When you walk into the Fleet Management Department at the Arizona Department of Corrections’ women’s prison in Perryville, you are greeted by a somewhat unusual sight. Working on the vehicles are women wearing prison uniforms. These female inmates aren’t just assisting the full-time supervisors — they are performing diagnostics, updating work orders, and making repairs. The women, most of whom had no automotive experience before their incarceration, are learning the skills necessary to work as technicians under the ADC’s Fleet 100 program — a program created to help reduce the rate of recidivism in Arizona.
Public safety is a core value of Arizonans. It is an area that has seen vast improvements and increased efficiency through the Arizona Management System (AMS), which is Gov. Doug Ducey’s initiative to improve government by focusing on understanding “customer” needs, identifying problems, continually improving processes and measuring results. There are 42 state agencies that have all engaged in this process. The following are but a handful of examples of what is working in Arizona as it pertains to a critical function of government – public safety.
Pima County is a leader in Arizona for criminal justice reform efforts, initiating innovate programs and diversion while several bills addressing the issue statewide remain in flux at the Legislature. That was the consensus when community members and several participants from last year’s Arizona Town Hall on criminal justice reform gathered in Tucson last week to discuss recommendations from November’s statewide town hall. In 2018, Arizona Town Hall, a nonprofit organization that educates, connects and empowers people to resolve societal issues through consensus, held 17 town halls addressing criminal justice in Arizona for more than 2,000 participants across the state. For the first time in the groups’ 56-year history, two of the town halls were held inside Arizona prisons, which board chairman Hank Peck said allowed the group to get information from a population they otherwise wouldn’t have hear from.
You’ll want to watch this inspiring report from FOX 10’s Troy Hayden about the Televerde call center program at ASPC-Perryville and a personal success story of how it’s providing Arizona inmates a great opportunity for a real second chance in life. The Arizona Department of Corrections is proud of our longstanding partnership with Televerde and the success it has in helping women change for the better.