Nevada officials want more money to support parole-eligible inmates

State officials plan to hire probation and parole specialists to work in prisons with inmates who are eligible for parole but stuck behind bars because they lack necessities like a place to live, legislative committees heard Tuesday.

The issue came up in presentations from both the Nevada Department of Public Safety and the Nevada Department of Corrections to lawmakers in a pre-session meeting that provided budget overviews. Nevada’s criminal justice system has suffered for years from a backlog of parole-eligible inmates who remain in prison because they don’t have a plan that qualifies them, often because they don’t have a place to live.

“We’ve got to look at doing things differently,” James Wright, director of the public safety department, told lawmakers.

The Department of Public Safety, which is responsible for probation and parole, has a budget proposal with $850,000 set aside for probation and parole specialists to be based in state prisons and work directly on plans with inmates eligible for parole.

The proposal also has $1.1 million budgeted for residential confinement for inmates who lack the means to pay for housing, and $300,000 in transitional housing funds for released inmates.

Embedding probation and parole specialists in the prisons, Wright said, “will speed up that process. There’s no doubt in my mind.”

Nevada Department of Corrections Director James Dzurenda said about 350 inmates are approved for parole, yet they “can’t go out the door because there’s nowhere for them to go.”

Contact Ben Botkin at bbotkin@reviewjournal.com or 775-461-3820. Follow @BenBotkin1 on Twitter.