As public officials and community leaders seek to build support for re-entry initiatives, they first need to assuage the public's concerns about its safety. To that end, it is essential for the public to recognize that, but for community corrections, people who are incarcerated go from incapacitation and the rigid routines of prison and jail to the chaos of complete freedom. ^[1]   Community corrections officials not only supervise a person's compliance with conditions of release, but they also broker and facilitate connections to services and employment, which are key to a person's successful transition to the community. Accordingly, policymakers and community leaders seeking public support for a re-entry initiative must be able to demonstrate that people released from prison or jail who represent a threat to public safety are being supervised closely and being held accountable for criminal behavior.

Unfortunately, many state and local governments have not provided community corrections systems with the resources they need to accomplish these goals. Their credibility with the public deteriorates further each time a person under community supervision commits a highly publicized crime. This Report provides numerous detailed recommendations for community corrections, in partnership with various stakeholder groups, to make community-based supervision more effective, meaningful, and efficient. (See policy statements in Part II, Chapter E , Community Supervision, for more on how collaboration with stakeholder groups can improve the supervision process.)

Coupled with the changes to policy and practice suggested in these and other policy statements, however, anyone wishing to develop a successful re-entry initiative must create a plan to communicate the value of community corrections to the public and to improve its visibility generally.

Example: Sixth Judicial District Department of Correctional Services (IA)

The Sixth Judicial District Department of Correctional Services, which supervises probationers in Iowa City and Cedar Rapids, has engaged in a variety of public relations activities, including organizing community advisory boards and posting information on billboards about sanctions for certain technical violations. Through its private foundation, Community Corrections Improvement Association, the Department holds public hearings across the state to consider restorative justice practices and the intersection of mental illness and the criminal justice system. The Community Corrections Improvement Association has administered surveys to assess public attitudes and knowledge, developed a video and media relations campaign, and planned a conference to raise awareness about mental health and criminal justice issues.

Probation and parole officials should meet periodically with community leaders to inform them about terms and conditions of release, as well as the sanctions that supervision officers apply when people fail to comply with these conditions. Providing community leaders with a sophisticated understanding of the supervision process will increase their confidence that community corrections agencies have the capacity to safeguard the community. Such education also yields other important dividends, including an enhanced supervision network. (See Policy Statement 26, Implementation of Supervision Strategy, for more on how community corrections can leverage community-based networks to assist in the supervision strategy.)

Community corrections agencies should consider ways to work with local media outlets to publicize success stories, such as a parolee who has found employment, is in recovery, and is complying with his or her conditions of release. Success stories may also illustrate how close and effective supervision by community corrections officers has enabled them to detect behavior that, had the offender completed or her his sentence in prison or jail, might have gone undetected.

As community corrections agencies work to build credibility with the community, they may want to refrain from touting their successes themselves, and instead engage others to speak to their value. Unlike a presentation made by a probation or parole official (which may seem self-promotional) remarks about the value of probation or parole coming from a police chief, prosecutor, victim advocates, or the clergy, for example, are particularly likely to resonate with the public. Such spokespersons are essential when the inevitable tragedy occurs, leading the public to question the role of community corrections in prisoner re-entry.

Example: Operation Night Light, Boston Police Department and the Office of the Commissioner of Probation for Massachusetts

Operation Night Light, a probation-police partnership intended to enforce the terms of probation placed on juvenile offenders, has been reviewed and endorsed by representatives of various non-community corrections agencies. James T. Jordan, Director of Strategic Planning for the Boston Police Department, authored an article in support of Operation Night Light in a 1998 FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin; two prominent lawyers at the federal and state levelâ€"former US Attorney General Edwin Meese and former MA Attorney General Scott Harshbargerâ€"praised Operation Night Light at a 2002 forum sponsored by the University of Pennsylvania's Jerry Lee Center of Criminology; and the Boston Public School District has touted the program on its website (http://boston.k12.ma.us/bps/bstory.asp#work).