The effort begun by President Bush to have faith based groups work with reentering criminals has issued its final report and from the early results, it looks promising; though there is some question about the selection process which screens out professional criminals; as most professional criminals will have some violent crime—by the definition of violence (robbery is considered violent) used by crime reporting bureaus—on their record.
And if a rehabilitation program is not working with professional criminals, it won't be very effective for very long.
As reported by Ted Gest at Crime & Justice News:
“Participants in a Bush administration prisoner re-entry program had a recidivism rate of only 15 percent, far less than the average 44 percent one year after release, says the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives. In a final report, the office said that nearly 16,000 people had been helped as of last September, at a cost of $115 million. That is a small fraction of the roughly 700,000prisoners released every year in the nation. The report said that grants went to 73 faith-based organizations and 63 criminal justice agencies.
“Of the roughly 16,000 ex-convicts enrolled in various programs, nearly 11,000 were placed in jobs; others went to educational programs and skills training. The report also discussed the separate federally funded Serious and Violent Offenders Re-entry Initiative, which got $110 million in federal funds. Participants in that program were 15 percent more likely to have a job and 12 percent less likely to test positive for drugs than were non-participants, 15 months after their prison release. Prisoner re-entry programs will be started or expanded under the new federal Second Chance Act, which has not been funded yet by Congress.”
Lampstand Foundation website, http://www.lampstandfoundation.org/
"The sinner is at the very heart of Christianity. Nobody is so competent as the sinner in matters of Christianity. Nobody, except the saint." Charles Peguy (1873-1914)
About
- David H. Lukenbill
- I am a California native, married, we have one daughter and live close to the American River with two cats and all the wild critters we can feed. I am a management consultant to nonprofit organizations and have an Associates of Arts degree in Administration of Justice from Sacramento City College, a Bachelor of Science degree in Organizational Behavior from the University of San Francisco and a Master of Public Administration degree, also from the University of San Francisco.