Artwork stating 'Education Destroys Barriers', 'We Demand Treatment', and 'I Need A Chance'

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  • How to stop youth violence: Role models, mentors, glimpses of life's possibilities

    At Syracuse, New York’s Hillbrook Detention Center for youth, the Thinking For A Change program provides kids with classes – taught by mentors with similar backgrounds – like conflict resolution, anger management, problem-solving, and how to recognize signs of abuse. The program is part of a national shift toward rehabilitation and community-based programming, which is associated with a decrease in the number of youth experiencing incarceration.

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  • Rewriting the narrative

    At the Motus Theater, formerly incarcerated individuals participate in JustUs – a performative program that gives them the space to share their stories. The Boulder-based program aims to complicate the narrative of those that commit crimes, surfacing the systemic, punitive nature of criminal justice. For those that participate, it provides them a literal platform to share their pain, trauma, and growth.

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  • How Philadelphia Flipped: Second Chances for Youth

    Philadelphia has made a concerted effort toward reducing the number of youth being arrested in schools. Leadership, including the school police commissioner and district attorney, changed procedures so that youth, instead of getting arrested, are enrolled in diversion programs. While there’s been pushback from some law enforcement, early studies have pointed to a decline in arrests without a decline in safety.

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  • In Reversal, Counties and States Help Inmates Keep Medicaid

    If incarcerated, low-income individuals who are reliant on Medicaid typically lose access to their benefits which accelerates the difficulty of reentry. To help close the gap, the National Association of Counties and the National Sheriffs’ Association have joined together to implement stopgap measures to help inmates either retain their benefits or have them only suspended instead of terminated.

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  • Baltimore crime crisis: How about trying something that worked before?

    When Baltimore put the necessary resources behind a “call-in” program that intervenes with people likely to commit gun violence, from 2006 to 2012, homicides dropped by 30% and shootings by 40%. The program, which no longer is used in the city consistently enough or with sufficient resources, summons people on probation or parole for gun crimes. A panel of law enforcement, social workers, and community members pairs the threat of federal prosecution and imprisonment with social services to help people build a new life. This approach has been shown in many cities to be effective at reducing violence.

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  • Marketing Psychiatric Drugs to Jailers and Judges

    Drug companies that market long-lasting psychiatric drugs have found new clientele in courtrooms and prisons, as a means to treat mental health issues for those that have been incarcerated. Although the practice of targeting judges and prison officials is controversial, several jails have attested that having free samples of the drugs has led to positive outcomes such as reducing barriers for inmates to receive medication and decreasing the likelihood of reoffending.

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  • Boone County Drug Court addresses racial disparities and trauma through grant

    In Boone County, Missouri the Habilitation Empowerment Accountability Therapy (HEAT) program offers young men an alternative to incarceration for drug-related offenses. The program works primarily with black men, many of whom bring issues of childhood and generational trauma, to work together toward their treatment plans, finding employment, and behavioral therapy. Fundamental to all of HEAT’s programming is the consideration of underlying factors like education, exposure to violence, and socioeconomic forces.

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  • An Airbnb for the Formerly Incarcerated

    The Homecoming Project in Oakland provides people recently released from prison with a soft landing by giving them free housing for six months, along with a menu of support services, in private homes willing to take in the formerly incarcerated. The recently released are at high risk of both homelessness and recidivism, two factors the program addressed successfully in its first group of tenants. With fundraising challenges, the program remains small. But it is developing a tool kit to help others replicate its model.

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  • ‘They only cut off half my left foot.' What happens when inmate care goes wrong in Georgia?

    Without federal oversight, prisons are left to their own devices to determine what sort of health care they want to provide. That, combined with limited funding and resources, often leads to low-cost privatized health care that doesn’t necessarily have safeguards or patient-centered interests. While an increasingly complex issue, the response of privatized health care for inmates requires reform, but won’t get there unless the sheriffs that oversee these prisons embrace them.

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  • Reporting for Work Where You Once Reported for Probation

    Since 2012, the New York City Department of Probation’s Arches program has integrated “credible messengers” into its mission, diverting some energies toward helping instead of punishing. The term refers to people, often formerly incarcerated or on probation themselves, who apply their street knowledge to mentoring youth caught up in the criminal justice system. The movement has spread to a variety of government agencies, but usually is used in street-outreach crime prevention work by community organizations. A large body of research shows the effectiveness of the approach in lowered crime and recidivism.

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