama Reentry Commission on an organizational call agreed to transition into a quarterly Reentry Task Force and create working groups to pursue recommendations aimed at lowering the state’s recidivism rate.

The move, described during a meeting of agency leaders and stakeholders, focuses the commission’s work into four main areas identified by outside reviewers: workforce development, reentry preparedness, behavioral health and treatment, and improved data collection and use. Megan Pfeiffer, project manager for Reentry 2030 at the Council of State Governments (CSG) Justice Center, told the group CSG had assessed Alabama’s reentry policies, convened working groups and produced consensus recommendations in those four thematic areas.

The shift to a task-force structure will reduce meeting frequency from monthly to quarterly while creating separate work groups to tackle economic mobility, behavioral and mental health, and related implementation tasks, Rebecca Vensima, assistant director of Reentry and Rehabilitation for the Bureau of Pardons and Paroles, said. "We will be in person at the next task force meeting to discuss these recommendations in further detail, to…