Youngkin announces efforts to support formerly incarcerated people

Gov. Glenn Youngkin announces an initiative to support formerly incarcerated people as they re-enter society in Richmond on Aug. 15, 2024. Charlotte Rene Woods / Virginia Mercury

Gov. Glenn Youngkin formally announced a cross-agency strategy to support formerly incarcerated people after their release. Executive Order 36 directs several state departments to coordinate with each other on data sharing and programming and to bolster partnerships with organizations for programming.

“There’s no magic wand,” Youngkin said of a single method to improve post-incarceration experiences. “It’s a comprehensive collection of initiatives and relationships.”

He was joined by cabinet members, his wife Suzanne, Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears, Attorney General Jason Miyares and formerly incarcerated people who shared stories of getting back on their feet. The goal, they said of the initiative, is to help people become less likely to commit a crime and instead find success in the workplace and their home lives.

Youngkin said that when people who have been released from jail or prison end up back in prison, “it reminds us that we must do better.”

Youngkin said the initiative can help people with employment, healthcare access, mental health resources and substance abuse treatment, and “appropriate supervision levels.”

Measures also include implementing a statewide partnership between the Department of Corrections and Virgnia’s Community College System and exploring increased opportunities to utilize Pell Grants for people behind bars to earn degrees.

“The expansion of access to Virginia’s Community Colleges and intentional efforts to stimulate workforce readiness are hallmarks of striving to build systems of restorative justice,” Rev. Linwood Blizzard said in a statement. The reverend is a board member with the Virginia Interfaith Center for Public Policy, which has praised government efforts to support incarcerated people and their families.

While calling Youngkin’s re-entry strategy “a good first step,” Senate Majority Leader Scott Surovell, D-Fairfax, criticized the governor for rescinding previous administrations’ automatic restoration of voting rights.

Around the time Youngkin said his administration began testing out the efforts outlined in the new executive order — April 2023 — he’d also adjusted the restoration of rights process. Once an automatic process upon completing a sentence, people now must apply with little knowledge of criteria for being granted or denied. Restoration numbers have dropped during Youngkin’s tenure compared to three previous governors that had streamlined the process.

His administration has also pushed back over laws to expand earned sentence tax credits, which incarcerated people can earn through good behavior and completing programs to shorten their time behind bars. The state’s new budget allowed the credits to be fully implemented . The state’s supreme court also ruled in favor of a man who’d served longer time despite earning credits.

“The Supreme Court this past year was very clear on the current sentence credits, and so we’re fully complying,” Youngkin said Thursday.

In the meantime, he reported that efforts already underway from his initiative have helped 3,000 formerly incarcerated people find work and helped 7,000 people get health insurance.