[Senate Hearing 107-473]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 107-473
NOMINATION OF PAUL A. QUANDER, JR.
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HEARING
before the
COMMITTEE ON
GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED SEVENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
ON THE
NOMINATION OF PAUL A. QUANDER, JR. TO BE DIRECTOR, DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
COURT SERVICES AND OFFENDER SUPERVISION AGENCY
__________
APRIL 11, 2002
__________
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COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS
JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN, Connecticut, Chairman
CARL LEVIN, Michigan FRED THOMPSON, Tennessee
DANIEL K. AKAKA, Hawaii TED STEVENS, Alaska
RICHARD J. DURBIN, Illinois SUSAN M. COLLINS, Maine
ROBERT G. TORRICELLI, New Jersey GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, Ohio
MAX CLELAND, Georgia PETE V. DOMENICI, New Mexico
THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware THAD COCHRAN, Mississippi
JEAN CARNAHAN, Missouri ROBERT F. BENNETT, Utah
MARK DAYTON, Minnesota JIM BUNNING, Kentucky
Joyce A. Rechtschaffen, Staff Director and Counsel
Jason M. Yanussi, Professional Staff Member
Jennifer E. Hamilton, Research Assistant
Marianne Clifford Upton, Staff Director and Chief Counsel, Oversight of
Government Management, Restructuring and the District of Columbia
Subcommittee
Richard A. Hertling, Minority Staff Director
Johanna, L. Hardy, Minority Counsel
Mason C. Alinger, Minority Professional Staff Member, Oversight of
Government Management, Restructuring and the District of Columbia
Subcommittee
Darla D. Cassell, Chief Clerk
C O N T E N T S
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Opening statement:
Page
Senator Durbin............................................... 1
WITNESSES
Thursday, April 11, 2002
Hon. Eleanor Holmes Norton, a Delegate in Congress from the
District of Columbia........................................... 2
Paul A. Quander, Jr., to be Director, District of Columbia Court
Services and Offender Supervision Agency;
Testimony.................................................... 3
Biographical and professional information.................... 9
Pre-hearing questions and responses.......................... 15
NOMINATION OF PAUL A. QUANDER, JR.
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THURSDAY, APRIL 11, 2002
U.S. Senate,
Committee on Governmental Affairs,
Washington, DC.
The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 3:12 p.m., in
room SD-342, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Richard
Durbin presiding.
Present: Senator Durbin.
OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR DURBIN
Senator Durbin. The Committee will come to order. Good
afternoon and welcome. My apologies for my schedule. Delegate
Norton can empathize with some of the problems we face.
Welcome to everyone. Today the Senate Committee on
Governmental Affairs holds a hearing to consider the nomination
of Paul Quander, Jr. to the position of Director for Court
Services and Offender Supervision Agency for the District of
Columbia.
CSOSA was established by Congress as part of the 1997 D.C.
Revitalization Act. It combined under one helm the previously
disparate local functions of Pretrial Services, Parole, Adult
Probation and Post-Conviction Offender Supervision, following 3
years of operation as a trusteeship. CSOSA was certified as an
independent Federal agency within the Executive Branch on
August 4, 2000. CSOSA, with 950 employees, an annual budget of
$132 million and responsibility for monitoring 21,000 pretrial
release defendants per year--that is about 8,000 at any one
time--and 15,338 post-conviction offenders on probation or
parole, has been guided under an appointed interim director
awaiting confirmation of the President's designee. So this
marks the first opportunity for the Senate to advise and
consent on the President's nominee to fill the CSOSA
Directorship post.
On October 18, 2001, Paul A. Quander, Jr. was nominated by
President Bush to be that director for a term of 6 years. Mr.
Quander has served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney for D.C. since
1994. From 1989 to 1994 he was Deputy Director of the D.C.
Department of Corrections. From 1982 to 1989 Mr. Quander served
with the Office of Corporation Counsel in the Juvenile Section,
the Civil Division and then in the Correctional Litigation
Section. He is a graduate of Virginia State University and
Howard University School of Law.
I am certain this is going to be a special day for you, Mr.
Quander. I understand you may have some family members who are
with you in support, as well as colleagues and friends. Would
you care to introduce some of them at this point in time?
Mr. Quander. Thank you very much. At this time I would like
to take the opportunity to introduce my mother, Roberta J.
Quander; my wife, Charlene Quander; my oldest daughter and a
sophomore at Hampton University, Candace Quander; and my
youngest daughter, Katherine Quander, who will be attending
Florida A&M this fall.
Also I would like to acknowledge and recognize three
lifelong friends who are present: Charles Cobb, Anthony Giles
and Steve Young. There are also former colleagues from the
Office of the Corporation Counsel, the Department of
Corrections, and current colleagues with the U.S. Attorney's
Office, and there are a number of staff members from CSOSA that
are also present that I would like to acknowledge as well.
Senator Durbin. Thank you very much, Mr. Quander.
And let me at this time welcome my friend, Congresswoman
Eleanor Holmes Norton with the District of Columbia who is here
to offer an introduction on your behalf.
TESTIMONY OF HON. ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, A DELEGATE IN CONGRESS
FROM THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
Ms. Norton. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. May I begin
by thanking you for your kind and very expert attention to the
affairs of the District of Columbia. I know of no one who has
been more helpful to this city.
I am pleased to come this afternoon to recommend Paul A.
Quander, Jr., to be Director of Court Services and Offender
Supervision Agency.
Now, Mr. Chairman, you and I helped get through the
Revitalization Act that transferred these functions, these
State functions for criminal defendants to the Federal
Government, but I do not think you or I should take any
responsibility for this name. It is, barring none, the most
cumbersome name of an agency perhaps in the Federal annals. I
have thought of putting a bill in to change it to something
simple, but its mandate is indeed complicated, and it will
take, I think, a candidate of the experience and the extensive
law enforcement background that Mr. Quander offers to make sure
that it continues on its excellent course.
After receiving his degrees, undergraduate and law degrees
with honors, both with honors, he has spent his entire career
in law enforcement in this city in the Corporation Counsel's
Office, in the U.S. Attorney's Office, at the Department of
Corrections, all three in high posts. His experience is
important because he will be working with State-level inmates
released after having committed serious crimes or been accused
of serious crimes.
Mr. Chairman, you might think this a thankless task. The
people over whom Mr. Quander will have jurisdiction are
statistically most likely to commit or recommit crimes. But
this office has functioned splendidly, and is responsible for a
large part of the reason that the crime statistics in the
District of Columbia have come down so rapidly. Mr. Quander,
therefore, has a running head start as he takes over this
agency. That is not always the case as one comes into a new
post.
And because of your own work in getting this bill through
and because of its importance to the residents of the District
of Columbia, I would just like to leave you with a few
statistics on this work. CSOSA now supervises 16,000 offenders
and 8,000 defendants. In the last 3 years the number of
parolees rearrested has dropped 63 percent because of the work
this agency does. We have profited mightily by transferring our
offenders to an expert professional supervision agency. It has
done so not because it holds tea groups, but because it uses
serious kinds of measures, including anger management, work
that has resulted in drug abuse and alcohol abuse being
reduced. I mean when you reduce it by things like--not just
sitting around and doing counseling, but by monitoring these
inmates so that, for example, with urine tests and the like, so
that when the period of supervision is over, they come back
into our community no longer ready to be involved in crime.
They have done extensive job referral and job training work.
Among a representative sample of offenders who completed
treatment in fiscal year 2001, positive drug results were down
50 percent. As you know, it is drug offenses that lead to crime
in large cities like Chicago and New York, so I cannot
emphasize enough the importance of this position to public
safety in the District of Columbia.
The experience and background that Mr. Quander brings to
the post shows he is well qualified for the job, and I am
pleased to recommend him to you this afternoon.
Senator Durbin. Well, Delegate Norton, your commendation
goes a long way with this Committee, and we are glad that you
are here today. And I also know that you have a pretty busy
schedule, so if you can stay, you are certainly welcome, but if
you have to leave, we certainly understand that too.
Ms. Norton. I thank you for excusing me, Mr. Chairman.
Senator Durbin. I thank you for joining us.
Mr. Quander, it is customary in this Committee to swear in
witnesses, and if you would be kind enough to stand and raise
your right hand. Do you swear the testimony you are about to
give is the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth,
so help you, God?
Mr. Quander. I do.
Senator Durbin. Thank you. Let the record indicate the
witness answered in the affirmative.
Do you have any opening remarks that you would like to
make?
TESTIMONY OF PAUL A. QUANDER, JR.\1\ TO BE DIRECTOR, DISTRICT
OF COLUMBIA COURT SERVICES AND OFFENDER SUPERVISION AGENCY
Mr. Quander. Very briefly. I would like to thank you,
Senator Durbin, and the other Members of the Committee and
staff for this opportunity. I am honored and humbled by the
nomination and the prospect for working for an agency and
leading an agency that has the mandate that it does.
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\1\ The biographical information appears in the Appendix on page 9.
Pre-hearing Questions and Responses appear in the Appendix on page
15.
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This agency touches the lives of many people, many people
that have had contact, all of them had contact with the
criminal justice system and may be down. But I look at it as an
opportunity to help, number one, the public as far as public
safety, but to help the individuals as well as they try to turn
around their lives and to become reintegrated with the society,
this society, the District of Columbia of which I am native. So
I am thankful for the opportunity and I am thankful to be here
this afternoon.
Senator Durbin. Thank you very much. Your nomination was of
course received in the Senate, and you completed a thorough
biographical questionnaire, and we have certainly reviewed it,
as others have as well, and I have reviewed the response as of
yesterday, and note that you have an extensive and exemplary
record of service, which certainly qualifies you.
Now, there are three standard questions asked of all
nominees, which I will ask first, and then get into particulars
about your specific responsibility. Is there anything you are
aware of in your background that might present a conflict of
interest with the duties of the office to which you have been
nominated?
Mr. Quander. No.
Senator Durbin. Do you know of any reason, personal or
otherwise, that would in any way prevent you from fully and
honorably discharging the responsibilities of the office to
which you have been nominated?
Mr. Quander. No, I do not.
Senator Durbin. Do you know of any reason, personal or
otherwise, that would in any way prevent you from serving the
full term for the office to which you have been nominated?
Mr. Quander. No.
Senator Durbin. Let me ask you about your background then.
After the standard questions here, let us get into things that
are perhaps a little more relevant to the particular
appointment.
You have a successful career as a prosecutor and
significant experience on the corrections side, but a big part
of this job goes beyond what you have done to deal with
offenders after they have served in the Department of
Corrections. If you are confirmed for this position, what
experience would you draw upon to enable you to assist
offenders and reduce recidivism?
Mr. Quander. Well, the first experience will be what I
gained with the Department of Corrections, because the
Department of Corrections, during my 5-year tenure as the
Deputy Director, we not only had responsibility for the
prisons, but we also had responsibility for the halfway houses
and transitioning those individuals who were in the penal
institutions into a halfway house and back into the community.
So we spent a lot of time, and I spent a lot of time, on trying
to provide services and a forum, so to speak, so that inmates,
both male and female, when they transition out of the penal
institution, will have a place that they can go where they can
transition back into the community.
Once they are in the community, it just doesn't stop there.
We had experience because part of our responsibility was not
only to house the inmates, but to a certain degree to keep them
in the community. So I have some exposure on the back end in
corrections. The other experience that I do have is in the U.S.
Attorney's Office. I handled a lot of the major narcotics and
gang cases, and you come into contact with people that have
been in the system, that have been on probation, that have been
incarcerated, and you get to spend time with them, and you get
to see what works in their minds, what is effective and what is
not. So you develop an understanding, you get a feel for what
programs may be successful and what won't be. You also get a
sense of what motivates people to succeed, and I think that
will be very helpful as I move forward with CSOSA.
Senator Durbin. So based on your personal experience, if
you had to come up with some general observations, what would
you point to as the reason for failure in most cases? Why do
you think some who have emerged from this corrections
experience end up back in jail again?
Mr. Quander. I think the largest issue is substance abuse,
which is closely intertwined with just economics. When an
individual returns to the community, that person, male or
female, has to make a living, has to have a way to survive, and
often the lure of fast money that drugs and narcotics presents
is sometimes overwhelming, and people are willing to take that
risk. If there are alternatives and if people know that people
are going to be watching, and we're going to be talking not
only with CSOSA but with the Metropolitan Police Department,
which is done right now and that we're going to be targeting
and we're going to be looking very, very closely.
So I think it's a staffing issue because you want to have
an appropriate ratio of community service officers to the
people that are on supervision, and it's also offering
alternatives to try to get people to make those lifestyle
changes that will get them off of the drugs, get them away from
the lure of the fast money, which just means in a matter of
time they're going back, and get them in to something whereby
they can get up and go to work the regular 9 to 5 job, and then
get into what we consider and society expects of them, just a
good solid citizen.
Senator Durbin. I do not know that you would be familiar
with the city of Chicago, which I am honored to represent, but
it turns out that in one congressional district in the west
side of Chicago there is just an overwhelming percentage of
formerly incarcerated people who come to live there because of
the various programs and opportunities on the west side of
Chicago. And I recently attended a meeting there, and one of
the things that I was surprised to find was that some of those
who had been incarcerated ran into problems right away because
of a reason they had not anticipated. They were turned loose
out on the street without any form of identification. And so
the Illinois Department of Corrections now has a program to
issue photo ID cards to those who are leaving the Department of
Corrections, so that they can prove their identity. It will be
probably some time before they will have a driver's license or
some other form of identification. Do you know if Washington,
DC has that problem or has responded to it?
Mr. Quander. I had a recent experience with a young man who
was just recently released from a period of incarceration from
a California facility. And he was a cooperating witness in a
case that I had, so he came to see me. And he indicated that he
had the same problem. I do know what CSOSA has in place a
number of programs and a number of meetings and things of that
nature once a person is released, and they're required to meet
with a supervision officer. I am not sure what is in place
right now to address that, but I do know that one individual
did have that issue of not having a valid piece of
identification.
Senator Durbin. When you are successful in this nomination,
and I trust you will be, if you would please look into that,
and if you think there is something we can do by legislation
that might be helpful, let us know. Otherwise, if D.C. can take
care of it, I am a big believer in home rule. So if you could
take care of it, more power to you.
Mr. Quander. Very well.
Senator Durbin. Can we talk about halfway houses?
Mr. Quander. Certainly.
Senator Durbin. Because I know that they're used quite a
bit, quite extensively, aren't they, in the District of
Columbia?
Mr. Quander. I believe they're used extensively, so much so
that I believe now we're running close to being at capacity.
And there's a significant need for additional halfway house
space. CSOSA has done a good job of getting out there, talking
to the community, trying to locate halfway houses, and it's a
tough process, but it's something that needs to be done on both
ends. I believe that a person that is being released from a
period of incarceration needs a--he needs a safe home. He needs
or she needs a transition setting. They need a place where it
will be easier for them to make that adjustment, because in
prison you're told when to get up, when to go to bed, when to
eat. When you're out in the street, you don't have those
issues, and sometimes it's kind of easy to run afoul of the
rules and the regulations. If there is a place where you can
get your bearings, be strictly indoctrinated into what is
expected of you, then I think people have a successful period
of transition.
On the other end, the Pretrial Services Agency for
individuals who are pending trial, halfway houses offer an
alternative to incarceration. There's a constitutional right to
be presumed innocent, and for your nonviolent offenders,
halfway houses oftentimes will offer a viable alternative for
even some of your violent offenders. The space is needed. I
believe it can be well run. I believe it can perform a service
that will benefit public safety, so I believe halfway houses
are key.
Senator Durbin. One of the other things that seems to be
critical is caseload ratio, and I know Delegate Norton talked
about some of the improvements at this agency, but some of the
statistics we have are dramatic, where the number of prisoners
assigned to each one of the supervising officers declined from
180 or 200 to 64. That is a substantial decline to about one-
third of previous levels. Still, it is a little higher than
what they have said should be the maximum, 50. Do you see that
as part of your responsibility to reduce that caseload even
further?
Mr. Quander. Absolutely. I think for public safety you need
to have a manageable caseload. If not, you just can't do the
job that is required by the citizens of the District of
Columbia. You're going to miss some things. And it's just too
important. We have basically a public trust. We have asked the
community to let these men and women come back into the
community and we will watch them. We will provide. We will be
your eyes and ears, and we have to have a caseload that allows
us to do that.
CSOSA has done, I believe, a great job in moving the
supervising officers out of the offices downtown and into the
community. There is a, for lack of a better term, a regional
center not far from where I live on Good Hope Road and
Minnesota Avenue. There's another one on South Capitol Street
in Southeast, and I believe there's another in Taylor, so
community service officers are right there in the community,
and it gives them a visible presence, and the individuals who
are under supervision know that their officers are nearby and
available if they need them, or available to come by to do a
spot visit and to check, which just helps lend credence to what
we do, and that is public safety.
Senator Durbin. One of my friends and heroes in the Chicago
area is a Father Clement, who is an African-American priest,
who started a number of programs on a national basis. One was
called One Child One Church, where they were asking churches to
try to bring in a child who might otherwise have no guidance in
their life, and the other was One Convict One Church, where
churches would try to reach out and mentor and assist those who
were recently incarcerated and try to get them back in society.
Is there such a program under way in D.C. that you are familiar
with?
Mr. Quander. Yes, there is a faith-based program that is
under way, I believe. Hallem Williams was recently appointed to
lead that effort in CSOSA, and essentially what we are trying
to do is to mirror that program in that there is a large faith-
based community here that is willing to work with us and to
assist, and we are trying to match up and to get individuals
who have been recently released from prison connected with the
church and have a church sponsor, and help that person with the
transition, not only just initially, but permanently, to give
the foundation.
Senator Durbin. Great. My staff is all over this one. They
just handed me an article from the Washington Post of January
12 involving the faith community partnership. It specifies
Faith Tabernacle of Prayer in Southeast Washington as one of
the cooperating churches.
Mr. Quander. Yes.
Senator Durbin. So I think that is an excellent program,
and I hope that we will find ways to work together to expand
it.
I do not have any further questions, and I would like to
thank you, Mr. Quander, for your responses. They were certainly
encouraging. I want to thank your family for joining you, as
well as your friends today. The next step in this process will
be the prompt consideration of your nomination in a full
Committee markup and reporting to the full Senate for final
action.
Let me note that the record of this hearing will remain
open for a period of 1 week to permit other Members of the
Committee to submit statements or questions for you to
consider.
With that, nothing further on my agenda, and I thank you
again for being here.
Mr. Quander. Thank you.
Senator Durbin. This hearing is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 3:33 p.m., the Committee hearing was
adjourned.]
A P P E N D I X
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