The motivational signs might fool those in groups that tour institutions into believing that administrators make authentic efforts to prepare offenders for successful re-entry into society. Those locked in prisons, on the other hand, recognize the huge disconnect between the smiley face slogans and the realities of prison life.

As a long-term prisoner, one reform that I know would work wonders in lowering recidivism rates would be to replace the cliches and trite expressions with policy changes. Among others, I’d welcome reforms that encourage rather than discourage prisoner efforts to build supportive success networks. Such fundamental changes would make society safer by lowering the number of prisoners who fail upon release; they also would reduce the financial costs associated with operating a prison system that churns out so much failure.

Taxpayers who fund these failure factories might be surprised to know that prison administrators support policies that effectively penalize prisoners who maintain strong family and community ties. We see such an example in the allocation of halfway house eligibility times.

In the recently signed legislation known as The Second Chance Act of 2007, Congress authorized prison administrators to grant inmates the privilege of serving up to the final 12 months of their sentences in a halfway house. While serving time in the halfway house, the prisoner is supposed to re-acclimate himself to society. He must find suitable employment and pay the costs of his confinement by surrendering 25 percent of his gross pay to the halfway house administrator.

The time in the halfway house would provide the federal prisoner with a head start at living a law-abiding life. While serving the final months of his confinement, he would have an opportunity to build a modest savings account and purchase the staples he will need to adjust as an independent citizen.

Despite the 12 months of halfway house time Congress authorized, administrative policies under the current Bureau of Prisons Director place a practical limit of six months halfway house eligibility. The real irony is that the harder an inmate has worked to maintain strong family and community ties, the less halfway house time administrators will grant him. Such policies thwart Congressional intent of helping inmates transition into law-abiding lives and discourage inmates from working to build supportive success networks.

The ridiculous halfway house eligibility policy represents just one example of the way prison administrators discourage inmates from building networks that can help them succeed upon release. We see the same patterns in visiting and telephone policies. Current visitation policies prohibit inmates from visiting with people they did not know prior to their current term of confinement. Only the warden has the authority to override such policies, but as a matter of practice, wardens refuse to grant exceptions to the policy.

I have been incarcerated for longer than 21 years. I was in my early 20s when my period of incarceration began, and during those troubling years of my life, I was trafficking in cocaine. I no longer have relationships with the people I knew then. Yet during the many years of my imprisonment, I have worked hard to educate myself and reconcile with society. Those efforts have brought many mentors into my life whom I did not know prior to my imprisonment. Those mentors are community leaders with impeccable, unassailable records of achievement. They correspond with me and guide my preparations to overcome the obstacles I will confront after a quarter century in prison. Yet because of my not having had a relationship with them that preceded my confinement, wardens in two institutions have denied them access to visit me. We need prison reforms that will encourage prisoners to build supportive success networks.

Telephone policies, too, thwart inmate efforts to build and nurture strong community ties. Prior to the election of President George W. Bush, and his appointment of John Ashcroft as the Attorney General, inmates were not limited to the number of minutes they could talk on the telephone. Officers monitored all prisoner telephone calls, of course, but inmates could keep ties with family and friends by talking on the phone without limit. Yet under the more punitive policies that followed Mr. Ashcroft’s appointment, inmates faced limits that restricted them to an average of fewer than 10 minutes of daily telephone access. We need prison reforms that will reverse such policies that block prisoners from nurturing family and community ties.

The post Top Ten Prison Reform Goals, Article 3: Prison Reforms Should Encourage Prisoners to Build Supportive Success Networks appeared first on Prison News Blog.

His release date approaches, yet he has no idea what kind of life he will lead. As we were watching the news this morning, we saw that a government agency had reported that more than 10 million Americans were unemployed. Dan is returning to Arizona, a state that has suffered one of the highest foreclosure rates in the nation. If national unemployment rates exceed 6 percent on average, Dan knows that unemployment may be worse in the Phoenix area. For a 40-year-old man without a job history, with a substandard education level, and with a lengthy prison record, the unemployment rate might approach 100 percent. The prospects for Dan’s future do not look bright.

Dan lacks both financial and human resources. Administrators from the Taft federal prison camp are releasing Dan to a halfway house six months prior to the expiration of his sentence. While in the halfway house, administrators will expect Dan to stabilize himself. They will allow him out of the house each day to find a job. Once he finds a job, Dan will have to forfeit 25 percent of his gross pay to the administrators of the halfway house. Those funds will cover the costs of Dan’s room and board. Administrators will allow Dan to keep the remainder of his earnings to prepare for his life.

During the time that Dan has served in prison, he has lost everything. He does not own any clothes outside of the ragged sweats he has accumulated from other prisoners. He does not own a vehicle and he has no idea of the cost of living. Without a work history, Dan does not expect to find a job that will pay more than $400 per week. Yet Dan will lose $100 of that money for halfway house expenses. He anticipates that after taxes, he may be left with $250 in take- home pay for a full week’s work.

Dan hopes to find a job during his first month at the halfway house. If he can reach that goal, he will have an opportunity to work for five months before his term will expire. When Dan’s time in the halfway house concludes, he will have to pay the full cost of his housing and food expenses, and he expects those costs to run him far more than $100 per week.

Yet during those six months that Dan serves in the halfway house, he knows that he will have personal expenditures. He will have to purchase clothing, as he does not own anything. He will have to pay for toiletries, transportation expenses, and any food that he eats away from the halfway house. Tough times await him.

Dan has heard that he will need to save sufficient funds to meet the expenses of renting an apartment. With move-in costs including a prepaid first-month rent, last-month rent, and a security deposit equal to one-month rent, Dan anticipates that even an efficiency apartment will require $1,200 in savings. With expected take-home pay of $250 per week, Dan has no idea how he will manage to save enough money to live independently.

In the early spring of 2008, President Bush signed a law known as The Second Chance Act. That law made it possible for administrators to release offenders to a halfway house up to one year prior to the expiration of their terms. That extra time in the halfway house was supposed to provide offenders with more opportunities to stabilize themselves upon release from prison. Dan requested halfway house placement at the earliest possible time so that he could find employment and work toward stability in accordance with Congress’s intention of The Second Chance Act. Yet the Warden at Taft Camp denied Dan’s request, assuring him that six months in the halfway house would be sufficient for him to find a job and save enough funds to begin his life. When Dan appealed the warden’s decision to higher-level administrators, they too declined to grant Dan relief.

Recidivism rates in our country exceed 60 percent. More than six in every ten offenders who walk out of prison engage in some type of activity that returns them to confinement within three years. For some, it appears that the complications awaiting their release dwarf the harshness of living in prison.

Prisons don’t have to churn out so much failure. Rather than warehousing prisoners like Dan for 14 years, administrators could have designed meaningful incentive programs that would have encouraged Dan to develop skills and resources that would allow him to transition to society as contributing citizen. We need prison reforms that will reverse the troubling trends of high recidivism rates. The entire mindset of these institutions need to change, and that change should begin by replacing the Director of the Bureau of Prisons with a new leader who shares the promising vision of President-elect Barack Obama.

For prisoners like Dan, any change will come too late. He will be home for Christmas of 2008, yet I have a suspicion that he may miss the steady routine of the human warehouse to which he has grown accustomed. Dan is not ready for the challenges of society. With more than 600,000 people returning to society from prison each year, Dan is but one of many examples that we need prison reform now.

In my article entitled Strategy for Successful Prison Adjustment, I offer guidance other prisoners may follow to ensure they don’t walk out like Dan.

The post Dan is Getting Out of Prison appeared first on Prison News Blog.

In April of 2008, President Bush signed the Second Chance Act of 2007. According to an overwhelming majority from both houses of Congress, the legislation had several purposes. Primarily, the law exists to break the cycle of recidivism. One of the changes Congress enacted was to extend possibilities for access to halfway house placement. Unfortunately, administrators in the institution where I’m being held have thus far refused to recommend inmates for maximum halfway house placement.

With the Second Chance Act, Congress stated that federal inmates were now eligible to serve the final 12 months of their sentences in a community corrections center. Inmates could serve up to the final six-months of that 12-month window on home confinement. By providing that opportunity for inmates to serve the final portion of their sentences in a community corrections center, Congress hoped to help offenders rebuild ties to the community. Such change would enhance their ability to transition from prison into law-abiding citizens.

Although I expect administrators will modify their rigid stance and implement the policies to fulfill the intentions of Congress by 2010, it may take litigation to push them along. As of this writing, administrators in this facility resist this need for change from the you’ve-got-nothing-coming mentality. Instead of providing inmates with a clear path to maximum halfway house placement, policies here are to award minimal halfway house placement. Clearly, those who preside over such policies ignore the struggles inmates will face upon release from confinement.

No inmate leaves prison with intentions of failing to make a successful transition. Yet as Congress pointed out through the historic Second Chance Act, nearly seven of every ten people who leave prison return to confinement. The flawed policies of the past are at least partly to blame. With time restrictions on access to visiting and telephone, inmates lose their support systems as they spend time inside federal prisons. Congress authorized the extended halfway house provisions as a good-faith effort to help inmates strengthen their community ties. Prison administrators, however, ignore or diminish this need. Despite specific language in the legislation citing that “families are an often underutilized resource in the reentry process,” administrators at this prison are using evidence of such support as a reason to prolong an inmate’s stay in prison and minimize his access to halfway house placement.

Danny’s case presents a twisted example. He has been incarcerated for longer than 11 years. Despite repeated requests for transfer to a prison closer to home, for the past four years administrators have kept Danny out of state. He has not had a single visit in longer than five years. He is 38-years-old now and within one year of his scheduled release date. During Danny’s imprisonment, he has maintained a record that is free of any disciplinary conduct; he has earned two college degrees; he has participated in volunteer community projects that allow him to travel into society without escort or restraints. Clearly, Danny does not represent a threat.

Danny requested 12-months of halfway house placement. To bolster his argument for consideration, he explained to his case manager that he had never held a job in his life, yet he wanted desperately to succeed upon release. While living in the halfway house, Danny pointed out that he would have to

1. secure employment
2. save money necessary to rent an apartment, including a deposit, first, and last month payment
3. save money to purchase transportation
4. save money to purchase clothing
5. pay for his living expenses while he served time in the halfway house
6. re-acclimate himself to society after longer than a decade in prison.

He must also agree to forfeit 25 percent of his gross pay as a condition of living in the halfway house. Danny seemed a perfect candidate for the full 12-months of halfway house placement that Congress authorized with the Second Chance Act.

Danny’s case manager, however, told him that she would submit him for only between five and six months of halfway house placement.

“Five or six months,” Danny protested, “that won’t be enough time. I’m a felon without any work history. I expect to struggle in finding employment and may not earn more than $10 per hour. To fund my transition into society I’ll need to save a minimum of $4,000. How can you expect me to do that in only five to six months?”

“Records show that your family has been sending you an average of $100 per month,” his case manager responded. “They should help you.”

“They’ve been sending me that money to pay for my phone calls because I’ve been locked up out of state. That’s the only way we’ve been able to stay connected, but my mother lives in a trailer and she’s in her 60s. She can’t afford to help me. I’m 38 and need to take care of myself. Are you telling me that the responsible approach for me to take upon release is to leech off my family?”

“Our policy says you’re only entitled to between five and six months,” his case manager said. “That’s all I’m submitting you for. The rest is up to you.”

Danny’s prison record showed that he had acted responsibly, as was evidenced by his minimum-security rating. He was also realistic about the high hurdles that awaited him upon release. Congress was moving in the right direction to fight recidivism when it authorized administrators to provide inmates like Danny with up to 12 months of halfway house placement. Prison case managers at this institution, however, refused to budge. Rather than providing a path for Danny’s successful re-entry, they were setting Danny up for failure upon release. Ironically, the efforts he made to maintain family ties during his eleven years of confinement have disqualified him from maximum halfway house placement.

Inmates need time to make the transition from prison to society. Until administrators begin encouraging all inmates to earn maximum halfway house placement, however, they continue the status quo and facilitate the high recidivism rates Congress is trying to avoid.

The post What Second Chance? appeared first on Prison News Blog.