From ou statehouse studio in Montgomery.

I'm Todd Stacy.

Welcome to Capitol Journal.

Leading our news tonight.

Governor Kay Ivey has signed into law legislation aimed at preventing suicide, especially among veterans, by promoting voluntar and temporary firearm storage.

Senate bill 40 from State Senator Keith Kelly and Stat Representative Russell Bedsole, establishes fire hold agreements between individuals and federal firearm licensees and creates a new program b which residents can voluntarily store guns and ammunition safely.

Dubbed the Houston Hunter act the new law is named after Army veteran Houston Tolman and he marine veteran Hunter Whitley, both of whom lost their lives to suicide.

Houston's mother, Michelle, and Hunter's mother, Shannon, were present there in the governor's offic as the bill was signed into law.

It's also one of three preliminary recommendations from the Alabama Veterans Mental Health Steering Committee.

State lawmakers will return to Montgomery tomorrow as the legislature returns for the 18th legislative day.

This is expected to be a three day week, meaning the House and Senate will gavel in for business on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, while also having a full committee slate on Wednesday.

House Speaker Nathaniel Ledbetter said the House will continue to hav an ambitious agenda on the floor in terms of the last third of the legislative session.

He said his members are eager to get tax cut legislation to final passage and deliver more savings to Alabamians this quadrennial.

If those tax bills pass, we have reduced taxpayers, taxes to the tune of $1.6 billion in this quadrennial, along with over 15 different tax cuts.

So to say that this body had done their part would be an understatement.

You know, more than anybod has ever done in state history.

So but we got to do it in what I consider a fiscally conservative matter.

And I believe we've done that.

I applaud the budge chairs on both sides for that.

And certainly Representative Garrett is somebody I respect immensely.

That's his world.

That's what he did for a living.

And to have somebody like that over the ATF is we're very fortunate, just like Chairman Reynolds, when he oversees the health care, Huntsville's budge and is the manager of the city and oversees that, and he works that budget.

We're fortunate to have him.

So we're we're very blessed to have people gotten those positions in the Senate.

Education will take center stage this week.

The Education Trust Fund budget is schedule to be in committee on Wednesday.

And then, if reported ou successfully on the Senate floor by Thursday, it will be accompanied b the much anticipated raise act, which would create a new student funding formula aimed at better supporting students in poverty, English language learners, gifted students and those with special needs.

Senator Arthur, or who chairs that Senate Education Budget Committee, spoke to reporter to boot to preview what's ahead.

We'll be on the floor for sure on Thursday to be determined whether we have a two day or three day work week next week.

So.

But we do know Thursday will be the day that the educational budget will be on the floor.

The big ticket item that you're going to see next week is the bill that will institute the student based funding formula, and we're calling it the Raise act.

RA, SC and it will, better support our publi schools for children in poverty, children that are English language learners, children that are gifted, and for those that have special educational needs, it will address those four buckets, of students and give schools the additional resources that to educate those children with because the studies have shown that for those children it requires additional resources.

This is the hybrid model.

You'll see the foundation program remaining intact.

And this is coming on top of that particular funding out of the foundation.

A reminder today from th Alabama law Enforcement agency, there's only one month remaining until requirements for star ID will go into effect.

Star ID, sometimes referred to as real ID, is an identification program enacted back in 2005 that is intended to enhance the security of state issued IDs.

The biggest impact is that those wanting to fly domestically won't be able to check in with an old driver's license that isn't a star ID.

Starting on May 7th, it's easy to upgrade to a star ID, and you can do it locally.

In fact, you can make an appointment through Alice's website at Elliott Gov.

You'll need other form of identification when you go.

You'll need to prove your date of birth, which you can do with a valid passport, a birth certificate, or other immigration forms.

You'll need to prove your Social Security number by with a Social Security card itself, a military ID, or a W-2 tax stub, and you'll need to verify your physical address either through a valid driver's driver's license, maybe a lease agreement, or even a utility bill.

The state of Alabama will host the 2025 World Police and Fire Games.

It's an Olympic style competition with thousands of first responder athletes throughout the world.

This includes law enforcement firefighters and other officers from corrections, probation and immigration competing in as many as 60 sports.

Governor Ivey made the announcement recently at the state Capitol from June 27th to July 6th, in Birmingham, Alabama will host over 8500 athletes from more than 70 countries.

This is a global salute to the law enforcement officers, firefighters, paramedics and every other type of first responder in between who keeps our communities safe around the world.

These brave men and women give their all, and I'm proud that our state gets to honor them this way.

Birmingham is ready.

Alabama is ready.

These games will bring $65 million in economic impact.

Filling our hotels, packing our restaurants, and supporting our local businesses.

We'll be right back with tonight's guests.

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Keep up with what's happening with Capital Journal.

The Alabama Department of Archive and History was founded in 1901, becoming the nation's first publicly funded independent state archives agency.

The archives identifies, preserves, and makes accessible records and artifacts of enduring historical value to the state.

Thomas owned, founded the agency and served as its first director.

He was succeeded by his wife, Marie Banchero, who headed the archives for 35 years and was the second woman to lead a state agency.

Welcome back to Capitol Journal.

Joining me next is cam Ward, director of the Alabam Bureau of Pardons and Paroles.

Cam, thanks for coming on the show.

Thanks for having me back, Todd.

Lots to talk about.

I want to get into the recent graduation from your Perry County facility up ther on the Prep Center, but kind of, as a part of that as well.

I know that April is Second Chance month, not just here in Alabama, but nationally.

Talk about Second Chance Month and what its significance is.

Second Chance Month was started by George W Bush when he was president.

It was the Second Chance Act and dealt with people who were formerly incarcerated.

What what can we d to get them back on their feet to make sur they don't commit a crime again?

It has to be renewed every year.

And it has been by every singl president since George W Bush.

And I expect it will be again this year by President Trump.

President Trump actually trumpeted it during his first term about how great of a program it was.

And we expect him to d the same thing again this time.

I know we've got some similar legislation here in the state of Alabama.

We'll get to that.

But talk to me about up to you about this recent graduation from the prep center there in Perry County.

Saw some images and everything.

It's a massive, legit graduation.

Caps and gowns.

I know you spoke at it.

Talk about what this prep center does and what these graduates can look forward to.

Well, so fa going all the way up until now.

Last two and a half years, it's been open.

We've had over 340 graduates, and of the 340 graduates, they have to go throug intensive substitute treatment.

They have to go through mental health treatment.

We have job training, GED programing, helping you get your license and ID back, but it's intensive and it's residential, so you're confined that facility.

But over 340 people have gone through it.

And of them we've not had a single person go back to jail or prison.

Not a one, not a one.

And I tell everybody that because recidivism is kind of my mark of, well, are we succeeding or not?

Well, recidivism in Alabama.

Do you go back to prison within three years of being incarcerated?

You're let out three years later.

Have you?

Going back in Alabama, our numbers are 29%.

We were at 34% just four years ago.

So those numbers are going down.

It's great, but that center i a 0% recidivism rate facility.

So I want to replicate it.

And to that end, we've ha states from around the country.

You and I briefly missed each other in Washington last week, but we were talkin with a congressional delegation and we've had other states reach out and say, we want to mimic what you guys are doing, because there's a lot of states where the recidivism rates are a lot higher than ours, including our neighbors like Tennessee, Arkansas, Mississippi and Georgia.

Well, okay.

That's zero.

Now, again, it's only been around since 2022, and 340 is small compared to the amount you know, end of sentence each year and everything from from our prisons.

But that tells the story 0%.

That's a that tells the story of what it takes to actually end that recidivism in terms of job training, drug treatment, mental health.

I mean, that's absolutely.

And we couldn't do this, but we couldn't do this without our partners.

It's not just us.

Ingram State Technical College provides a lot of the job training and the GED and educational programing, the business community.

We're looking at 17 different companies and organizations that have now signed up to say, can we want to hire people and we want to train them.

We want to help you train them.

So having these partners, Department of Mental Health, coming in and help us find good contractors that can handle the mental health treatment, having these partners without having to pass a new law.

I mean we passed a law on this in 2021.

The legislature did, and now we have this wonderful program that other states, for once, Alabama's leading the way in something.

And I think we should take pride in that.

But also look at ways down the road.

We can expand on it with the least amount of cost because at the end of the day, it is public safety.

It's public safety 101.

If you get that treatment yo need, you get that evaluation.

Determine what your needs are.

We can use that in a manne to make sure you don't go back to prison and commit a crime.

So, you know, the alternative unfortunately, is end of sentence with not with not a lot of all that.

Right.

And so that that's where you do get that 29% re-offending somehow.

Yep.

You do.

So what we call it iOS, we have all these acronyms to state government.

But on iOS you in the sentence there is no supervision.

You walk out the door, you get a check.

Odds most likely are you'r going to commit a crime again.

If you're on some sort of parole where you are supervised an forced to go into a programing, it works.

It really does.

And I've seen it firsthand.

I had my doubts.

Pardon?

Parole is a carrot and stick.

There's a stick in that.

If you re-offend, guess what?

We're going to put you back in prison.

They know that there's.

You break the law, yo get punished, and you should be.

But there's also a carrot approach.

If you have a substitute issue or mental health issue and we can treat that and help you get it addressed so that you can b a functioning member of society.

I think everybody in Alabama would want that to be a goal.

Again, going back to kind of the optics of it, it's a legit graduation ceremony.

The caps, the gowns, the graduation speech, the the song, the Pomp and circumstance song, the plays.

And that just struck me.

That's got to be a difference maker to those individuals right there.

You know, commencing, you know, a sentence and really or finishing a sentence.

They're commencing a new life.

Talk about that difference that it makes, treating it like the way you do.

And, you know, maybe some feedback from those who have gone through it.

And the difference that treating it like that really makes.

Well, you have some people who in their life, they, they grew up with a broken family.

They had most of a lot of them have families that were had drug addiction, poverty.

And it was just they were never going to make it.

The odds were against them.

But they also never had anyone look them in the eye and say, you did a good job.

You did something right.

Their whole life's been negativity and half the time, and I'm not trying to be, you know, soft and squishy here.

But I would say this if you have a drug induced family or mental illness in your family, the odds are you're goin to follow down that same path.

And that's what they did.

Have somebody come up and say, you know what I believe in?

You're going to make it.

You're going to do a good job.

You're not going to hurt somebody again.

You're going to follow the law, you're going to do well.

You're going to be clean.

It makes a difference.

A good paying job.

Good paying job means they pay taxes.

They're not on the government rolls.

They're not on welfare.

And guess what.

They're not going to hurt somebody.

So that's that's what I think the success.

And look at that ceremony and seeing that look on their face, knowing they're going to make it.

It's interestin because, you know, in politics and you've been in plenty of politics, elective politics maybe you will again, who knows?

But the easiest thing in the world it can be is to be tough on crime, especially in moments like, you know, the last couple of years and the last several is really where people have been worried about crime.

Easiest thing to do is say, lock them up, throw away the key because you're not going to lose many votes that way.

It's tougher to be, smart on crime.

And I wondered if I could ask you kind of the difference about that, because you all have to do it from a programmatic standpoint, and it's not all you know, electoral votes and things like that.

So talk about being smart on crime with some of these policies, knowing that that end of sentences comin and knowing that the goal is to have them not come back.

Yeah.

And it is tough And it's tough on our lawmaker.

You know, the climate change every year on criminal justice.

But I will say this I respect the predicament they're in because I agree.

I mean people want a solution to crime.

I mean, here in Montgomery, we've seen it.

They want a solution.

My solution is not to give all.

I mean, it's it' not going to solve everything.

My solution is when they come out, I want to do everything I ca to make sure they don't go back.

Now.

They break the law again.

They're going to go back to prison.

But at the end of the day you want to be smart on crime.

Being smart means making sure they have the tools so they don't go back.

And I will say, my conversations you and I were talking about, State of Arkansas, had a conversation with some legislators and cabinet members for the governor.

And one of the things tha struck me was their recidivism rates are at 29%, their 47% recidivism rate.

And they have also a problem with they're trying to build $1 billion prison.

They're in the same situation when we're not alone.

They're in this.

And they called and said, we got to have ideas on how to reduce recidivism.

So it's not just Alabama that deals with this.

Other states are seeing it.

I'm just glad to see that we're on the front line and being a role model to help them figure out that pathway to go forward.

You've had some legislative help on that along the way, too.

And I wanted to ask you, while we're talking, while we're here in the middle of the legislative session, are there bills y'all are, advocating for budget items you're looking at?

Well, don't talk about your last couple of weeks of session one.

We think, first of all, we can increase our services on reentry.

And we asked for a level funded budget to do it.

We think we can do it by moving resources around, getting rid of programs that don't work, putting it toward programs that do annually ask for outside groups to come in and audit us and tell us what we're doing right and what we're doing wrong in our programing.

So that we can use our resources better.

Second, we're looking at a bill that one deals with occupational licensure.

One of the things I've seen is a lot of people coming out of prison.

They work hard.

They get a job certificate they get all the skills needed.

But we have government occupational licensure boards that automatically deny them because they went to prison for any reason.

I get it.

If you're child molester, you should work in a daycare.

That should be and it should be the norm.

It is under this bill.

But what this bill says is you can deny license and no business has to hir anybody they don't want to hire.

But you cannot deny them jus because they've been to prison.

That gives them a chance at least to demonstrate their skills.

And then the company can decide if they want to hire somebody or not.

It's totally up to the company.

So I can't, but they can't blame it on a rule from the agency.

Yeah, but it shouldn't be a government arbitrary government rule.

It should be delivered to the private sector and let the companies decide if they want to hire somebody or not.

Not some obscure government board was the business community.

So the business community have been fantastic partners.

Had it not been for them, we wouldn't have gotten this far on the bill.

And I'm very thankful, to the various we we talke about this for a year with them, worked out some of their concerns, and without the business community, this wouldn't be possible.

And I'm very thankful for their support.

What tells you a lot about, yo know, their involvement in it?

We're out of time.

Thanks again for we'll see you again.

But, good luck.

The last half o session.

Thanks.

Had me, Todd.

We'll be right back.

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Welcome back to Capitol Journal.

Joining me next is Matthew Capps director of Alabama State Parks.

Mr. director thanks for coming on the show.

Thanks for having me.

Well this is a breath of fresh air.

We do politics here in the middle of the session.

So I wish we could all be in a state park right now.

But I wanted to start with asking.

I mean, it's kind of spring break time.

You've had probably a couple of really busy weeks.

Is it really pick up in the spring break weeks?

Absolutely.

So right now we're in th in the throes of spring break.

And so as you can imagine, Gulf State Park is, you know, very overwhelmed right now.

And so but we also have beaches at other locations.

And so we're we're tryin to drive people to Oak Mountain and all the other parks that have beaches and lakes to enjoy.

It's a beautiful time to be out in nature and enjoying some of our state parks.

And that's I think people forget sometimes just how many beautiful state parks are out there withi driving distance a lot of times.

And so I want to get to that in a minute.

But since we are in the state House and is legislative session, it wasn't too long ago that lawmaker and eventually voters approved this $80 million bond issue.

It was meant to, you know, for improvements at state parks and historical sites.

What kind of projects have you all undertaken to do those improvements?

Well, we have projects, actively right now all over the entire state.

Some of the key projects that we really want to focus in on right now is a Gulf State Park.

We're building another 100 campsites at the old, old golf course.

So that's somewher in the ballpark of $28 million.

Probably going to be due to be completed first of next year.

Another project is Lak Lurleen up in Tuscaloosa area.

That park just needed a total remodel.

So we we've kind of just starting from scratch and redoing that again.

That project is around 88, 18, that $18 million.

So, again, look for that one to be completed around Q1 of next, next year.

But again that's just to make everything much more, larger campsites to new, improved, access to the, the lake.

Just a total remodel of the day use area as well.

And another on that we're really proud about.

Kind of our signature, bond piece is the cheetah, Lodge.

So, that lodge was in aging infrastructure for sure, and we needed to remodel it.

So what we ended up doing i we demoed, the existing lodge, and we've moved everything kind of towards where the restaurant used to be.

And so now everything is going to have bluff side, views.

All the rooms, it's a 32 room lodge.

It'll be a boutique type style.

Which means it's just smaller, more intimate areas.

We'll have, like a bistro conference area, small conference are and a rooftop, lounge and more.

So that's perfect for the mountain top there.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

That's great.

And so Jeff did some reporting a couple of weeks ago on not just you all, but included some images really beautiful.

And and the way the architecture is, it kind of fits into the mountain, into the woods.

It's not, I don't know, gaudy or some kind of, you know, modern thing.

It's kind of rustic looking.

Yes.

So it still is modern, but it is a we've used natural elements, so.

Right.

One thing that we're really proud about is that we're using Alabama trees, to make these, to make the lodge.

And so we do all have exposed timber, so, exposed wood.

And it's going to be beautiful.

I think that it's like.

So this part chia was built by the men and women from the Great Depression.

And so, you know, you typically see all the stone structures that have been there for since the 60s.

Well, now with the SEC, we're building it.

They're going to build modern style architecture.

And so, it's a little bit modern, but it's natural materials.

It'll blend in nicely with the mountains.

Yeah, there's certain certainly looks like that.

I wanted to ask you, you recently announced the promotion of Chad Davis.

Now, that's a familiar name around conservation circles.

What's his new role in the organization?

So Chad was recently our, district regional manager for the North West district.

So he was at Joe Wheeler State Park, and he manages, Monticello to Lurleen, and the two cave parks.

And so now we've recently been able to promote Chad to deputy director.

So he filled my role as I got promoted to director.

So his first couple of days in office right now, in Montgomery and just already hitting the ground running because he's been here in the system for 20 years.

Well, good for him.

That's.

Well.

Well, well-deserved.

Absolutely not.

I said it was spring break, but summer will be here before we know it.

And I know that families are planning trips and vacations.

How can people bes find out how to take advantage of our state parks, I guess.

Is there a website?

And certainly so Alabama, state parks.

You can just Google that.

But it's ala.com.

Our reservations page is brand new.

If you're an Alabama resident, you can actually enter in your zip code and, and book 13 months ou if you really wanted to do that.

So that just gives, Alabama residents an advantage on pricing and, and first available.

But yeah, come on in and check us out.

Find us on Facebook.

That's a lot of, like, pertinent information that that's, that's happening daily.

So.

Yeah.

Check us out.

Well, I have to say, y'all have really done incredible work in terms of, just, I don't know, bringing our state parks really into the into the, you know, modern era.

It's not like it was when I was growing up.

It's it's a really great quality experience.

And, so kudos to you and your team, and I'll look forward to visiting a couple of state parks this time around.

What we'd love to do is bring Capital Journal to Mount Geo, and that project's finished.

Absolutely love to have you there.

That'd be great.

Well, thanks again for coming on the show, and good luck with the summer months.

Thank you so much.

We'll be right back.

Chia mountain, often called Mount Chia, is the highest natural point in Alabama at 2407ft above sea level.

It is located in north centra Alabama and Georgia State Park, surrounded by the Talladega National Forest in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains.

This dramatic landscape gets its name from the creek Indian name for the mountain char, meaning high place.

That's our show for tonight.

Thanks for watching.

We'll be back at the same tim tomorrow, right here on Alabama Public Television for our Capital Journal team.

I'm Todd Stacey.

We'll see you next time.