MONTGOMERY, Ala. — Alabama Pardons and Paroles Director Cam Ward championed the success of the state’s participation in a program to reduce recidivism Friday during a meeting of the Council of State Governments Justice Center.
Ward told representatives from across the country interested in reducing recidivism about the bi-partisan support he’s received for his agency’s participation in the national program known as Reentry 2030.
“Here in Alabama, we developed a simple message: We want to see a 50% reduction in the number of people who were formerly incarcerated going back,” Ward said to a crowd of a few dozen people.
“We focused on that because it was a public safety angle, but we’re all still doing the same rehabilitation. I’ve heard other states who adopted it say it’s a human rights issue; whatever your angle, all that matters is (that) we’re getting to the same goal.”
One model that Ward touted and said he hopes to apply across the state is that of the PREP Rehabilitation Center in Perry County, which offers courses in welding, forklift operations and more for incarcerated Alabamians.
Ward shared that the center had recently graduated 60 students, its largest graduating class yet, and that not one graduate had reoffended since its opening in late 2022.
At the meeting, organizers also shared that another state has joined the national initiative, Washington, with Ward telling Alabama Daily News that most states that joined after Alabama – the second state to join the initiative – were largely replicating Alabama’s model of reducing recidivism.
Ward told ADN that he doesn’t expect his agency to request a significant increase in its budget ask for 2026, in large part due to his efforts to rebuild trust between the agency and lawmakers after a falling out in 2020.
During the 2020 legislative session, lawmakers voted to cut the agency’s budget by 43%, from nearly $49 million to $28 million.
Ward, a former lawmaker, was a member of the Senate budget committee that voted to ax the agency’s budget, a decision that came shortly before he was appointed by Gov. Kay Ivey to head the department.
“The Legislature got upset with the board and the previous director…” he told ADN.
“So then what happens, I take over. My goal has been to reestablish trust, let lawmakers know that we’ve got good, verifiable programs that are working to keep recidivism down.”
The agency’s budget has steadily increased over the years, with lawmakers allocating $91.4 million toward the agency in the 2025 General Fund budget, an amount that Ward said would be sufficient in the coming years to accomplish its goal of cutting recidivism in half by 2030.
“I think you’ll see a small increase request, but it will be mainly inflationary for salaries for our employees, but I don’t think you’ll see us asking for anything big, I think we’re in a good spot,” he told ADN.