State correction agencies fear funding cuts

PINE BLUFF — Officials overseeing Arkansas’ prison, probation and parole systems said this week they’ll ask for a sit- down with Gov. Asa Hutchinson after being saddled with funding cuts.

Prisons in Arkansas, under the Department of Correction, will not have to cut back on any “essential” services — namely security, work programs and inmate care — and will not have to let any staff members go, a spokesman said.

But plans to contract out up to 400 re-entry beds for offenders through Arkansas Community Correction next year are already being scaled back, after the governor announced budget cuts to state agencies in fiscal 2018 earlier this month.

In addition to cuts in next year’s Category B, or lower priority, spending, the directors of each agency said they learned Tuesday morning that they will have to absorb millions in the cost of implementing a state pay raise for their employees.

The notice preceded a state Board of Corrections meeting Tuesday in Pine Bluff, where board Chairman Benny Magness said he would “beg” the governor for more money.

Both departments are expected to submit their budgets in a week for fiscal 2018, which starts July 1.

“It’s gonna be pretty lean,” Magness said.

The state’s $43 million cut for fiscal 2018, precipitated by an expectation of revenue falling below forecast, will be spread evenly across agencies’ with Category B funding.

Both prison-related agencies will have to trim similar amounts — $1.7 million for the Correction Department, $1.5 million for Community Correction — though the prison system’s nearly $350 million budget is quadruple that of Community Correction, which oversees probation and parole services.

Before announcing cuts for next fiscal year, Hutchinson said in late April that he would cut $70 million in the secondary funding for the remainder of the current fiscal 2017.

That led to a $2.2. million hit to prisons, while Community Correction, which did not have Category B funds this year, avoided a loss.

Community Correction was planning to use Category B funds in fiscal 2018 to expand its network of re-entry beds, contracted at $30 a night at small, private centers.