State Sen. Cam Ward of Alabaster will be in Washington on July 15 to speak to a congressional subcommittee about making changes in prisons.
Ward is chairman of Alabama's new Prison Reform Task Force. The House Judiciary Committee's crime subcommittee invited him to speak at a hearing on prison reform, and Ward accepted.
The Alabama Prison Reform Task Force was created last month. It is looking at ways to change a prison system that is at nearly twice its designed capacity. Ward says the task force plans to develop policy options before the 2015 session of the Alabama Legislature.