On January 13, 2024, I appeared before the Administrative Services Committee to express deep concern about the practices of CSRA Probation, a private probation company contracted by Augusta-Richmond County to carry out what could potentially amount to a for-profit scheme targeting the poorest citizens of Augusta. These concerns were in response to a December 10, 2024, Georgia Budget and Policy Institute article authored by Ray Khalfani entitled The Public Harm Under a For-Profit Probation System: Spotlight on Augusta (https://gbpi.org/the-public-harm-under-a-for-profit-probation-system-spotlight-on-augusta/).
Also at that meeting was Steve Queen, Director of Field Services for CSRA Probation Services, Inc. Queen also happens to be Chairman of the state Board of Department of Community Supervision (https://dcs.georgia.gov/steve-queen).
After presenting quantitative data showing that between 2019-2022, Augusta was number one in the state in sentencing people to pay-only misdemeanor probation while during that same period closing out misdemeanor cases at the fourth lowest rate in the state (those numbers, we argued, suggest that a for-profit scheme is at hand and that a review of CSRA Probation was needed to ensure that financially disadvantaged Augustans who become clients of CSRA Probation are not being subjected to a vicious “out of compliance” loophole cycle being exploited by private probation companies nationwide) our agenda item was sent to the newly-formed Jail Population Committee.
This past Friday, March 7, 2025, I appeared before that committee to discuss specifically the CSRA Probation matter. What transpired was nothing more or less than an opposition hit job. It felt like I walked into the mouth of the enemy rather than a committee whose objective was to seriously address any concerns The Justice-Impacted Reformation Society Inc. (JIRSI) as it related to the harm our poorest Augustans could possibly be experiencing at the hands of private probation corporations (remember Sentinel).
First, Deputy Administrator Charles Jackson, who chairs the Jail Population Committee, had been telling me for nearly a month that those meetings are not accessible to the public due to the sensitive nature of items discussed within those meetings. That all changed on February 25, 2025, when, during a committee meeting Commissioner Jordan Johnson said publicly in the Commissioners Chamber that I could in fact appear at those meetings and speak to the committee if I wanted to (see Johnson’s statement at 3:54:24-3:54:30 of the committee meeting on https://www.youtube.com/live/rENn4eaBxpw?feature=shared).
What followed was a call extending to me an invitation to appear at the next Jail Population Committee meeting. JIRSI and our partner were thankful. However, the next day I received another call in which I was told that I would not be allowed to have any knowledge of what they had so far discussed concerning CSRA Probation out of concerns the information might get back to the media (my colleagues and I quickly translated that to mean let the political apparatus make the public statements). It was at that moment we knew that the invitation I received was a “hollow invite”—it was meaningless.
So, on Friday I walked into that meeting severely handicapped and was pressured into making an uninformed decision while the court administrator, Nolan Martin, had all of the cards along with the backing of the judge who approved of the CSRA Probation contract. That meeting was highly prejudicial. It smacked to high heaven of “local top level administrator v. lowly common citizen” bias. One committee member went so far as suggesting that nixing private probation would lead to more probationers being incarcerated—and then asking me if that is what I wanted. The hubris of the committee members who stood in strict defense of private probation reminded me of just how much these local administrators respect the lowly common man. My voice does not have meaning.
Maybe not my voice. But on July 26, 2024, a group of United States Senators and Representatives sent Ginny D Kent, President and Chief Executive Officer of CSRA Probation Services, a letter also expressing concerns about the practices of private probation (https://www.warren.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/warren_cardenas_letter_to_csra_probation_services_072624.pdf). Included in that letter is a list of questions that we are now requesting the Jail Population Committee and our local government answer. If the data shows that the practices of CSRA Probation are not harming the poorest Augustans, then there should not be any problem releasing the data and answering those questions.
Lastly, JIRSI is a pro-government, pro-law enforcement, 501c3 grassroots reform advocacy nonprofit organization. I formed this organization after sitting in jail for 38 months charged with a crime that the Richmond County Sheriff’s Office and Augusta Judicial Circuit District Attorney’s Office pursued despite the lead investigator admitting that he did not see the existence of an essential element that must be present for the crime I was charged with to have taken place. I was poor, I did not have any resources, and they tried to railroad me. But I fought it out because I knew I did not commit that crime.
So, when our local district attorney, who I campaigned and voted for, releases all of these fancy public statements, he needs to be sure he is not prosecuting an innocent person in the process (by the way, the Augusta Fire Department performed an investigation and never ruled that fire an arson). Not every person in handcuffs is guilty.
Nevertheless: on Friday I had a “this is Augusta, boy” moment, which seemed to me a stark similarity to “this is the South, boy.” I hear you loud and clear.
Lawrence A. Brannen
Founder/Director The Justice-Impacted Reformation Society Inc.
