JEFFERSONVILLE — The days of chain gangs are in the past, but a new Clark County initiative is giving inmates the chance to work outside of jail and reintegrate themselves into the community.

The Michael L. Becher Adult Corrections Complex in Jeffersonville is beginning a work-release program that allows inmates near the end of their sentence to leave the cellblock and return to work. Housed on the third floor of the jail, the program will work with 152 nonviolent offenders serving the last two years of sentences.

It also will offer behavioral and substance-abuse treatment to inmates. There will be 20 inmates who will not be working, but will receive more intensive treatment in those areas than they would get in the jail.

“They (inmates) are going to get out anyway, and when a typical inmate gets out, he’ll be the same person with the same problems,” said work-release program Director Stephen Mason. “Hopefully, we can break the cycle by providing treatment and giving people the opportunity to serve their sentence while still supporting their family and changing some of the things that brought them here.”

Mason began interviewing potential county inmates last week and the court system will begin directing qualifying inmates to the program. The state is waiting to see how the program works before sending inmates.

State and county officials hope to ease prison overcrowding, in addition to offering inmates the chance to more slowly readjust to life outside custody.

Clark County Sheriff Danny Rodden is in charge of a new jail that was built to help ease overcrowding, so much so that Clark County previously paid other counties to house inmates.

“Now that judges have that option [to send offenders to work release instead of jail] maybe we’ll see a difference in the inmate population,” Rodden said.

The third floor of the new Jeffersonville jail was a shell when the program began and Mason — a former probation officer in Indiana and Louisville — expressed excitement about starting the program from the ground up.

Only nonviolent offenders and inmates with no weapons or bodily injury offenses will qualify. Mason expects inmates with convictions such as property crimes, repeat driving while intoxicated arrests and failure to pay child support to sign up. Participants in the program will be drug tested the first day and randomly throughout the rest of their sentences.

The $3 million facility aims to eventually be self-funded. Inmates will be charged $15 a week if they make up to $200, and the program will draw 25 percent from inmates receiving more than $220 a week.

“It’s basically rent — you don’t get to live anywhere else for free,” Mason said.

Inmates work no more than 60 hours a week or two jobs, and no more than six days a week at no more than 12 hours a day. They are driven to the job site and return promptly after work.

Arriving more than 10 to 15 minutes late results in administrative action, and inmates who don’t show up after that will be considered escapees and police will begin searching for them. If inmates are arrested while they are supposed to be on the job, they will stay in jail until their court date and will not return to the work-release program.

Wages are the “same as if you come in off the street — I can’t control that,” Mason said. Inmates beginning the program have 10 days to get a job.

“There are exceptions. If they can demonstrate that they’ve been looking, I’ll give them another 10 days. They (inmates) would rather be there (at work) than jail.”

The sooner they get a job and “the longer they work, the less time they’re here and that’s encouragement enough to get a job,” he said.

The program teaches inmates skills such as resume building and interviewing, with the help of WorkOne New Albany, an arm of the Indiana Department of Workforce Development. The program is boosted by state grants.

WorkOne also will help inmates in the program find jobs that fit their skills and ability. Through the federal Work Opportunity Tax Credit, employers can receive as much as $2,400 for each inmate employed. The tax credit is broken down for employers to receive 25 percent of up to $6,000 of wages for inmates who work more than 120 hours and 40 percent of up to $6,000 for inmates who work more than 400 hours. More than 630,000 tax credit certifications were issued to employers in 2005.

“One of the unique challenges we face is to get the public and business sectors to give (inmates) a second chance,” said Gary LaVelle, director of WorkOne New Albany. “It (Work Opportunity Tax Credit) is designed as incentive for employers to hire certain job-seekers that have difficulty securing employment.

“It’s a nice little incentive to give individuals a chance to show they’ve changed and want to work.”

The work-release facility is separated into three 36-man dormitories, one 20-woman dorm and an additional 20-man dorm for inmates with a combination of mental illness and substance abuse. Those 20 men will not work, but will receive intensive treatment through the program. Inmates in the program also receive behavioral counseling — such as anger management — and get the opportunity to obtain their General Educational Development certificate.

“They’re still in jail; they just go out and work,” Mason said. “You don’t take somebody out of society for five or six years and just stick them back in. We don’t want to see them a second time around.”

Calls to the Indiana Department of Correction seeking comment about how similar programs have worked elsewhere in Indiana were not returned.