SARASOTA COUNTY (WSNN) – Too often a person who is sentenced to time in jail does their time, gets out, but lands back in jail, failing to adjust to a life beyond bars. Now Sarasota County is partnering with a Suncoast foundation to help reduce what’s called recidivism.
“Incarceration breaks the social fabric of entire families. It’s not just that one individual who was involved in the justice system, there’s an entire network behind them, that was impacted as well,” a Charles and Margery Barancik Foundation representative, Murray Devine said.
The Charles and Margery Barancik Foundation granted $225,000 to the Sarasota County Sheriff’s Office to help with its recidivism rate.
“The last reports from the nation, the recidivism rates were around 65-percent, and in Sarasota, we’re down to about 53-percent,” Corrections Services Bureau James Forrest said.
Recidivism is defined as criminal acts that resulted in rearrest within a three-year period following a prisoner’s release
“Ultimately our goal is to try and help these individuals find their path and stop being part of the system,” Forrest said. “So many of the individuals that we have in here, they come in with checkered backgrounds.”
So, the sheriff’s office has created programs to help keep prisoners from returning to the system. In 2009, it created one of the first addiction recovery pods in the state. Now, it has more than 50 programs, focusing on mental health support and job training.
“We go to the process of identifying what criminogenic needs they have,” Forrest said. “So is it education? Substance abuse? Employment? And then we try to match them up with the programs we have available.”
With this grant, the sheriff’s office is planning to create specific re-entry programs targeting cognitive-behavioral therapy, employment skills, while teaming up with local partners like the Suncoast Technical College.
“It’s saving the community overall because these people are now safer to the community, they’re now part of our community, and they want to be part of it,” Forrest said.
Not only does the program help the inmate, but it also helps their family..
“You can’t put a price on the toll that it takes when a child has their father or mother taken away from them,” Devine said.
This is why the foundation is providing the grant.
Florida’s recidivism rate is about 25-percent, while Sarasota’s rate is about 53-percent. Captain Forrest says he hopes SCSO’s programs help lower the rate.
