A Look Inside - Crawford Co Model S2E5

Many Arkansans in prison and/or with children in the child welfare system started their legal engagement with misdemeanor crimes like traffic tickets, driving with no insurance, or theft. Community Diversion in District Courts is a key move to prevent future incarceration and/or foster care. 

In Crawford Co the District Court and Adult Ed have co-located to create a one-stop resource center. This unique situation has impacted hundreds of people who found their way out of crisis into stability and employment. 

Thanks to:
Dr Debbie Faubus and the team at Crawford Co Adult Ed
Judge Charles Baker and Crawford Co District Court staff

Transcript

00;00;08;16 - 00;00;28;23
Dr. Debbie Faubus
I wholeheartedly believe we have kept people from going to prison. And they will tell you that because they'll tell you I was on the wrong road making bad choices. And I've asked I just every once in a while I'll just ask, you know, hey, what if you weren't here, what’d you be? I'd probably be in jail or be on my way to prison or be out on the street or I might be dead, you know?

00;00;28;23 - 00;00;34;18
Dr. Debbie Faubus
So, yes, I definitely think it makes a big difference.

00;00;35;07 - 00;00;41;19
Charles Newsom
This is season two, episode five of the Smart Justice Podcast. A Look inside.

00;00;45;06 - 00;00;51;20
Paul Chapman
Crime and Punishment are hot topics. Are there solutions different than what we're hearing about at national level?

00;00;51;24 - 00;00;59;05
Judge Amy Grimes
They're trying to stop that cycle so that we don't see their children. They don't see them in juvenile court. We don't see them headed to circuit court.

00;00;59;13 - 00;01;06;15
Jamie Hammond
We give someone a traffic ticket and they're scared they can't pay their ticket. And what do they do, they don't show for court. They think it's going to go away. Well it doesn’t go away.

00;01;06;18 - 00;01;13;00
Judge Charles Baker
It's not about the court bringing in that money. It's about helping that person avoid this kind of problem in the future.

00;01;13;00 - 00;01;18;14
Paul Chapman
There is a different way to approach justice that has better return on investment.

00;01;18;14 - 00;01;25;20
Sheriff Phiillip Miller
The bad people need to be in jail and stay there. Folks that are suffering from just social ills, they don’t need to be here.

00;01;25;20 - 00;01;33;27
Paul Chapman
That seems to strengthen both law enforcement and courts and tie that together with community resources.

00;01;33;27 - 00;01;42;13
Judge Amy Grimes
And that's what makes it worthwhile that little bit of extra time you spend working on it. But if you can't do a little mercy when you're here, then it's not worth being here.

00;01;42;14 - 00;01;53;22
Paul Chapman
And then track the impact to communities and better outcomes. And we're calling this approach smart justice.

00;01;53;22 - 00;02;18;08
Ed Lowry
Smart justice is a work of Restore Hope and partner organizations. Restore Hope is a software and services organization that helps communities achieve better outcomes for justice and child welfare efforts. Smart Justice is focused on optimizing the system by improving the relationships among its parts.

00;02;18;08 - 00;02;36;29
Charles Newsom
In Season two, we have been going upstream discussing how district court can be the place to meet people needing an off ramp out of the justice system. In this episode, we're taking a look inside a very unique district court that could serve as a model.

00;02;36;29 - 00;03;03;26
Paul Chapman
In this episode of Smart Justice we have a real treat for you. There is a unique program that really illustrates what is possible in community diversion in Van Buren, Arkansas. We have the pleasure of being with my friend Dr. Debbie Faubus, the director of adult Ed for Crawford County. And we're going to meet some of her staff as well as district court.

00;03;04;00 - 00;03;32;27
Paul Chapman
Crawford County District Court Judge Baker. And you are co-located your adult ed staff and the court is all under one roof. And I don't know of any other place that that happens in the state of Arkansas. So, Dr. Faubus, before we start the tour, how long have you been doing alternative sentencing or community diversion with the court? Because you didn't you didn't start it by moving in together with the district court.

00;03;33;14 - 00;03;37;06
Paul Chapman
But tell us a little bit about how this all came to be.

00;03;38;06 - 00;03;59;04
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Well, I've been in adult ed for 14 years, and they started a program in South Arkansas, and they called it smarter sentencing at that time. And I thought, oh, what a neat idea. You grab people before they go to prison or before they go to jail. And so I had a luncheon for the judges in the area and the prosecuting attorneys.

00;03;59;04 - 00;04;14;27
Dr. Debbie Faubus
And Judge Baker was getting ready to take the bench in January. And he came up to me afterwards and said, I want to start this program. But we've been doing it about five years now and probably saved our county about a million and a half in jail.

00;04;14;27 - 00;04;15;11
Paul Chapman
In jail fees?

00;04;15;11 - 00;04;16;09
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Yes. Jail fees.

00;04;16;09 - 00;04;21;20
Paul Chapman
So Dr. Faubus, when did you actually move in together?

00;04;21;23 - 00;04;24;09
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Oh, okay. We've been here a year and a half.

00;04;24;21 - 00;04;34;27
Paul Chapman
Okay. So you've been doing alternative sentencing for about five years, but you had the opportunity then to move into this abandoned school building?

00;04;35;00 - 00;04;43;23
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Yes. The school district moved out. Court moved in because they needed more space. Where they were at they were all cramped.

00;04;43;23 - 00;04;45;07
Charles Newsom
Judge Charles Baker.

00;04;45;26 - 00;04;55;15
Paul Chapman
You made a big move a few years ago in that you've got kind of a one stop shop now. Can you kind of walk us through the story of how this occurred?

00;04;56;00 - 00;05;19;22
Judge Charles Baker
Yes. We had a district court office at another location that sometimes I refer to as our district court closet, because we had a lot of people crammed into a really small space with a really small courtroom. And it was... it was difficult just day to day. But then COVID hit. And of course, we initially were told spacing was critical and you didn't want to crowd large numbers of people.

00;05;19;28 - 00;05;38;21
Judge Charles Baker
The Van Buren School district had built a new elementary school and had planned to close the building that we are currently in, they didn't have any plans for it in the future. When I was in law school, there was a savings and loan in Fayetteville on North College that had built the most beautiful building you'd ever seen in your life.

00;05;39;09 - 00;06;05;21
Judge Charles Baker
Savings and loan scandal hit. It closed, and they sold that building to Washington County for a dollar. And that is now one of the Washington County courthouses clerk's offices. I mean, it's a well-used, beautiful building. And I remembered that. And I said, well, a van Buren's not going to use the school building. I wonder what they'd say. So I met with the superintendent, told him our plans.

00;06;05;23 - 00;06;27;19
Judge Charles Baker
He looked at me like I was crazy and I said, We'd like to give it a shot. If it doesn't work, we'll come back and talk again. But if it does, we'd like to make this long term. And so long story short, here we are. We've got a whole building. But what that enabled us to do was not only provide enough space for our court people, but to say to adult education, we're referring people to you every day.

00;06;28;02 - 00;06;50;09
Judge Charles Baker
Could you all have a presence here in our building? And we've made that available to agencies at the state level. Some of them have taken advantage, some of them have not. We send a lot of people to have evaluations done about substance abuse issues. Western Arkansas Counseling and Guidance actually has someone here for every court session with an office in our building.

00;06;51;05 - 00;07;15;15
Judge Charles Baker
The agencies that do education for people who have been convicted of DWI come here every court session for us. We provided space for attorneys to meet here with clients. If they’ve got somebody traveling from out of town and it's more convenient for them just to come here before court. So it's just enabled us to do all kinds of things we never imagined would be possible before.

00;07;15;15 - 00;07;19;16
Judge Charles Baker
You've got significant fines to pay in this case. Are you currently working?

00;07;19;16 - 00;07;20;25
Defendent 
No.

00;07;20;25 - 00;07;24;01
Judge Charles Baker
How long has it been since you have worked?

00;07;24;01 - 00;07;25;21
Defendent 
In six months.

00;07;25;21 - 00;07;39;01
Judge Charles Baker
All right. Well, I'm going to order you to be evaluated by our adult education team. And they've got some programs I think would be beneficial to you. I'm ordering you to complete the programs that they recommend.

00;07;39;11 - 00;07;58;20
Judge Charles Baker
And you'll do that in lieu of paying the fines. It's important that you do exactly what they're asking you to do, because if you don't comply, then they're going to bring you back in front of me and we'll have to deal with that in a different way. All right. At this point, I'm going to order you to go with the people from adult Ed, meet with probation officers.

00;07;59;06 - 00;08;03;17
Judge Charles Baker
They'll get you set up in the program and you'll be dealing with them from this point forward.

00;08;05;06 - 00;08;31;05
Paul Chapman
So, Dr. Faubus, we just witnessed the judge give the option to a defendant to participate in the community diversion program that you're running here. And this is such a unique facility that you've got all of these resources under one roof. And so what what happens now to that participant? He chose to participate. Now what happens?

00;08;31;12 - 00;08;44;29
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Well, you're right. We do have a unique situation here, and we're very fortunate. And we do have someone in the court at all times, one of my staff members, and then we have another staff member that works with the probation.

00;08;44;29 - 00;08;47;22
Paul Chapman
Okay. So what are what is the staff person that's in court? What do they do?

00;08;47;23 - 00;09;08;08
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Okay. The judge requested this person. This person is available if somebody didn't have a job, like they might not always be our students. Okay. But there's people that still need help. So if the judge, you know, somebody comes to the podium and they go, yeah, judge, I don't have a job, I can't pay my bills. Go see this person.

00;09;08;09 - 00;09;21;03
Dr. Debbie Faubus
They can help you get a job. Okay, then, Bryan, who generally works with the probation officers, he goes, he's waiting in the probation office for the person that is going to be our student, and he will work with them over there.

00;09;21;03 - 00;09;21;27
Paul Chapman
So can we that?

00;09;21;27 - 00;09;35;11
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Do you want to go over there? Sure. Yeah. Let's go. And this area up here on this level is all the court people. Okay? This is all of his employees.

00;09;35;11 - 00;09;39;16
Paul Chapman
Okay, so we just left the courtroom and then we've got offices, court staff.

00;09;39;23 - 00;09;53;08
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Chamber, judge chamber stuff down here. we’ve got the police officer, window arraignments. And then down this hall is some more of his staff, plus counseling and probation is down here.

00;09;53;08 - 00;09;55;25
Paul Chapman
Ok, counseling. So you can actually get signed up for?

00;09;55;25 - 00;09;56;07
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Yes.

00;09;56;07 - 00;09;57;23
Paul Chapman
Substance abuse and mental health here..

00;09;57;23 - 00;10;05;06
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Yes. Okay. And he can court order it. Can have him evaluated. They can do it. They can send them and have them evaluated and get the.

00;10;05;06 - 00;10;07;08
Paul Chapman
It’s really convenient that it's just right here.

00;10;07;08 - 00;10;28;26
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Very. And they’re here every time we have court, just like we are all the time. I did leave out one thing before. I haven't told you if you turn behind here, this is a new thing that we've started. This is our food pantry. We've partnered with Western Arkansas Community Development, and every second Saturday of every month, we do a food handout.

00;10;29;05 - 00;10;35;15
Dr. Debbie Faubus
So we have a freezer there. We have food ready if people need food. And Melinda Cook is in there all the time.

00;10;35;26 - 00;10;57;26
Paul Chapman
So, Dr. Faubus, the thing that I've really appreciated over the years and the way that you view kind of yalls’ mission with Adult Ed is you're actually meeting needs of your students that are here. And so you've obviously found that. Well a couple of things. One is like food is an unusual thing I think, for adult ed programs to be involved in.

00;10;59;01 - 00;11;10;24
Paul Chapman
But number two is you go out and get other community resource sources like the church and the food pantry, and then you're connecting. You're a conduit out to the other resources.

00;11;10;25 - 00;11;44;23
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Absolutely. Yeah. We have churches that feed Tuesday and Thursday evenings because that's when we have classes. And I have 13 churches right now and I rotate. I try to get churches from every denomination and we have... we have a pretty extensive group of people. And it's really it's always been so powerful to me when people come in and you've got homeless people and you've got the people coming in from the churches and they're sitting down with them one on one talking to them that... I mean, they're not throwing religion at them.

00;11;44;23 - 00;12;09;08
Dr. Debbie Faubus
They're throwing, how are you? You know, what can we do to help you? You know, those kinds of things. To me, it encompasses the whole person. And that's what we try to do, you know, And whether they're our students or not, we have people that come in like if John Doe's coming, and his wife’s sitting out in the car with their kids and she's having to pick him up because he didn't have a driver's license, we invite them in to eat also.

00;12;09;17 - 00;12;20;08
Dr. Debbie Faubus
So, you know, go out in the parking lot and get them. So that's to me is that's the way it works. But it all comes back because they remember your kindness.

00;12;20;09 - 00;12;22;03
Paul Chapman
May not remember what you say. But they're remembering.

00;12;22;09 - 00;12;42;23
Dr. Debbie Faubus
How they treated you, you know, and and I love stories, but the one powerful one to me was I came in on a Saturday because we have Saturday classes, because some people work out of town and they can't they can't go to class. So a mother had come in and she was in class and the dad took the kids out to the playground and they're playing on the playground.

00;12;43;06 - 00;12;58;03
Dr. Debbie Faubus
When they had lunch, she took lunch and went out and they had a little picnic out there until she was, you know, it's time to come back. He stayed out there until she finished. Now, those kids don't have to know that momma was in trouble. Those kids just know that mom is going to school. And isn’t this cool.

00;12;58;12 - 00;13;21;16
Dr. Debbie Faubus
You know, what an example for your kids. You know, it just gives me chills when I think about that, because that's their first teacher is their you know, their parent. So just... It’s just cool. Then they come in here and they visit with Grant and they visit with Brian or they visit with Mary and they visit with Brian.

00;13;22;08 - 00;13;30;15
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Mary is also a probation officer. When they come in here, they talk to Brian about what program of study they want to go through.

00;13;30;15 - 00;13;33;10
Paul Chapman
What does that even look like? What are the options that someone may have?

00;13;33;18 - 00;13;57;15
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Well, we have OSHA 10, of course, they can work on their G.E.D.. We have a wage certificate which is basically soft skills. They can get a national career readiness certificate, which a lot of companies require. They can just do any you know, we have a certified clinical medical assistant. You know, just... They can go to college. Different things that we have. Choices are so important.

00;13;57;23 - 00;14;10;10
Dr. Debbie Faubus
If I have anything to say about a program, when you put a program together, you have to give them choices. Remember, we're dealing with adults. They like choices. They want to be treated with respect, and we see...

00;14;10;10 - 00;14;14;22
Paul Chapman
I imagine the choice gets buy in from the person.

00;14;14;25 - 00;14;36;17
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Yes. Yes. So they can say so. That's why we sit down even after Brian takes them and they come to our come to the school, we sit down with them again and say, okay, where are you at? You know, Well, and then a lot of will go, Well, I'm just here because it's because I got to be here, you know, and and then at the end what's really cool is they'll go, you know, I'm glad I came here.

00;14;37;02 - 00;14;56;20
Dr. Debbie Faubus
You know, I really learned some things. You know, this wasn’t so bad after all. That's the kind of stories I like. The stories when the judge comes downstairs where we are and the people walk up to him and say, Thank you for giving me this opportunity. We're not doing the work, but we're helping them. We're giving them another path besides going to jail, you know, because.

00;14;56;20 - 00;14;58;24
Paul Chapman
I almost view you all as a bridge to opportunity.

00;14;58;24 - 00;15;11;03
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Yeah, that I kind of like that. That's good, but you know, and as I've said before, we've probably saved the county in five years, a million and a half in jail cost and.

00;15;11;18 - 00;15;13;17
Paul Chapman
You're preventing incarceration, so...

00;15;13;19 - 00;15;33;29
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Right, and that's just... that's just going to jail here. What if I get in trouble and I keep going to jail, I end up in prison. You know what the cost is there. That's unbelievable. And so we don't want them to get to that point. We don't want them to be, you know, a career criminal. We want to help them down here.

00;15;33;29 - 00;15;54;24
Dr. Debbie Faubus
And the smallest things can make a difference. You know, fixing a flat tire, showing them how to get to how to manage a schedule, you know, if you got it, if it says 8:00, be there a little bit before 8:00. You know, not 8:15 and not 8:30. If you haven't lived that way and been taught those things, you don't know that.

00;15;55;04 - 00;16;09;06
Dr. Debbie Faubus
And there's a lot of adults that haven't been you know, they haven't had opportunity. And so that's what we try to give them is the opportunity to better themselves, to keep their job, to keep their families together, you know, whatever it is they need.

00;16;09;18 - 00;16;10;26
Paul Chapman
Can you show us some more?

00;16;10;28 - 00;16;15;08
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Yeah, you bet. Do you want to go on down to where?

00;16;15;16 - 00;16;17;01
Paul Chapman
Yeah. Show us. Show us your digs.

00;16;17;13 - 00;16;28;29
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Okay. One thing I always wanted was a library slash book nook. So this gave us an opportunity...

00;16;28;29 - 00;16;29;27
Paul Chapman
You’re such a teacher.

00;16;29;27 - 00;16;43;21
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Yeah, I know. It's the teacher... So this gave us an opportunity to set this up, and we've given out, I don't know how many books, and we get books from the library when they're going to give them away, or people donate books to us all the time.

00;16;44;16 - 00;17;08;20
Dr. Debbie Faubus
And up here we also have our Parents as Teachers program. If it is a, you know, a person that comes to court, Judge Baker thinks that they might benefit from that program, he also might mention that to them, but generally he gives us the run of it. Somebody comes in, he like he said in court, they will evaluate you, they will talk to you, and then you make those decisions.

00;17;08;22 - 00;17;35;06
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Well, if I get somebody that's got small children or let's say it's a woman, she's pregnant, you know, or it's a dad, we try to enroll them in the Parents as Teachers program because that's just another support system for them. This is Western Arkansas. I had mentioned them Western Arkansas Community Development, and that's Milinda McSpadden, and she's going to be teaching some classes for us too. We're going to have some more, some cooking classes and some other things like that.

00;17;35;06 - 00;17;37;09
Dr. Debbie Faubus
We're always looking at things to add.

00;17;37;09 - 00;17;46;24
Paul Chapman
So when someone chooses to participate in a program, what they're committing to is 40 hours of of whatever choices amongst the options.

00;17;46;24 - 00;17;47;12
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Exactly.

00;17;47;12 - 00;17;53;18
Paul Chapman
So it could be getting the GED or participating in some other workforce development program, Right?

00;17;53;18 - 00;17;54;00
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Right.

00;17;54;14 - 00;17;55;21
Paul Chapman
Does counseling count in the 40 hours?

00;17;55;21 - 00;17;57;18
Dr. Debbie Faubus
No. No that's a different...

00;17;57;24 - 00;18;06;27
Dr. Debbie Faubus
That's a whole different ballgame because that's on the other side. So that that doesn't anything to do with that. Now I do have a counselor that works for me. She's a drug and alcohol counselor.

00;18;07;05 - 00;18;14;14
Paul Chapman
What what happens when they successfully complete the 40 hours? They go back to court and judge reviews?

00;18;14;19 - 00;18;15;02
Dr. Debbie Faubus
No they're done.

00;18;15;02 - 00;18;16;03
Paul Chapman
They're just done?

00;18;16;03 - 00;18;32;05
Dr. Debbie Faubus
They're just done. They get a letter, probation officer gets a letter and a letter goes in their file and they're done. Yeah. So it's that simple. They don't even have to see him again.. Now, I know in some courts they do want to see them again, but he doesn’t. He said we're good after that.

00;18;32;06 - 00;18;36;23
Paul Chapman
Okay. I guess that's helped along by your whole being in one location.

00;18;36;23 - 00;18;37;22
Dr. Debbie Faubus
I think it does. Yes. Yes.

00;18;38;03 - 00;18;39;22
Paul Chapman
It just makes communication easier.

00;18;39;22 - 00;18;58;09
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Oh, my gosh. Because we were in another building, you know, when we started. This is so much better. So much better when you're in the same building and you you know, we have issue with somebody, we can walk right up or bring the probation officer down. And we have our person here that is from Carl Albert, and he helps with financial aid.

00;18;58;16 - 00;19;03;08
Paul Chapman
So if someone wanted to go to college, then you have just here on site.

00;19;04;06 - 00;19;28;17
Dr. Debbie Faubus
And then we have our clothes closet and also with, you know, housewares, whatever they need, we don't have it. We try to get it for them. We’re partners with a place in Alma called Hand to Hand. And this is my snap person that's here also to assist. So we have SNAP and TANF, and then we have Teresa over here who is Work Force, and this is Brittney.

00;19;28;17 - 00;19;50;09
Dr. Debbie Faubus
She's our AmeriCorps member. Do y'all want to go down the stairs or the elevator? Brian takes care of all of the data that we collect from the alt sentencing program, DWI court, child support court, drug court. He takes care of all of that data.

00;19;50;12 - 00;20;06;16
Paul Chapman
So and that's not only tracking kind of the the success or failures, but also you're providing that communication then back to the court? Yes. So the probation officers and the judge know who's participating, what their status is and participation?

00;20;06;16 - 00;20;27;24
Dr. Debbie Faubus
And if they're not participating and they're not getting their hours every week, then they follow warrant. Brian does, like I said, he does all the data, which is very important because we have used that data to apply for grants. And, you know, we try to collect, you know, percentages. We were real excited this year, 100% of our people that went through, that had a job, kept a job.

00;20;28;15 - 00;20;29;22
Paul Chapman
Oh, really?

00;20;29;22 - 00;20;31;24
Dr. Debbie Faubus
So we were really excited about that?

00;20;32;12 - 00;20;41;06
Paul Chapman
I would imagine so. I mean, that's got to be one of the most impressive job readiness or job programs in the state.

00;20;41;07 - 00;20;45;10
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Yeah, I was just I was ecstatic about that. On on down the road.

00;20;45;24 - 00;20;50;28
Paul Chapman
Onto the next.

00;20;50;28 - 00;21;10;18
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Okay. I want to tell you a little bit about... did you see that? I came in looking for help and I found a miracle. That came from a student that came in here. He was homeless had no clothes, pair of shorts, shirt, needed a job, needed food. He was meeting with one of our people out front, and that's what he said.

00;21;11;00 - 00;21;30;04
Dr. Debbie Faubus
So I told you we have college classes here? That's Vinsennes University. We have... we offer an associate's degree through them. And it's also we offer our clinical medical assistant, and we're getting ready to offer a pharmacy tech degree next year. Okay. Certification. Excuse me. You know, the more the merrier. The more we have to offer

00;21;30;04 - 00;21;30;29
Paul Chapman
More options?

00;21;31;04 - 00;21;43;05
Dr. Debbie Faubus
More options. That's exactly right. So all of this through here is all of our area. We do our testing. Classrooms here. You've probably met you met Darla before, and Darla is our.

00;21;44;14 - 00;21;46;24
Paul Chapman
Hey, how are you? Good to see you again.

00;21;46;27 - 00;21;48;22
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Course, this is our testing area.

00;21;49;25 - 00;22;12;01
Paul Chapman
So, Debbie know how many GEDs? I know that's not the only thing you do, but probably what you started as is traditionally the adult that has done that. You know, how many a year is average for y'all that have passed? Ms. Darla, how many how many folks passed GED a year? About 100 a year? Okay.

00;22;12;18 - 00;22;31;02
Dr. Debbie Faubus
That's the whole GED. That's not just the sections. Okay. You know, you can take each section so they could roll over into the next year or the next two years because, you know, adults don't drop out. They stop out, something happens that we hear that all the time. Yeah, well, this happened in my life. In fact, one of the ladies that just walked through.

00;22;31;10 - 00;22;52;10
Dr. Debbie Faubus
I talked to her, you know, she had to stop out, but she's come back now. She's going go to college. She said, I'm on it, you know. Okay, good. It's, you know, they just got to be ready. But out here is where when I talked about earlier too, people serving, this is where we serve the students. They'll come in and set out and we keep water available here for them.

00;22;52;21 - 00;22;56;15
Dr. Debbie Faubus
And they set up out here. And then I can sit out here and eat.

00;22;57;01 - 00;22;57;07
Paul Chapman
Okay.

00;22;57;20 - 00;23;25;26
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Like I said, on Tuesdays and Thursdays, because a lot of them come from work or, you know, like can't afford to do a drive through. We're walking into the resource center hub. We have 100 families office up here. And then, the county Conservation District has a an office up here. And then we rent it out or people use it in the community.

00;23;26;01 - 00;23;32;08
Paul Chapman
I've been to some community meetings up here where you had put together, you know, a number of other community.

00;23;32;18 - 00;23;33;02
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Yes.

00;23;33;14 - 00;23;37;12
Paul Chapman
Agencies and and organizations.

00;23;37;12 - 00;23;56;10
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Yeah. I like to have at least twice a year a meeting of all the resources that we work with. So we can all see each other, so we can all be in the same room and talk about the needs of the county or, you know, who's new in that office. Who do we need to know what your who's your face of that office and

00;23;56;10 - 00;23;57;03
Dr. Debbie Faubus
So you.

00;23;57;03 - 00;24;01;15
Paul Chapman
You know, what you've built here is truly a community resource hub.

00;24;02;01 - 00;24;36;24
Dr. Debbie Faubus
That's what I want. That's what I've always wanted. We just had our second chance job fair, and we partnered with ACC in Fort Smith. Great turnout. We had a 20 something vendors to hire people. It was unbelievable. And they showed up. We had lunch, people got jobs, got to meet people, help them with resumes, and we're going to start having one in the spring and in the fall for people that are, you know, needing help and not just jobs, but like I said earlier, just resources that they don't know that's out there.

00;24;37;02 - 00;24;57;23
Dr. Debbie Faubus
You know, you know, we have Monarch 61 here that's for women that have, you know, have been traumatized or lived in trauma. People don't know that's available. It's free for them to go out there. So they're all set up here for them to talk to, you know, And that was so cool to see that happen. And one guy ended up coming to school here.

00;24;58;00 - 00;25;06;17
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Him and his wife was here, and they had their three little bitty kids. I mean, just cute as they could be. And now he's in school here, not because he has to be, but because he chooses to be.

00;25;07;04 - 00;25;34;24
Paul Chapman
Well, let's talk about the opportunity that district court provides to be able to engage people. What we've seen and the case we're trying to make here is that district court is upstream of foster care and incarceration... more serious consequences for crimes and actions, but that we could find individuals that are likelier, more probable to end up there. We can find them in district court.

00;25;34;25 - 00;25;46;00
Paul Chapman
And so talk to us a little bit about just you know, do you see that's true after five years of working so closely with the court? You know what? Reflect on that a little bit.

00;25;46;02 - 00;26;08;04
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Absolutely. I wholeheartedly believe we have kept people from going to prison. And they will tell you that, because they'll tell you I was on the wrong road making bad choices. And now I've kept my job, kept my family. Well, they're taxpayers. You know, people say, well, it don't have anything to do with me. Yes, it does. It's good economics, because then you keep people where they need to be.

00;26;08;15 - 00;26;34;21
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Their kids aren't. Don't go to foster care, like you said, because I have nowhere to go if their parents are incarcerated. So, yes, I definitely have seen it and I've heard them say that to me. And I've asked I just every once in a while, I'll just ask, you know, hey, what if you weren't here? What’d you be...? I'd probably be in jail, I'd be on my way to prison or be out on the street or I might be dead, you know, So, yes, I definitely think it makes a big difference.

00;26;35;08 - 00;26;57;21
Paul Chapman
What you've been able to kind of assess at this point is the county, Crawford County has saved at least 1,100,00 in direct jail cost. You've just been able to divert someone from instead of going to jail, you get to go to school and and better yourself. And that is good not only for the individual but for the Crawford County community.

00;26;57;21 - 00;27;15;22
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Oh, absolutely. And for, you know, for families. Just think about that. It just comes full circle. And, you know, and I say that a lot. You have to take care of the whole person. If you come in and you're hungry or you don't have a place to live. Those are the kind of things that we make referrals to.

00;27;15;27 - 00;27;28;15
Dr. Debbie Faubus
We have 100 Families here, Hand to Hand in our community. You know, just different resources in our community. It's not all about us. We're not doing all of it. But if we can't do it, we probably know somebody that can.

00;27;29;04 - 00;27;38;02
Paul Chapman
When you started alt sentencing with Judge Baker five years ago, you had how many students per year kind of leading up to it, and then...

00;27;38;02 - 00;27;45;18
Dr. Debbie Faubus
We had 400 the first year we had alt sentencing. The first full year, we were up to 1200 students.

00;27;45;26 - 00;27;49;17
Paul Chapman
Okay. So you went from 400 students when you were.

00;27;49;24 - 00;27;50;11
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Just adult ed.

00;27;50;18 - 00;27;56;16
Paul Chapman
Just adult ed, but then when you started partnering with the court, you touched 1200 lives?

00;27;56;22 - 00;28;06;13
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Right. And it wasn't just, you know, alt sentencing students, you know, it's mom, dad, grandma and grandpa. We've had three generations in the building at a time going through programs.

00;28;06;15 - 00;28;12;16
Paul Chapman
So someone was seeing that you provided opportunity, and they talked to their loved ones and brought them up here..

00;28;12;21 - 00;28;30;04
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Yes. Well, they had to bring them because in the state of Arkansas can't drive for six months if you get in trouble with drugs, you know, So they'd have to bring them. Well, why sit out in the car? I might as well go through one of the programs. Hey. you know, I never touched the computer. I think I'll take one of those programs.

00;28;30;15 - 00;28;43;22
Dr. Debbie Faubus
So, yeah, it was it was unbelievable at how quick you know, it started. Well, then COVID came around and our numbers kind of dropped a little bit. And then we're on the way back up this year. We're probably looking at about 1100 this year.

00;28;44;16 - 00;29;02;13
Paul Chapman
What would you say to some community members that might be watching this and then be interested in how could they get started in their own community? Because you've I mean, clearly what what you all have built here after five years is truly remarkable.

00;29;02;29 - 00;29;23;13
Dr. Debbie Faubus
I would have a luncheon, I tell everybody that, and invite all your judges who's going to be involved, your prosecuting attorneys, whoever is going to be in that pipeline, invite them and talk to them about this program and how you're going to put it together. You've got to work as a team. We work with Judge Baker's, not just him,

00;29;23;23 - 00;29;44;04
Dr. Debbie Faubus
We work with all of his staff. We are a team. We had a luncheon not too long ago so I could share with them our numbers and what they they've been a part of. And they were so excited because they didn't realize, you know, they're a part of this. This wouldn't work without them. It wouldn't work without us.

00;29;44;04 - 00;29;55;02
Dr. Debbie Faubus
We have to work as a team and we have to make this work for our community. And they are on board. I mean, they they're just they're a phenomenal group of people to work with.

00;29;55;03 - 00;29;55;19
Charles Newsom
Judge Baker.

00;29;55;19 - 00;30;17;06
Paul Chapman
If you were thinking about, you know, how to replicate what you have here, at least in principle, you know, in in other district courts, you know, can you talk a little bit about why should maybe another court consider going through all the trouble that you've gone through and working that out, and the community providers, and...?

00;30;17;06 - 00;30;41;24
Judge Charles Baker
Because you can see the effect in the community, that's the end result that you see is the community is different as a result of the opportunities that we're providing people. I think the biggest impediment to other judges implementing this is unfortunately, in some communities, agencies don't talk to each other, courts don't communicate with the other agencies that can help the people that are appearing in their court.

00;30;42;08 - 00;31;03;10
Judge Charles Baker
And I don't understand why that is. But I talked to groups occasionally, and I'll say to them, Well, have you ever gone down and talked to your district judge? And they'll say one of two things either no, I never have, or I don't even know who my district judge is. And so we've got to fix that. And I think it's easier for us as judges to reach out to people than it is to expect them to come to us.

00;31;03;23 - 00;31;25;07
Judge Charles Baker
And so I encourage other judges, if they want to look at what we've done to get out there, talk to community groups, talk to the other government agencies in your community. I meet regularly with our county judge, with the members of our Quarum Court, with the chiefs of police for all of our agencies, with mayors, with the superintendents in our school district.

00;31;25;07 - 00;31;47;18
Judge Charles Baker
I never refuse a phone call from anybody that wants to talk to me about what we're doing in court. In fact, yesterday I got a phone call from Western Arkansas Planning and Development asking if I can come in Friday and meet with me. Happy to do that. We've got to take advantage of those opportunities when we get a chance to tell people what our needs are and what they could do to make it better for people who are having to go through our court system.

00;31;48;02 - 00;32;00;06
Paul Chapman
What recommendations might you give to another judge on how to start? I know you said kind of reached out, but what would be the way to. You've grown so large over six years. How would another judge just get started?

00;32;00;07 - 00;32;23;13
Judge Charles Baker
Well, I was really lucky because the first person that I talked to about this was the director, our adult education service, Doctor Debbie Faubus. And she is just on fire about helping people. And so I think that's the key to other district judges is you've got to find that person in your community that's on fire that really believes in what you're talking about and is willing to commit the time and effort to make it happen.

00;32;24;08 - 00;32;43;12
Judge Charles Baker
I was fortunate enough that was the first person I talked to. Some judges might have to go through several people before you find that person, but if you find somebody who's willing to take it on and we've been so fortunate here, we've had retired state legislators who have signed on to help us. We've got retired teachers and educators who have signed on to help us.

00;32;43;19 - 00;32;59;11
Judge Charles Baker
I mean, it's just every day I look up and I'm just shocked that people who have lived substantive lives, who have already accomplished so many things in their career, who take the time to come in and try to help us. So you just got to make that connection with your community leaders who are willing to get involved.

00;33;00;03 - 00;33;18;11
Paul Chapman
Dr. Faubus, It has to be harder to do adult ed the way that you're doing it than than the way maybe that traditionally it's been done. I mean. It's got to be a lot more time and.

00;33;18;12 - 00;33;42;23
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Oh, it is. It is. I could sit behind my desk, draw my same paycheck, and then retire when I needed to. But it's so much more fulfilling, more than money or anything when you can help somebody and when somebody's successful and somebody comes back and tells you or your staff, you helped me. We had a gentleman leave the other day and he wrote a thank you notes to every staff member that helped him.

00;33;43;11 - 00;34;16;28
Dr. Debbie Faubus
Now, who does that anymore? You know, that meant so much to the staff members. It's about our whole team. And they believe in what we do. And they know that if they don't believe in what we do, they don't really need to be here because we're here for people and we're here to serve. And that's that's what we need to do.

00;34;17;21 - 00;34;31;01
Charles Newsom
Thanks for joining us for a look inside the Van Buren District Court. Join us next episode as we look to the future of the court system. Thank you again.

00;34;33;18 - 00;34;58;07
Ed Lowry
Thanks to our guests, Dr. Debbie Faubus, Judge Charles Baker and the staff of the Crawford County District Court and of Crawford County Adult Education. And thanks to Arkansas Churches for Life for sponsoring. Musical credits include “The Simple Truth” by Dr. Delight, “Tangles” by Aaron Sprinkle, “Wander” by EILOH and “Road to Home” by Solitude. Music is licensed through soundstripe.com. Smart Justice is a work of Restore Hope.

00;34;58;21 - 00;35;19;28
Ed Lowry
Please consider helping us produce more work like this by becoming a sponsor at www.smartjustice.org. Thank you again.

00;35;23;16 - 00;35;24;10
Ed Lowry
Sound rolling.

00;35;24;14 - 00;35;31;04
Paul Chapman
We are now. Yes. Yes we are now rolling around holding the....

00;35;31;05 - 00;35;38;24
Ed Lowry
And now that we're actually recording audio, can we not have a really loud conversation in the room right next to us while we're talking? Just asking.

00;35;39;04 - 00;35;40;26
Paul Chapman
Not naming names.

00;35;42;09 - 00;35;43;06
Ed Lowry
Asking for a friend.

00;35;43;29 - 00;35;46;11
Jamie Hammond
Okay. And action.