Most
Effective Community-Based Programs
There are
several ways of reducing recidivism available for any state that wishes to
avert the ordeal. One of the strategies is the establishment of halfway house
programs. It presents an opportunity for the newly discharged inmate to
entangle and review the laws and regulations in the country in order to avoid
recidivism. Physical evidence example of these programs that have been very
successful in incorporating convict back to the society is the balling booth
and Maud booth programs in New York that were set out in the year 1896. It allowed
reintegration of prisoners to the community where they went in and out of
prison without stringent rules being imposed upon them.
The next program
involves the metropolitan residential programs where law offenders are housed
in developed areas. The healing process is facilitated by the availability of
modern facilities in the urban areas that increases the rate of reintegration. A
research carried out in the year 2005 by Ohio department of youth services
found out that there were high instances of moderate risk that faced youths
housed in Ohio department of youth services firms finding their way back to the
justice system than those located in places where community was involved in the
healing process (Young, Taxman, Byrne, University of Maryland, & College
Park, 2002).
Case Summary
In the event of
helping individual re-entry to the community, the federal department of justice
in the United States has come up with the following initiatives to facilitate
the process. The first investment includes the reentry partnership initiatives
(RPI) that unites social services, criminal justice and community groups in dealing
with reentry problems. The second initiative is about re-entry courts that are established
to deal with ex-inmate drug related cases, the last one is about weed, and seed
based reentry partnerships. Participation in reentry initiatives involves citizen’s
representatives including guardian, family members, and community advocates motivated
to enhance the transition process and reintegration of inmates to the society (Schmalleger, 2012).
The reason as to why the community must be involved in these initiatives is
that the informal control agents found in the society is superior to the formal
control agents. The two factor agents are different in the way they conduct
their reunion process in terms of procedures and process. Therefore, it is
essential to incorporate them for efficient and effective administration of
justice. Formal agents include the correction agencies, prosecutors, parole officers,
board, and the police.
On the other
hand, informal agents incorporate friends, clergy, service providers, victims,
neighbors, family, business people, and employees. Informal group is inherently
connected and related to the inmate thus the healing process start when they
engage and contact with a positive motive to change the offender’s behavior.
Reaction of the member of the community determines the motivation level of the
offender and the rate of reintegration. At this point if a person was offended
by the accused, reentry programs provides grounds for forgiveness and
transformation where the two parties agree to forget about the past (Robert Jonson,
Konopasky, & Hans Toch, 2010). This manifestation reduces the feelings of
revenge to the offenders consequently resulting to lower level of recidivism.
However, there
are problems that face these initiatives in the United States while reuniting
prisoners to the community. One of the challenges is that an offender may go back
to his usual behavior when undergoing reentry. Having ones relative in the
program increases the risk of slipping back to the old behaviors that led to the
conviction. Structural factors in the United States justice system are rigid to
procedural behavioral change in the sense that a prisoner is subjected to
formal change in behaviors (Chastain
& Moyano, 2010). In the event, they are released through reentry
initiatives they exhibit behaviors that conform to formal corrections
attributes. These attributes are slowly disillusioned as they entangle with
other members in the society.
Recently, there
has been development of community policing to give a chance to the community to
deal with the issues of security culminating from the release of prisoners.
Most of the prisoners have changed their lives and thirty percent are now
serving as advisors and clergymen (Bobbie Huskey, 2010). This transformation is
central to the development of the country’s economy in the sense that there is
reduction in the recidivism budget. They become community advisors in cases of
drug and substance abuse.
Case Analysis
Changes need to
be done on the side of procedural compliance to behavior change when carrying
out the reentry program for offender so that they are reintegrated at ease. It
is because of the dire need of maintaining the new status of the ex-prisoner
who is likely to find his or her way back to the old behaviors.
Executive Decision
Opening of a halfway
house in my neighborhood will facilitates the act of curbing recidivism of some
of the newly released offenders. On the contrary, there will be increased cases
of conflicts between the community and the ex-prisoners. When they are put
together, they practice the crimes that they learned while in prison. I would
support this initiative because it would bring changes to many lives of young
and old people.
References
Bobbie Huskey, L.
(2010). Community Residential Correctional Programs. InCommunity corrections (pp. 301-330). Los Angeles:
Sage.
Chastain, G., &
Moyano, F. (2010). Corrective
measures: Volume 2. Rockford, IL: Arcana Studio.
Robert Jonson,
Konopasky, R. J., & Hans Toch. (2010). Special Population in
Community Corrections. In Juvenile
sexual offending: Causes, consequences, and correction (pp. 332-350).
San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers.
Schmalleger, F.
(2012). Criminal justice: A brief
introduction. Boston: Prentice Hall.
Young, D. W.,
Taxman, F. S., Byrne, J. M., University of Maryland, &
College Park. (2002). Engaging
the community in offender reentry. College Park, MD: Bureau of
Governmental Research.
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