| Policy Statement 2 |
Coordinate—and ideally integrate—distinct agencies' policies, procedures, and information systems so that the fines, fees, surcharges, and restitution orders of each person sentenced to prison or jail are consolidated to improve collection rates, where possible, and child support and restitution are prioritized appropriately. |
| Recommendation D |
Provide the agency responsible for managing collections with the resources and organizational supports—such as dedicated staff time, reduced caseloads, and access to information about people’s debts and employment—it needs to maximize the efficiency of collections. |
Personnel in agencies responsible for collections are often spread thin; it is not unusual for community supervision staff to handle caseloads of more than 100 individuals.1 Personnel working for agencies charged with consolidating debts must draw on information from multiple sources. Depending on the degree to which information is shared efficiently among distinct agencies, this process can be especially time- and staff-intensive. For many staff members, assuming these responsibilities in addition to their other job duties is impossible; their caseloads are already extraordinarily high, and they may lack the skills or the authority to use information systems to detail people’s various debts, employment status, or other personal financial information.
For these reasons, administrators of agencies charged with consolidating collections should dedicate specific staff to collections or reduce caseloads to enable all staff to better incorporate collections into their job duties. Reducing caseloads will likely require additional resources. The American Probation and Parole Association has identified a ratio of one officer to every 30 supervised individuals as the minimum necessary for adequate supervision of high-risk individuals.2 This ratio may not be realistic or necessary, however, for people under community supervision who are at low risk for committing a new crime. Such individuals, where appropriate, can potentially be moved to “collections-only” caseloads, thus requiring fewer staff resources.3
Indeed, dedicating specific staff to collections may be less resource-intensive than reducing caseloads across the board. Agencies that withhold a small portion (such as 5 or 10 percent) of successful collections to pay for the costs of collections staff can recoup personnel costs.4 With either approach, personnel who establish a rapport with people under community supervision may be able to improve collection rates.
Agencies responsible for collections often have significant backlogs of collections cases. Substantial resources are expended pursuing old cases with little potential return. To enable staff to prioritize current collections over past arrears, administrators should develop criteria for determining when an outstanding debt is uncollectible because time spent on pursuing the collection will outweigh considerably the value of the debt being pursued. With the exception of restitution, staff performance should not be based on the collection of small, outstanding debts from individuals no longer under community supervision.
Collections Audit, Office of the State Auditor, New Jersey
In 2004, the New Jersey state auditor reviewed probation records and found that, among 180,000 outstanding cases, approximately 6,000 people on probation owed sums under $25, and an additional 20,000 people owed between $25 and $100.5 The auditor recommended creating collections-only probation cases for amounts between $25 and $100 and writing off as losses amounts under $25 for people no longer under probation supervision. Accordingly, the New Jersey adult probation department does not base its staff performance evaluations on the collection of debts that have been deemed "uncollectible."6
To enable staff to determine an individual’s total debts, administrators of agencies responsible for collections should establish information-sharing agreements, such as memoranda of understanding (MOUs), which authorize the consolidating agency to collect information about an individual’s debts from all of the various parties to which he or she is indebted. The agreement should specify what information each participating agency will provide to the consolidating agency and at what intervals this information will be updated.
The consolidating agency should also develop information-sharing agreements with the Social Security Administration and with state and local departments of labor, health, and human services to secure birth, death, disability, and employment information. Agencies should collect this information with the sole purpose of adjusting or suspending payment schedules that best ensure longer-term repayment in the event of changes that affect an individual’s financial status, such as unemployment or disability.
Information-Sharing Statute, Washington State
Washington State's information-sharing statute (Rev. Code Wash. 9.94A.760 (13)) permits the county clerk to access employment records to verify employment or income, to seek wage garnishment, and to perform other duties necessary for the collection of restitution, fines, fees, and surcharges. Clerks add this information to an integrated judicial information system, which includes municipal and superior courts, to track payments toward the total, consolidated debt that an individual owes.
1 Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor, “Probation Officers and Correctional Treatment Specialists,” section of Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2006–07 Edition, retrieved at www.bls.gov/oco/ocos265.htm, November 25, 2006.
2 American Probation and Parole Association, Restructuring Intensive Supervision
Programs: Applying What “Works” (Lexington, Ky.: American Probation and Parole Association, 1994).
3 Personal communication, Julie Begoña, Field Division Director Maricopa County Probation Department, Arizona, April 6, 2006.
4 Ibid.
5 Richard Fair, “Report on the Audit of the Judiciary, Administrative Office of the Courts, Probation Services Division for the Period July 1, 2002 to June 30, 2004” (Trenton, N.J.: New Jersey State Legislature Office of Legislative Services, Office of the State Auditor, 2004).