Who is the Colorado Criminal Justice Reform Coalition?
Our mission is to reverse the trend of mass incarceration in Colorado. We are a coalition of nearly 7,000 individual members and over 100 faith and community organizations who have united to stop perpetual prison expansion in Colorado through policy and sentence reform.
Our chief areas of interest include drug policy reform, women in prison, racial injustice, the impact of incarceration on children and families, the problems associated with re-entry and stopping the practice of using private prisons in our state.
If you would like to be involved please go to our website and become a member.
Our chief areas of interest include drug policy reform, women in prison, racial injustice, the impact of incarceration on children and families, the problems associated with re-entry and stopping the practice of using private prisons in our state.
If you would like to be involved please go to our website and become a member.
4 comments:
This report is sad, but not nearly as sad as the reality. Basically, almost NONE of our inmates are trained to do anything (valuable or good) while in prison. Prison time in Colorado is 99.9% totally wasted, dead time and the inmates are not prepared for jack squat when they come out. Whoopee!!! 605 (out of 23,000 average inmates at any given time) of our inmates learned how to clean toilets, scrub floors, and change light bulbs (Janitorial Training). What will that do for anyone?!? About all I can see that will do is help keep the prison clean. At BVMC, "no one" completed any vocational training and out of 886 inmates at BVCC, 11 people completed vocational training of some type, but what I cannot tell. They may have all been toilet cleaners. I have a hard time believing the majority failed to complete the few programs offered due to transfers or releases. None of the vocational programs are even available for short timers (minimum of 18 months remaining on sentence for anything). So, where are they transferred to? I can learn basic skills of any job faster than 18 months (and so can anyone else). I believe these figures are misleading.
"It appears that many if not most inmates who need employment-related training will not receive it while incarcerated."
1,393 inmates out of 13,288 who need it as defined and determined by the CDOC completed a vocational program. That's so sad it would be comical if it wasn't also so inhumane, given that these people will come out with a felony conviction and no training and a parole officer and parole conditions. One more reason to hate the Department.
All of it is a set up for failure. On the DOC website it gives Accelerated transition FAQ’s. It says among the services which are going to be provide to parolees, depending on offender needs, is a housing voucher for 30 days. When you first read this you think they are actually going to give the parolees a chance. But the reality is much different. My son knows someone who is due to be released. This person was told, because there are so many inmates being released early there is no money. The best they could do for him was a week at a sleazy hotel on drug infested East Colfax. Gee I wonder how that is going to turn out?? It makes you think they are only trying to make it look like they are trying to do something. So when all these inmates end up back in prison, they can use it for a reason to go back to the “tough on crime” logic, they love so much. I would really love to see a reality T.V. show where they take an average person, drop them off in a city with a hundred dollars and the clothes on their back, just to see how long they last. It doesn’t take rocket science to know it isn’t going to turn out well.
Good job Barney. These are the things the public needs to know about how the CDOC is wasting there tax dollars.DJW
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