Alabama Pardons and Paroles Bureau Director Cam Ward said a new program intended to help people on parole or probation overcome addictions, become employable, and stay out of trouble is off to a good start.

The Parole and Probation Reentry Education and Employment Program Center, or PREP, is housed in what was previously a private prison in Uniontown.

PREP is a residential program that provides substance abuse and mental health counseling and will also provide career tech training through Ingram State Technical College. PREP’s first class graduates on Friday. It has only 10 members, but Ward said that should grow dramatically.

“It’s been a big success and it’s going to be a bigger success,” Ward said. “It’s going to be the model for us in the future. We have mental health services. We have substance use. And now Ingram is building an $8 million facility out there for job training for those reentering society.”

Ward said there are 15 private sector partners prepared to hire the graduates.

“I think going forward we could get as many as 200 or 250 people out there going through the same kind of programming,” Ward said.

Ward talked about PREP during an appearance Wednesday before the budget committees of the Alabama Legislature. Lawmakers are holding budget hearings to prepare for the legislative session, which starts March 7. Alabama Department of Corrections Commissioner John Hamm and other state agency heads also spoke at today’s hearing.

The Pardons and Paroles Bureau bought the vacant prison last year with money appropriated by the Legislature for that purpose — $15 million for the purchase and $4 million for renovations. The facility on U.S. 80 was built as a 700-bed prison built in 2006 but had been empty for years.

In November, Ward said the bureau was ready to begin treatment programs for the first participants at PREP by the end of the year. The bureau entered a $5.2 million, two-year contract with GEO Reentry Services to staff PREP.

Ward, a former state senator who accepted Gov. Kay Ivey’s appointment as Pardons and Paroles Bureau director in November 2020, has said the program is aimed at people who have gotten into trouble for violating the terms of probation and parole for reasons such as failing a drug test as opposed to people who commit more serious violations.

“Not everybody is eligible,” Ward said. “There are some people who it’s just not for them, they’re just not going to make it. But for those that are screened and go there, I think this could be the model for the future if we replicate this around the state.”

Ward said PREP can be an important component in reducing the recidivism rate in Alabama, a key part of solving problems in Alabama’s overcrowded and understaffed prison system.