On Tuesday, Gov. Kay Ivey awarded grants totaling $250,000 to help fight crime in five Black Belt counties including Dallas County.

The Dallas County Adult Court program will use a $50,000 grant to enable some offenders to avoid incarceration by enrolling in a corrections program, which requires they remain drug-free and commit no further offenses.

This goes along with the process of rehabilitating criminals to get them back into society instead of simple jail or prison time.

This falls in line with District Judge Bob Armstrong, who works through Hope Academy to provide a chance for young adults to change.

“We give opportunities to change,” said Armstrong in a previous Times-Journal interview. “That was the first side of the strategy, and the second side is that we have to help these kids change. You can’t just paddle somebody and expect that to work everytime. When you combine these two strategies together it works.”

The Dallas County Adult Program has the same mindset in not just punishing these people, but helping them break the cycle of crime in their own lives.

This method of rehabilitation is often criticized.

It is often said that these people cannot change, and we agree to an extent that in order to change, you have to want to change.

In Armstrong’s world however, the numbers show a great decrease in offenders.

In 2008, 91 youths were committed to DYS. This past year, there were only four giving a 95.6 percent decrease.

In 2007, there were 12 serious violent juvenile offenses, and last year, there were only seven, which is a 42 percent decrease.

In 2007, there were 482 delinquent juvenile petitions filed, and last year there were only 181, which is a 62 percent decrease.

In 2008, the average juvenile probation caseload was 139 cases per probation officer. This year, it was only 30 per probation officer.

“Some people think I’m too soft, and then there’s others who think I’m too tough,” said Armstrong. “What I have learned is that I can’t worry about it, but you do have to try and educate people. Our prisons are jammed full so the state lets them out quicker. So some will get out real quick with no intervention … you just have to do what you know is right. If I try and lock people up it doesn’t really fix the root cause of the problem. That is why we do this.”

We stand by programs like this. Because it is obvious that just jail time alone is not working. We are also thankful for the state in helping programs like this keep doing the work they are doing.

Probate Judge Kim Ballard said it best that anything that helps the county make a difference in crime is a good thing.