Deja Bryant

Spielvogel
CAS138T
4/12/2016
Combating Recidivism
In 2005 a study tracked 404,638 prisoners in thirty states after their release from prison.
Within five years of their release 76.6 of the ex-inmates were rearrested, and within that
percentage 56.7 percent were arrested before the end of their first year out.1 The amount of
people who offend is a growing problem.
One in five people who leave prison
become homeless. These people have
technically paid their debt to society, but yet
they suffer more when they are released due
to not having a home, money, qualifications
for a job, and no planning. Ex-inmates are
going from being told what to do and when to
do it, to just being on their own in a world
they have not been in in at least a year.
America imprisons people more than
any other country in the world, and on top of that it is quadrupling the second place contender.
America is growing in the amount of people who are imprisoned; it was found that from 1980

to 2008, the U.S. incarceration rate climbed from 221 to 762 per 100,000.2 That is almost
quadrupling in the amount of people in just twenty-eight years. For us to have so many people
imprisoned we should find a way to make sure that when they are released they will be able to
have somewhere to go home to and that they can survive on a basic level.
Inmates are not informed when their release date is approaching due to safety concerns. It
was discovered that eighty percent of federal prisoners report a history of drug or alcohol abuse,
two-thirds of offenders do not have a high school diploma or equivalency degree, up to 16
percent have at least one serious mental disorder and 10 percent of those entering jail are
homeless in the months before incarceration.3 Without help it is very difficult to combat any one
of those issues alone. A study done in 2010 by the Center for Economic and Policy Research
discovered that that a felony conviction or imprisonment significantly reduces the ability of exoffenders to find jobs, costing the U.S. economy an estimated $57 to $65 billion annually in lost
economic output.4 It is extremely hard for ex-inmates to find work because few jobs would
consider hiring them. Under policies enacted by President Clinton felons cannot obtain public
housing benefits. Many landlords also can legally discriminate against any criminal, except if
they were charged with drug use.5 Ex-Prisoners struggle to find a job and struggle to find a
home, resulting in them being homeless with no support.
The California Innocence Project stated that to reduce recidivism, communities need to
consider factors such as the threat of homelessness, mental health services, substance abuse
programs, adequate health care, education and employment assistance, and family support.6
Implementing more residential reentry centers, or halfway houses, would be the most efficient
way to solve the issue of criminals becoming helpless right after incarceration. The typical
halfway house provides a stable place for the ex-offender to stay, classes to make sure they are

rehabilitated from whatever caused them to be imprisoned, roommates, employment, and works
with them to become self-sustainable. Currently there are only 230 residential reentry centers
nationwide compared to the 4,575 active prisons. The number of residential reentry centers needs
to greatly increase to balance out the prisons and the amount of prisoners being released. A study
done found that around 637,400 people are released annually from state and federal prisons.7
There is no way possible that 230 facilities can accommodate for that many people. The people
who cannot get help usually commit another crime and return to prison. The average national
recidivism rate is 43.3% Based on that average rate, an estimated 276,000 released prisoners can
be expected to recidivate each year.8 The offender re-committing a crime not only affect them
and their life but also the victims life and society as a whole.
Other Proposed Solutions
There have been other attempts to solve the problem of recidivism such as setting up
living arrangements with relatives and increasing education in the prisons but these current
systems are failing.
Many prisons have attempted and is currently attempting to solve the problems of
inmates struggling when they are released by getting the families involved. A report done by
American Correctional Association stated that family can be a critical component in assisting
individuals transitioning from incarceration because family members provide both social control
and social support, which inhibit criminal activity.9 Having family allows the transition between
leaving prison and entering the world again to be much smoother; they provide you with the
necessary support that would be difficult to get if the felon was on their own. Families also have
a lot of pressure placed on them too, if the family has not accepted the person then there is an
obvious strain on the relationship. About 80 percent of people leaving prison live with family

members, at least initially. Many of these situations quickly become unstable and often result in
homelessness.10 It is not hard just on the felon to make the transition back to society, families
have to deal with emotional and financial strains also, and for a lot of families it is too much and
the felon ends up on the streets with nowhere to go. Research shows that prisoners who have
maintained close ties with their families while incarcerated are more likely to make it in the
world when they are released. A report done by Vera Institute in 2011 found that many
corrections practitioners and policy makers intuitively understand the positive role families can
play in the reentry process, but they often do not know how to help people in prison draw on
these social supports.11 The problem with advocating for more family intervention is that some
people do not have family who wants to help and some people have family who cannot help even
if they want to due to financial or other issues. Prisoners can communicate with their
families/friends by either writing, calling, or them visiting. Each one of those methods have
flaws. For the letters aspect, a 2007 report by the National Center for Education Statistics found
that 39% of prisoners scored below basic for quantitative literacy testing, while another 39%
scored at only a basic level.12 That means that many prisoners are pretty much illiterate, which
makes writing and reading letters a very difficult task. On top of that, more and more prisons are
adopting a postcard only model. Every so often the prisoner is allowed to send and receive postcards, furthermore limiting the contact between family members. Visiting a prisoner can be a
very lengthy and irritating process. According to the 2011 Vera Institute study, Many family
members also indicated that prison rules and practices including searches, long waits, and
inconsistent interpretations of dress codes for visitors can be unclear, unpleasant, too
restrictive, and even keep people from visiting again.13 The hackle to visit a family member
could easily result in someone not wanting to visit again, especially if they were not allowed to

enter the prison and typically the prisons are far from where the families reside. The problem
with the phone calls is that they cost a lot of money for little time and the prices are currently
inflating. These barriers take a detrimental toll on the amount of family contact a prisoner can
have which results in the them not having anyone to go to when they are approaching their
release dates.

Another way
of attempting to
establishing a better
life for inmates when
they are released is
through education at
the prison. There are
prisons in thirty-two
of the fifty states that
offer GED classes
and also college
equivalent classes.
Education increases the chances of the felon being able to obtain employment after being
released significantly. Almost half of all prisoners lack a high school education and only about
sixteen percent of state prisoners have a high school diploma.14 The issue with the education is
that the prisoner and their families have to pay for the classes out of their own pocket. Before
being incarcerated majority of prisoners were making less than 22,500 dollars a year.15 Lois
Davis, a senior policy researcher at the RAND Corporation, studied the issue of increasing
education in prison and she stated that we find that for every dollar invested in a prison
education program it will ultimately save taxpayers between $4 and $5 in re-incarceration
costs.16 Although there would be more taxpayer money saved there is still a lot of opposition to
this solution. One way the government is attempting to fix it is by allowing inmates to access
Pell Grants. Overall, the implementation of more education is under a lot of construction.

Increasing the Number of Reentry Centers

Many people, due to the lack of support, find themselves back in prison after being
released. Statistics indicate that more than two-thirds of state prisoners are rearrested within
three years of their release and half are re-incarcerated.17 Reentry housing not only keep people
who were released off the streets, it also provides them with programs so that they can begin
developing their own lives and become self-sustainable. Different versions of this type of
housing allows the person to stay anywhere from a few months to a few years. Reentry centers
also save taxpayers a lot of money. A cost analysis done by the Corporation for Supportive
Housing found that a single re-entry housing unit in New York used by two people over one
year can save $20,000 to $24,000 relative to the cost of release to shelter and re-incarceration.18
The issue is that these programs need money. These houses are controlled by small business or
non-profit companies. In order to increase the amount centers, they will have to be privately
funded by the prisons. To accomplish this, different jurisdictions would be drawn to include one
to two big reenter centers. Prisons are huge businesses, so they bring in a lot of money. Private
prisons are currently booming; about 18 corporations guard 10,000 prisoners in 27 states. The
two largest are Correctional Corporation of America (CCA) and Wackenhut, which together
control 75%.19 They are paid a fixed amount per prisoner. Together those two companies alone
made 2.53 billion dollars in revenue in 2012.20 Americas prison system as a whole made 74
billion dollars. Money is not an issue when it comes to the prison industry and it also helps that
majority of prisons are controlled by the same two companies.
Not only does it greatly benefit the economy by saving money, but it also helps the exconvict stabilize themselves. Washington State has a program that aims to reduce recidivism by

providing high-risk offenders with 12 months of housing support when they are released from
prison. The study tracked 208 participants in three counties and found statistically significant
reductions in new offenses and readmission to prison.21 The stabilized housing provided safety
for the subjects, reduced the criminal violations they would have had if they were not there, gave
them healthy social network connections, and also provided them with treatment and other
services. Another transitional housing facility in West Harlem, known as The Castle also had a
lot of success. A study found that the program has been so successful with recidivism rates as
low as one percent that the group received city support to open a second facility.22 Texas
Department of Criminal Justice system even had success with implementing reentry housing.
After starting the reentry programs its recidivism rate dropped from 25.3% to 22.6% over a
three-year period.23 These programs have proved that reentry houses are extremely effective in
keeping offenders off the streets and helping them get/keep their lives in order.
The Obama administration also thinks that combating recidivism with reentry programs
and housing would be very beneficial. The Obama administration has been developing new ideas
for housing and other programs to make reentry into society less harsh. Secretary Donovan
encourages PHA executive directors to allow ex-offenders to rejoin their families in the Public
Housing or Housing Choice Voucher programs, when appropriate.24 This allows the felon to
either live with their family or get their own housing, both providing them with a stable place to
call home. The Administration stated that they realized the importance of offender reentry as a
critical tool in breaking the cycle of drug use and crime, and improving the public health and
public safety of our communities.25
Reentry centers/programs are something that should be used to help people released from
prison who need it. They are affordable, they save money, and they change a lot of people lives

for the better. These reentry houses help the people who have already paid their debts to society
integrate back into the real world smoothly. To fight homelessness among criminals we should
develop more reentry houses and programs.

Endnotes
1. Durose, Matthew R., Alexis D. Cooper, and Howard N. Synder. Recidivism of Prisoners
Released in 30 States in 2005: Patterns from 2005 to 2010. National Institute of Justice.
N.p., Apr. 2014. Web. 11 Apr. 2016.
<http://www.nij.gov/topics/corrections/recidivism/pages/welcome.aspx>.
2. Western, Bruce, and Becky Pettit. "Incarceration & social inequality." American
Academy of Arts and Sciences. N.p., 2010. Web. 11 Apr. 2016.
<https://www.amacad.org/content/publications/pubContent.aspx?d=808>.
3. Dory, Cadonna. "Society Must Address Recidivism, Officials Say." USC. N.p., 11 Nov.
2009. Web. 11 Apr. 2016. <https://news.usc.edu/30029/society-must-address-recidivismofficials-say/>.
4. "Study Shows Ex-Offenders Have Greatly Reduced Employment Rates." Prison Legal
News. N.p., 15 Dec. 2011. Web. 11 Apr. 2016.
<https://www.prisonlegalnews.org/news/2011/dec/15/study-shows-ex-offenders-havegreatly-reduced-employment-rates/>.
5. "Can I Be Refused an Apartment Because of My Criminal Record?" NOLO. N.p.: n.p.,
n.d. NOLO. Web. 11 Apr. 2016. <http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/questionrefused-apartment-criminal-record-28006.html>.
6. "Recidivism Rates." California Innocence Project. California Innocence Project, n.d.
Web. 11 Apr. 2016. <https://californiainnocenceproject.org/issues-we-face/recidivism/>.
7. Friedmann, Alex. "Lowering Recidivism through Family Communication." Prison Legal
News. N.p., 15 Apr. 2014. Web. 11 Apr. 2016.
<https://www.prisonlegalnews.org/news/2014/apr/15/lowering-recidivism-throughfamily-communication/>.
8. Ibid
9. Ibid
10. "Re-entry." National Alliance to End Homelessness. N.p., n.d. Web. 11 Apr. 2016.
<http://www.endhomelessness.org/pages/re_entry>.
11. Friedmann, https://www.prisonlegalnews.org/news/2014/apr/15/lowering-recidivismthrough-family-communication/
12. Ibid
13. Ibid
14. Ibid
15. New York. Leg. House of Delegates. New York State Bar Association Special Commitee
on Re-entry. Special Committee on Re-entry. 2016 Leg. 2016. NYSBA. Web. 11 Apr.
2016. <http://www.nysba.org/WorkArea/DownloadAsset.aspx?id=61806>.

16. Westervelt, Eric. "Measuring The Power of A Prison Education." nrdEd. N.p., 31 July
2015. Web. 11 Apr. 2016.
<http://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2015/07/31/427741914/measuring-the-power-of-aprison-education>.
17. Caporizzo, Cynthia. "Prisoner Reentry Programs: Ensuring a Safe and Successful Return
to the Community." What's Happening. N.p., 30 Nov. 2011. Web. 11 Apr. 2016.
<https://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/11/30/prisoner-reentry-programs-ensuring-safeand-successful-return-community>.
18. http://www.endhomelessness.org/pages/re_entry
19. Pelaez, Vicky. "The Prison Industry in the United States: Big Business or a New Form of
Slavery?" Global Research. N.p., 31 Mar. 2014. Web. 11 Apr. 2016.
<http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-prison-industry-in-the-united-states-big-business-or-anew-form-of-slavery/8289>.
20. Ibid
21. Moraff, Christopher. "Housing First Helps Keep Ex-Inmates Off the Streets (and Out of
Prison)." Next City. N.p., 23 July 2014. Web. 11 Apr. 2016.
<https://nextcity.org/daily/entry/housing-first-former-prisoners-homelessness>.
22. Ibid
23. Ibid
24. Caporizzo, https://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/11/30/prisoner-reentry-programsensuring-safe-and-successful-return-community
25. Ibid