Smart Justice in District Courts: Joint Judiciary Presentation

District courts handle more than four of every five lower-court filings in Arkansas, and a program that places a Restore Hope navigator inside those courtrooms costs about $85,000 per court. That was the case Judge Sarah Capp, Restore Hope Executive Director Paul Chapman, and Director of Judicial Services Janet Camp brought to a legislative committee on October 16, 2026.

The three presented Smart Justice, Restore Hope's district court initiative, which pairs a judge's referral with a navigator who helps defendants resolve the practical problems that keep bringing them back to court. Smart Justice has served 556 participants statewide since it began and currently operates in seven courts, serving eight counties, with more asking to join.

Judge Capp: "There are more people that walk through the doors of a district courtroom"

Judge Capp, who presides over the district court in Johnson and Franklin counties, opened by putting the scale of district court in front of the committee. "There are more people that walk through the doors of a district courtroom than any other court system, more so than your Circuit Courts, your Court of Appeals, and your Supreme Court," she said. "In 2025, according to the statistics from the Administrative Office of the Courts, there were 906,000 district court filings in Arkansas. You compare that with 194,500 in circuit court. So 82% of those filings in your lower court systems come from your district court."

She pointed to the ten most common charge categories that result in jail time, noting that driving on a suspended license, failures to appear, DWI, and public intoxication account for 76% of them. "But behind those filings are people, many of which are indigent, with limited resources and little understanding of the legal system," she said. "They may leave court knowing that they have a specific sentence in their order to do something, but they don't know how to do it. Finding treatment, restoring a license, arranging transportation, or obtaining employment can feel out of reach for these individuals."

Before taking the bench, Judge Capp practiced law for 16 years and represented indigent defendants in district court. She described a pattern she sees daily: "In my experience, there is a substantial overlap between the people that appear in district court and that later appear in circuit court. I've seen people return repeatedly on misdemeanor matters and then later face felony charges. I can't quantify that progression, but it's a pattern that I have seen every day in the courtroom."

"I believe that if we intercede at the district court level, it will prevent criminal behavior from escalating," she told the committee. "District court gives us an opportunity to intervene while a different outcome is still possible."

In her own courts, Smart Justice served 54 people in the last year. Judge Capp reported a 95.45% employment retention rate among those participants, a 114% increase in financial stability, and a 178% increase in transportation. "Through Smart Justice, a navigator works alongside community partners to connect participants with treatment, housing, employment, and transportation," she said. "They help address the things that I cannot fix with a court sentence alone." She closed by asking members to "support dependable navigator staffing, access to services, and consistent evaluation of outcomes."

Paul Chapman: a navigator "in that court working with the judge"

Paul Chapman traced Smart Justice back to Restore Hope's founding. "Restore Hope was an idea that was born out of the Restore Hope Task Force in 2015, when we were struggling as a state with incarceration and a foster care system that had grown by about the same rate as the number of people that we incarcerated," he said. The organization's intent from the start was "to provide coordination at a local community level to tie all the resources together" through software-directed case management and a community alliance of providers, agencies, and nonprofits "coming together to help people move from crisis to career."

That model is now in or about to be in 30 Arkansas counties, Chapman said, and is being replicated in more than 20 Iowa counties and in Tennessee. In years of looking at local data, Restore Hope found that people coming out of prison or involved in child welfare cases often had unresolved obligations in district courts, sometimes in several courts at once. That finding led to Smart Justice.

"What the Smart Justice model, does is it provides a collaborative case management system called HopeHub to a community," Chapman explained. "It puts a case manager in courts. They're called a navigator in that court, working with the judge. The judge and the court would make referrals to someone who's in a very complex situation. They have unresolved issues in court and they've got a lot of other things going on in their life that makes their success unlikely, and where a navigator would help understand exactly the situation that they're in, create a specialized program for them, and then connect them to existing resources in their community."

"This navigator is probably the one person who will hear the entire story," he said. "We'll understand exactly where they are, the situation that they're in, and help them create a plan connecting to the existing resources that already exist in our communities to be able to get them out of trouble, but then stay with them hopefully until they will make it all the way to full-time employment. We call that career. So from crisis to career."

Navigators are now embedded in multiple courts, and Chapman echoed Judge Capp's point that other district courts "are in line and want this navigator for their court also."

Janet Camp: "These needs are connected"

Janet Camp walked the committee through what the program looks like for the people it serves. Navigators assess thirteen social determinants of health in a participant's life, from financial stability and employment to housing, transportation, and health. "These needs are connected," she said. "Someone may be ready to work but have no reliable transportation. They may have transportation but no childcare. They may need treatment but also need to keep a roof over their head while engaging in treatment. The navigator helps identify those connections and build a practical action plan with the participant utilizing existing state and community resources."

The participants arrive with significant barriers. Camp reported that 93% score at high criminogenic risk on the RANT, a validated risk and needs assessment. "Only 41% at intake were employed. Nearly one half arrived with a suspended driver's license. Almost one third have no high school diploma or GED. And one in three had experienced homelessness in the past twelve months," she said. "These are often people with several barriers, as Judge Capp mentioned, and most importantly, are the people who appear repeatedly in court."

Eligibility is simple: a participant must be at least 18, have an identified need in at least one of the thirteen assessed areas, and voluntarily agree to take part. Participation is voluntary, and the court retains its authority throughout. After intake and assessment, the navigator and participant build an action plan, which is matched to community resources through the HopeHub platform. Monthly reassessments follow, and where the court holds reviews, the navigator provides a concise report on engagement, achievement, and ongoing needs.

The outcomes so far, Camp said, show a program that is scaling. Smart Justice served 158 participants in 2025 and 380 so far in 2026, for a total of 556. Of those, 84% have completed a follow-up assessment, demonstrating continued engagement. Full-time employment has grown 2.1 times, job retention stands at 90%, and 71 participants who entered with a suspended driver's license now hold a valid one. Among the 475 participants with a follow-up assessment, the share rated stable in legal standing rose from 13% to 47%, and the share stably housed rose from 44% to 65%.

Household income is the number Camp emphasized most. "As of this morning, the household income increased by approximately 57%," she said. "So that is right at $1,108 to $1,737 per month. That equates to about $7,500 annually." She was candid about what remains: 166 participants who arrived with a suspended license are still suspended. "While we see meaningful progress being made in this area, there is still some work to be done to address those outstanding barriers."

What it costs: $85,000 per court

The committee's questions turned quickly to the financials. Asked by Representative Hudson what the biggest barrier to scaling the program would be, Chapman answered that it is primarily financial. "We're using opioid settlement funds primarily to pay for the navigators," he said. "I think that's a great way to kind of prove concept. But as long as the return on investment continues at scale, I think that's a great way to continue to grow. But eventually, I think it's something that we're going to need to figure out how to pay for long term." He added that the proof "would need to continue to be ROI on those dollars."

Representative Gazaway pressed for a specific figure for running Smart Justice in a district court each year. Chapman put the navigator cost at roughly $85,000 per court, all in. That figure covers the navigator's salary, fringe benefits, and supplies and equipment for the position.

Chapman also emphasized the importance of connecting Smart Justice's district court partnerships with Governor Sanders' 10:33 Reentry Initiative. He noted that more than 60% of the men participating in 10:33 over the past twelve months had outstanding district court issues that could create barriers to successful reentry. “So not only are we talking about getting on the front end of someone who may go on to commit a felony and then become incarcerated,” he said, “but we’re also talking about those that are returning to the community need this kind of organization to be able to help them get cleaned up and return to the community.” 

By establishing a designated point of contact within participating district courts, Smart Justice helps the reentry program identify and resolve outstanding court obligations. This coordination provides a more direct pathway for individuals returning to their communities to address unresolved legal matters that may interfere with employment, transportation, and long-term stability.

Next steps

Camp closed by thanking Representative Tosh for noting that the legislature has already authorized postponement of judgment in district courts, which supports this kind of work. Restore Hope is working with Representative Bentley and others on a small cleanup bill to make district courts' authority to participate in Smart Justice explicitly clear. 

"District courts give us an opportunity to reach people earlier and address problems that may otherwise continue to bring them back into the criminal justice system," Camp said. Smart Justice brings together judicial leadership, a coordinated community response around each person's plan, and accountability through real-time data in HopeHub. "This is the opportunity that the district court gives us: intervening early to connect people with support, establish clear expectations, and measure whether their lives have become more stable."