The Northwest Michigan Prisoner Reentry Initiative is committed to the safety of victims of violent crimes. This year, MPRI designated funding to provide domestic violence prevention and batterer intervention services to parolees. The program helps the prisoners begin the process of changing formerly ingrained and habitual behaviors that harm others before and after they are released from prison.

At the parole agent's request, men who have a history of behaviors that put them and their families at risk for domestic violence are placed in classes designed to prevent assaults on family members. In these classes, prisoners learn about relationship dynamics and the scenarios which can trigger old, violent behaviors. Group participants learn new skills for dealing with those triggers and for resolving conflicts with others in a safe and more productive manner. Participants are encouraged to continue the classes upon release. Those who do continue the classes receive reinforcement for their newly learned skills.

Women's Resource Center of Traverse City began partnering with MPRI in 2007 to provide these services for MPRI participants who were returning to Grand Traverse, Leelanau, Antrim, Kalkaska, and Benzie Counties. The 2008 MPRI Comprehensive Plan calls for expansion of these services by helping to form a network of domestic violence providers in Manistee, Wexford, Missaukee, Charlevoix, and Emmet Counties who will help reinforce the lessons learned at Pugsley Correctional Facility by MPRI participants returning to those counties.

• On any given day, 1 out of every 238 individuals in the United States is in prison or jail *
• On any given day, one out of every 38 individuals in the United States is under supervision (probation or parole)
• In 2004, the parolee recidivism rate in Michigan was 48% (returning to prison within the first two years after parole)
• In 2007, after two years of MRPI, the recidivism rate of parolees who participated in MPRI was 23%
• During fiscal year 2007, the Northwest Michigan MRPI program served 117 parolees
• In a given month, approximately 61% of active MPRI clients are working in some kind of job

* Source Bureau of Justice Administration

** Source Michigan Department of Corrections

Nine Counties in Northwest Michigan were chosen as one of eight pilot sites for the Michigan Prisoner Reentry Initiative (MPRI). This project includes Grand Traverse, Leelanau, Otsego, Antrim, Kalkaska, Manistee, Charlevoix and Emmet Counties.

The goals of MPRI are: 1.) to reduce recidivism, 2.) increase parolee success, and 3.) create safer neighborhoods by implementing a seamless system of services for offenders from the time of their entry to prison through their transition, community reintegration and aftercare in their communities.

Since the Nine County Area pilot started in October of 2005 the project has accomplished the following:

• A total of 250 parolees have been served,
• 165 of them were newly released to this area,
• 85 of them were already in the community.

The following services were provided to these individuals and their families:

• 128 received housing assistance in the form of transitional and permanent housing, 159 received vocational assistance in the form of work assessment, work readiness training, temporary work experience, vocational rehabilitation assistance and job placements,
• 105 parolees received some form of substance abuse treatment,
• 26 received bus passes, gas vouchers, or bicycles,
• 28 received clothing vouchers,
• 44 received assistance in obtaining birth certificates and/or social security cards,
• 4 received treatment for a severe mental illness and
• 12 received treatment for a mental health condition,
• 6 parolees received family therapy and
• 6 received dental screenings, office visits with a physician, or prescription assistance.

To date, 83.6% are employed or otherwise occupied on the following ways:

• Full – time permanent
• Full – time temporary
• Part-time permanent
• Part-time temporary
• temporary services
• casual labor
• temporary work experience
• enrolled in vocational training
• unemployable due to treatment or detention needs.

The remaining 16.4% continue to search for work.

The Transition Teams that accomplished this work include the following local partners: Michigan Works!, Michigan Rehabilitation Services, Grand Traverse Industries, Goodwill, Catholic Human Services, Addiction Treatment Services, Child and Family Services, Pugsley Correctional Facility, and area Parole Offices. Each returning prisoner has a case coordinator who collaborates with the parole agent to ensure that these services are in place and that the parolee actively participates in his or her Transition Accountability Plan.

Preliminary results indicate the strategy for guiding reentering prisoners back into their communities is providing additional security for the community by:

• increasing the number of people who are monitoring the parolee,
• engaging parolees in productive work,
• stabilizing them in parole approved housing, and
• reducing the number of individuals who violate their parole during the first few weeks they return to the community, a time period when parolees and the community were formerly at the greatest risk.

Effectiveness of the program will be evaluated based on the rate former prisoners return to prison. The goal is to increase the number of people who successfully complete parole and reduce the number of people who return to prison before they have been in the community two years.

Kirt J. Baab, MPRI Community Coordinator

and

Mary Harwood, LBSW