Whatcom County’s Behind the Scenes Reform

Part 2

Electronic Home Monitoring for a New Lease on Life

by Ella Gage

There’s a fine line between locking up offenders who pose a critical threat to public safety and creating alternate pathways for those who commit low-level crimes — specifically poverty and substance use-related offenses — who would better benefit from home monitoring sentences and rehabilitation programs.

For nearly 50 years, Barbara Miller has dedicated her career to those who fall into the latter category. As the executive director of the public benefit nonprofit Friendship Diversion Services (FDS), her organization has supplied over 2,000 GPS and alcohol monitoring ankle bracelets to the City of Bellingham (COB) so that lower-level offenders can complete their sentences at home. Those bracelets may very well offer offenders a new lease on life.

Though diversion via electronic home monitoring (EHM) is not a “right,” it’s an opportunity for offenders to comply with court orders, work to fund restitution, get treatment and attend rehab, and stay with their families. (1) Those in the program pay $15.50 to $30 fees each day in place of serving hard time — statistics from Bellingham Municipal Court announced that EHM had saved COB over $9 million over eight years, from 2016 to 2023. (See table below).

Home Monitor chart

source: Bellingham Municipal Court
City of Bellingham
Electronic Home Monitoring
*Includes defendants who began serving in previous year.
**Amount of money the City of Bellingham saved by defendants not spending time in the Whatcom County jail.

 

Jail isn’t beneficial to individuals struggling with mental health or substance use disorders. Yet, according to the 2022 sheriff’s office report, 48 percent of those booked in jail have mental health issues and 80 percent struggle with substance abuse. (13) Incarceration makes those individuals worse, more volatile, more likely to commit crimes upon their release, and less likely to re-assimilate and become productive members of society. Jail is not rehabilitative. It’s what Miller refers to as “jail school,” a dubious education one would rather not imagine.

Preserving Dignity

Through FDS’s contract with the COB, their EHM program has allowed offenders to preserve their jobs, relationships with their families, and dignity. If they pass pretrial safety screenings, the municipal court will divert them away from jail, into FDS’s electronic home monitoring program where they serve their sentence at home via the ankle bracelets’ carefully set geographic parameters.

The way I look at it, [low-level offenders] get into this trough where they’re not really criminals, they’re not out there doing major criminal activities,” said Miller. “But if you stop them in their tracks long enough so they can ask themselves what they’re doing and why, they get into treatment, self-correct, and change the trajectory of their life, and that’s our goal.”

Miller worked in a state penitentiary for over 10 years as a prisoner advocate under a Prison Legal Services initiative. She took over FDS in 1981, and has committed the last 43 years of her career to doing “anything she could” to prevent people from making the consequential jump into the system.

Most of the people who complete [FDS’s home monitoring] program aren’t going to end up incarcerated after all,” said Miller. “It’s not all about finances — the light goes on and people realize ‘my life is better, my family is happier,’ and that change is not measurable, but we see it constantly.”

In 2016 and 2017 — the first two years COB adopted FDS’s electronic home monitoring program — there was “an unheard of success rate of 98 percent of those serving their time on the FDS bracelets,” according to Bellingham Municipal Court Judge Debra Lev.

Additionally, pretrial defendants are enrolled in EHM instead of awaiting their trial in the Whatcom County Jail. This is exceptionally beneficial considering the ongoing trial backlogs local courts have grappled with in the wake of Covid-19, which ground sentencing to a virtual halt. (4) With FDS’s services, judges can immediately order EHM sentences for defendants so they don’t have to wait up to three months to begin serving time. (4)

Security of Being Home

I asked Miller and FDS’s branch manager Belem Rodriguez if there were any hurdles FDS has faced in terms of public opinion. Assumably there would be at least some controversy around giving sentenced offenders — albeit low-level offenders — limited autonomy. They looked at me, raised their eyebrows, and shook their heads.

Actually, we have a lot of offenders reach out to us and say they’re grateful to have a bracelet and the security of being at home,” said Rodriguez.

I glanced at Miller, somewhat expecting a story or anecdote. Certainly not everything had been rosy in the past 19 years since adopting electronic home monitoring as part of FDS’s services, I wrongly presumed.

If anything, [the public] doesn’t understand the process of what we do or how we do it,” she said. “But if you open up a conversation, there’s always an ‘aha’ moment and everyone says, ‘oh, that’s a great idea.’”

This was deja-vu; months earlier, I sat down with Barry Buchanan from the Whatcom County Council to discuss the county’s diversion efforts through rehabilitative programming, one of which is electronic home monitoring. He’d been on a public safety committee listening tour through Ferndale, Deming, Sudden Valley and Lynden during the conception of Whatcom County’s justice reform efforts in order to gauge public opinion.

Across the board for all those different local demographics, the one message that rang consistently was: we prefer treatment over punishment whenever possible,” said Buchanan. “That was the reaction we got even out of some of the most conservative people out in Lynden, because the community looks at [incarceration] differently once they get to have that conversation.”

That’s a rather profound concept: diverting low-level criminals out of jail — which could easily be construed as a partisan initiative, perhaps even radically progressive — appeals to both sides of the aisle after sitting down and laying out the rationale.

Whether viewing diversion programs such as FDS’s for the the tax dollars they save, the recidivism and incarceration rates they lower, or the lives they change, there is sound reasoning for keeping individuals out of jail and diverting them into programs like EHM that offer a chance for rehabilitation and give them a new lease on life.

FDS’s Humble Beginnings

Prior to becoming a full-scale nonprofit contracted to provide EHM to cities and counties across Washington state, Friendship Diversion Services was conceptualized by a small Thurston County church group in the 80s. Their primary concern: keeping teenagers out of jail for marijuana possession.

They were concerned about people ending up with convictions who didn’t necessarily need them,” said Miller. “Quite frankly, that mostly ended up being teenagers getting arrested for pot, because in those days it meant a 20-year sentence.”

Miller was on FDS’s board of directors, but she felt focusing solely on diversion didn’t cut it, so she opened a state work release facility as a private contractor under the Washington State Department of Corrections. It started out as a one-woman-band with a singular part-time employee, and Miller locked down state funding so FDS could help offenders find employment.

FDS expanded to offer a variety of diversion programs: monitoring for pre-file misdemeanor resolutions, post-charge employment services and educational opportunities, community service work programs, re-licensing for suspensions, and post  conviction compliance monitoring. (1) Though they still offer those programs, Miller says the COB was only ever interested in electronic home monitoring.

It wasn’t until 2005 — over two decades after the organization’s inception — a Clallam County sheriff approached FDS with a proposition: they hire a diversion officer and extend their services to provide the county with electronic home monitoring, which was newly possible in the early 2000s due to GPS technological advancements.

Initially, I said I don’t know anything about home monitoring, so why on earth would I want to do that?” Miller laughed. “His point was, because we were doing diversion and he saw we were helping people find employment opportunities, helping them with housing, and all the other kinds of ancillary problems offenders have, he wanted those services for people on electronics.”

After some consideration, Miller found a company called Trak Group to provide GPS monitoring ankle bracelets. To this day, FDS is contracted with Trak Group — now one of the most prominent providers of GPS tracking bracelets in the United States. (5)

This device just answers everyone’s prayers,” said Miller.

About three years later, FDS expanded its services to alcohol monitoring bracelets. For both GPS and alcohol monitoring ankle bracelets, the organization charges a mere $30 per day, and $15.50 for GPS monitoring only. In contrast, as of 2024, incarceration in Whatcom County jail costs $185 per day and $67,525 per inmate annually. (6)

Along with Bellingham, FDS is currently contracted with Thurston, Pierce, Spokane, Okanogan and smaller counties; the cities of Olympia, Cle Elum, Port Angeles, Kent; and a handful of smaller cities across the state. They primarily provide electronic home monitoring services rather than diversion, with the exception of Thurston County and a handful of smaller counties. Miller thinks most of FDS’s work has largely shifted to electronic monitoring in recent years because it’s “more conducive for alternative consideration from courts than straight diversion.”

Friendship Diversion Services illustration

Illustration: Ella Gage
Nonprofit Friendship Diversion Services (FDS) is contracted with the City of Bellingham to provide electronic home monitoring bracelets to lowlevel offenders instead of jail time. Above: a Trak Group GPS device with three-way voice technology that tracks offenders’ immediate location down to the second.

How Effective Are FDS’s Ankle Bracelets?

Electronic home monitoring is appealing to municipal and county courts for a reason. GPS bracelets track offenders down to the second: how fast they’re driving, what direction they’re going in, and whether or not they’re approaching a court-mandated “restricted zone,” or within 1,000 feet of a victim’s home or school. FDS has access to all this information, and law enforcement is immediately contacted if a low level offender is somewhere they shouldn’t be.

If we have an ‘active offender,’ so someone who needs extra supervision, if that person tries to remove the bracelet, we’d immediately get a phone call,” explained Miller. “The other side of it that I think people should always tell the defendant, is it can help them because there’s a phone in the bracelet.”

With three-way voice communication, FDS operators and law enforcement can speak to the defendant or offender directly when interventions are needed. The wearer also has the capability to call FDS at any given time if they’re in an emergency.

Miller shared a story about a Cle Elum offender, whose car rolled over on the highway, and his phone was nowhere to be seen. Trapped in the car, he pushed the call button on the bracelet which connected him to FDS’s monitoring center.

FDS called the sheriff and someone went and rescued him as quickly as possible, so it’s worth mentioning there’s a benefit to the defendants,” said Miller. “But there’s a ton of benefit to us and to law enforcement.”

If more serious offenders — specifically for domestic crimes — approach a court-mandated geographic perimeter, FDS will call them immediately to tell them they are in an exclusion zone and police have been alerted. What if they enter the zone anyway?

There’s a 92-degree siren that goes off so everyone around them is aware, so they usually don’t ignore our calls after that because they’re frantically trying to contact us to shut down the siren,” Miller laughed.

Individuals with no-contact orders are labeled “active defendants.” Despite the severity that label implies, active defendants typically have more autonomy than those with strict home monitoring sentences. They can leave their house, go to school, work, appointments, and public spaces if the court mandates it. For those on home detention, authorities are notified when they step outside the perimeter of their home unless they get a special court approved exemption, typically for medical reasons.

For offenders with high-risk alcohol-related offenses — primarily DUIs — continuous alcohol monitoring bracelets run transdermal alcohol testing at 30-minute intervals. (7) When alcohol is consumed, one percent of it is excreted through perspiration. The bracelets use gas spectroscopy to identify any trace chemical signatures of alcohol, immediately alerting FDS and the municipal court. (8)

Sober and Compliant

Ninety-nine percent of those with alcohol monitoring bracelets remain sober and compliant with court orders. Bracelets track sober days and are proven to support long-term substance abuse treatment, behavioral changes, and wearer accountability. (3)

Both alcohol and GPS monitoring bracelets immediately alert FDS if an offender is tampering with them. With thick rubber straps and internal wires, Miller says removal is possible but “extremely difficult and rare.” Offenders who are particularly volatile or pose a higher safety risk are given heavy-duty bracelets with thick, steel interiors.

One time in Alaska, a guy took a diamond drill to the steel bracelet and nearly lost his foot,” Miller recounted. “I wouldn’t recommend it.” However misguided, the creativity was certainly there.

Each monitoring device is worth about $1,500 and FDS is billed a $50 insurance deductible in the event someone cuts off or destroys their device.

That happens in Pierce County, but rarely here,” said Miller.

Key to Acronyms

How the Program Works

FDS’s electronic home monitoring services fit into Bellingham’s long history of leaning towards diversion and rehabilitative services for a specific demographic of lower-level offenders, as opposed to serving hard time. For those with misdemeanors, substance use disorders, and behavioral health issues, incarceration is not going to provide those individuals with a pathway to long-term improvement. Booking “familiar faces” for repeat minor offenses drains law enforcement funding without providing rehabilitation, and first time offenders with charges such as lesser property crimes, domestic charges, and DUIs are carefully assessed by courts to determine if incarceration is necessary.

There’s certainly a fine line between balancing the need for public safety and providing alternate pathways to incarceration so individuals get into treatment that would better benefit them in the long term.

Since 2015, Bellingham and the larger Whatcom County have expanded resources such as the community court, mental health court, Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion, Anne Deacon Center for Hope, Bellingham’s Alternate Response Team, and FDS’s in-home detention program to fill that programmatic gap between incarceration and rehabilitation.

FDS provides a key alternative pathway to incarceration, starting in the pretrial phase.

Defendants usually start on pretrial, and, once they get sentenced, they’ll get a certain amount of days on home detention,” said Rodriguez. “So, depending on how they do pretrial on EHM, it typically converts into their sentence.” Miller adds that judges assess defendants’ adherence to mandates and behavioral changes during the pretrial phase to deem whether or not they qualify for an EHM sentence — which they typically do.

As soon as defendants enter the EHM program, FDS operators manually program court-mandated parameters. Courts determine if individuals are to be locked in their house or are able to go to work, school, treatment, or counseling. As an independent contractor, the organization is required by state statute to follow those parameters unless they receive specific court amendments.

Interestingly, Whatcom County is not contracted with Friendship Diversion Services — only COB. Though over 2,000 individuals have served EHM sentences under the municipal court jurisdiction with overwhelming success by every metric — completion, behavioral improvement, affordability, and more — yet only about 300 individuals pre- and post-trial have qualified for Whatcom County’s adjacent ankle bracelet program, according to the 2024 report (4).

That’s because the Whatcom County sheriff has the contract for electronic monitoring,” explained Miller. “We get a few referrals from the county for things they won’t cover and provide services for, in which case they send people here.”

Since the sheriff is running the county’s EHM program, Miller’s organization can’t be contracted as a private provider — and, if they were, the contract would have to be extremely specific so there would be no overlap in case management. For example, if the county sheriff didn’t want to cover DUI and theft cases, there would have to be an agreement that FDS could only touch those specific cases.

We’ve been getting quite a few direct orders from the county over these past couple years though, so it’s ramping up,” said Rodriguez. Miller added FDS is continuing to expand their services throughout Washington state.

A Viable Alternative to “Lock ‘Em Up”

America’s high incarceration rate is unparalleled due to its long history of overly punitive laws such as the War on Drugs, longer sentencing, and prejudiced policy-making targeting low-income individuals, immigrants, and people of color. (9) Our prison rate has increased 500 percent over the past 40 years, despite an onslaught of research that finds it vastly ineffective in lowering crime rates and enforcing public safety. (10)

The Vera Project finds the inertia behind widespread justice reform lies in local jurisdictional reform efforts and shifts, though “these declines have been driven almost exclusively by larger cities; smaller cities and towns continue to see incarceration rates grow.” (11) As a mid-sized city, Bellingham is an outlier in this phenomenon.

Though Bellingham’s efforts to expand diversion programming, community courts, and electronic home monitoring haven’t been as visible as Seattle’s due to its smaller scale and lower media visibility, the breadth of Bellingham’s reform is remarkable — especially as a localized, collaborative mission between city and county jurisdictions.

I asked Miller whether she believes, as a justice system veteran, that the solution to driving down incarceration rates lies in diversion programs such as Friendship Diversion Service’s electronic home monitoring.

For those enlightened communities that decide to adopt programs like ours, yes … but there are still so many communities across this country who lock ‘em up and throw away the key, which does no good for anybody and costs us billions of dollars every year from taxpayers,” she said. “But I’d say Bellingham and Whatcom County are definitely more enlightened communities.”

Trump’s promised brutal policing policies may slash funding for city, county, and state jurisdictions’ diversion programming. Miller says that most of the smaller Washington cities and counties in which FDS is contracted rely on federal grants to fund services. However, these same local jurisdictions tend to have much more power over criminal justice reform than the federal government, so EHM and diversion programs will likely remain protected locally.

EHM continues to play an important role in communities as a middle-ground between incarceration and probation, as participants are often able to repair family relationships, work to pay off debt, receive treatment for substance dependencies and behavioral health issues, and go to rehab. For many, court-mandated enrollment in EHM programs such as Friendship Diversion Services allows them to become functioning members of society without ever having to go to jail and then re-assimilate — or recidivate.

At the end of the day, electronic home monitoring sentences give low-level offenders the life changing opportunity to become functioning members of society without having to go to jail and then re-assimilate.

It’s incredibly rewarding to see people when they complete the program and they’re so proud of themselves, so proud to be present with their family,” said Rodriguez. “By the end of the road, they’re usually thanking us.”

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Ella Gage is a journalism-public relations student at Western Washington University with a longstanding interest in environmental conservation, social issues, and the ways in which they intersect.

Endnotes:

  1.  https://s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/thurstoncountywa.gov.if-us-west-2/s3fs-public/2023-02/BoCC_LJC-Ronnie-West-Presentation-20151119.pdf
  2.  https://drive.google.com/# le/d/1pwrs7JVmrPVtjpJhTvlrDkm_wwMd5sss/view?usp=drive_link
  3.  https://whatcomwatch.org/index.php/article/alternatives-to-jail-save-money/
  4.  https://www.whatcomcounty.us/DocumentCenter/View/85871/IPRTF-2024-Annual-Report-?bidId=
  5.  https://trackgrp.com/
  6.  https://www.visualcapitalist.com/cost-per-prisoner-in-us-states/
  7.  https://www.scramsystems.com/monitoring/scram-continuous-alcohol-monitoring/
  8.  https://whatcomwatch.org/index.php/article/bellingham-reduces-incarceration-challenge/
  9.  https://www.vera.org/ending-mass-incarceration/causes-of-mass-incarceration
  10.  https://vera-institute.# les.svdcdn.com/production/downloads/publications/for-the-record-prisonparadox_02.pdf
  11.  https://www.vera.org/publications/the-new-dynamics-of-mass-incarceration
  12.  https://www.aclu.org/trump-on-the-criminal-legal-system#speci# c-threats-potential-responses
  13.  https://www.whatcomcounty.us/DocumentCenter/View/82333/WCSO-2022-Annual-Report
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