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A local group of social service leaders has come together to help Blair County Prison inmates and other incarcerated individuals re-enter society successfully when released.
The Blair County Re-entry Coalition works with inmates still incarcerated and after their release to help with housing, employment, family and mentoring support, parenting, education, care for physical and mental health and rehabilitation treatment when necessary, according to officials at one of the coalition's recent monthly meetings.
It's a "holistic approach," beneficial to both inmates and the community at large, according to the coalition's mission statement.
Representatives of organizations connected with the coalition have been going into the prison to meet with inmates to prepare them for re-entry: including Blair County Community Action, the Blair County Chapter of the Pennsylvania Prison Society, Blair Drug and Alcohol and the National Alliance on Mental Illness.
The pre-release conferences they conduct, along with robust re-entry plans that include contacts for supportive resources, are critical for the inmates after they get out, according to Ken Dean, retired former Blair County mental health program specialist, and Lisa Hann, executive director of Family Services Inc.
If there's no contact before release, no firm plan to ease inmates onto a successful path and no guidance for obtaining assistance once outside, there's a high likelihood "we may lose them" -- as inmates can easily return to familiar people and the same familiar ways that got them into trouble in the first place, Dean and Hann said.
In the pre-release meetings, coalition representatives may try to set up appointments with CareerLink, so inmates can look for work; or with the Altoona Housing Authority, so they can find a place to live, they said.
The coalition has been working with other local advocates toward possible establishment of transitional housing for newly released inmates, Hann said.
The prison tries its best to accommodate the pre-release meetings, but getting them set up and then following through isn't easy, given the lack of space and staff at the jail, according to Dean.
The coalition is prepared to collaborate with government, faith-based and community organizations, according to its mission statement.
There are currently five subcommittees: Education/employment/resources, which helps create a resource network for inmates, while intervening with employers and schools; Housing, which helps identify subsidy opportunities; Prison, which helps with reentry planning and tracking of recidivism; Stepping up, which aims to encourage "trauma informed care training" for county criminal justice employees; and Reunification, which hopes to increase the amount of certified recovery specialist programing in the prison and also engagement in parenting programs.
The coalition has been active for about two years, although the effort began in early 2020, before COVID-19 resulted in a hiatus, Dean said.
The group received state certification in February, he said.
It behooves the community to support the coalition's work, if only for self-interest, according to Dean.
"It's better to have them become useful returning citizens than to be reincarcerated," he said. Or to be "kicked to the curb," he added.