APRIL 2016

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE

ROADMAP TO

REENTR

REDUCING RECIDIVISM THROUGH REENTR

Y

Y 

REFORMS AT THE FEDERAL BUREAU OF PRISONS
“Supporting successful reentry is an essential part of the Justice Department’s mission to promote public safety — because by 

helping individuals return to productive, law-abiding lives, we can reduce crime across the country and make our neighborhoods 

better places to live.”

“An important part of that task is preparing those who have paid their debt to society for substantive opportunities beyond the 

prison gates, and addressing obstacles to successful reentry that too many returning citizens encounter.”

- Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch

National Reentry Week Announcement 

April 2016 

ROADMAP TO REENTRY 

REDUCING RECIDIVISM THROUGH IMPROVED REENTRY OUTCOMES AT

THE FEDERAL BUREAU OF PRISONS

Overview

Each year, more than 600,000 citizens return to neighborhoods across America after serving 

time in federal and state prisons. Another 11.4 million individuals cycle through local jails. And 

nearly one in three Americans of working age have had an encounter with the criminal justice 

system—mostly for relatively minor, non-violent offenses, and sometimes from decades in the past. 

Federal prisoners are held at the Bureau of Prisons (BOP), a law enforcement agency of the U.S. 

Department of Justice and the country’s largest and most complex prison system—housing nearly 

200,000 prisoners in 122 federally-operated correctional institutions, 13 privately-operated secure 

correctional facilities, and a network of more than 175 community-based centers around the 

country. 

Reflecting on the size of the American prison population, Attorney General Loretta E. 

Lynch has stated: 

Sometimes the sheer size of these numbers ... blunts our sensibilities 

to what they truly represent: people. Every number is a person. 

Behind every person is a family and surrounding every family is a 

community. These are people who could contribute to our economy, 

who could support their families and who could transform their 

communities into better places to live. If we are truly going to make 

the most of this precious resource, this human capital, we must 

ensure that these individuals have the tools and the skills and the 

opportunities they need to return to their communities not just as 

residents, but as leaders; equipped not only to survive, but to 

succeed. We must ensure that our returning brothers and sisters, 

mothers and fathers—our fellow Americans—can truly return home.

The long-term impact of a criminal record prevents many people from obtaining 

employment, housing, higher education, and credit—and these barriers affect returning individuals 

even if they have turned their lives around and are unlikely to reoffend. These often-crippling 

barriers can contribute to a cycle of incarceration that makes it difficult for even the most wellintentioned individuals to stay on the right path and stay out of the criminal justice system. This 
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cycle of criminality increases victimization, squanders our precious public safety resources, and 

wastes the potential of people who could be supporting their families, contributing to the economy, 

and helping to move our country forward.

Under the Obama Administration, the Department of Justice has already taken major steps 

to make our criminal justice system more fair, more efficient, and more effective at reducing 

recidivism and helping formerly incarcerated individuals return to their communities. In 2011, the 

Department established the Federal Interagency Reentry Council, a unique Cabinet-level effort to 

remove barriers to successful reentry. The Reentry Council, which now includes more than 20 

federal departments and agencies, has developed significant policies and initiatives that aim not only 

to reduce recidivism, but also to improve public health, child welfare, employment, education, 

housing, and other key reintegration outcomes. 

To ensure that all justice-involved individuals are able to fulfill their potential when they 

come home, Attorney General Lynch has launched a major effort to support and strengthen reentry 

programs and resources at BOP. These principles of reform—known as the Roadmap to 

Reentry—will be implemented throughout BOP, deepening and further institutionalizing the 

Department’s commitment to reentry. These efforts will help those who have paid their debt to 

society prepare for substantive opportunities beyond the prison gates; promoting family unity,

contributing to the health of our economy, and sustaining the strength of our nation.

The Department has also established full-time positions to promote reentry work at BOP, 

the Executive Office for United States Attorneys, and the Office of Justice Programs; this includes

hiring the first-ever Second Chance Fellow—a formerly incarcerated individual with deep expertise 

in the reentry field—to assist in development of reentry policy initiatives. BOP established a new

Reentry Services Division to better equip inmates with the tools needed for success outside the 

prison walls, including expanded mental health and substance abuse treatment programs and 

improved work and educational opportunities. Through the community of U.S. Attorneys, the 

Department participates in reentry and diversion courts in more than 50 judicial districts nationwide. 

And the Department supports state, local, and tribal reentry efforts by providing resources under the 

Second Chance Act of 2007: the Department’s Office of Justice Programs has made nearly 750 

Second Chance Act grants totaling more than $400 million, and established a National Reentry 

Resource Center that serves as a one-stop resource for returning citizens, advocates, and

stakeholders. 

In 2013, the Department launched the Smart on Crime initiative—reorienting our federal 

prosecution priorities to make better use of our finite resources and to more equitably apply the law. 

The results have been very encouraging: Department prosecutors are charging fewer mandatory 

minimums and focusing on more serious drug offenders; plea and cooperation rates are 

undiminished; and, after nearly 40 years of growth, the federal prison population has declined for 

the second consecutive year. But, to truly serve the public good, the Department cannot only be 

concerned with innovations related to prosecutions and entry into the criminal justice system; we 

must focus on those who are leaving it as well. 

Throughout its history, the Federal Bureau of Prisons has been committed to the dual 

mission of operating institutions that are safe, secure, and humane, and providing the treatment, 

training, and life skills that inmates need to be productive, law-abiding citizens after release. By

implementing the principles laid out in this Roadmap, we can better prepare motivated individuals to 
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successfully reenter society; we can reduce crime across the country; and we can make our 

neighborhoods better places to live, work, and raise our children.

Principles for Improved BOP Reentry Practices

The Roadmap to Reentry identifies five evidence-based principles guiding federal efforts to

improve the correctional practices and programs that govern the lives of those who will reenter 

society after incarceration. The Department of Justice takes the view that “reentry begins on 

Day One.” And, just as important, our involvement does not end at the prison gates. As 

such, these corrections principles span the cycle of custody and beyond: from intake, to 

incarceration, through to release. The principles are as follows:

Principle I: Upon incarceration, every inmate should be provided an individualized 

reentry plan tailored to his or her risk of recidivism and programmatic 

needs.

 

The Department embraces a corrections philosophy that reentry preparation must begin on 

the first day of incarceration. The first, and most important, step in reentry planning is obtaining 

information about an individual’s risk of recidivating and programmatic needs that can inform the 

development of an individualized reentry plan. This assessment—which is currently under 

development at BOP—should include a review of the key information about an incarcerated 

person’s criminogenic needs,such as criminal history, substance abuse history, and education level.1

 

After such an assessment, an incarcerated person should receive an individualized case plan, 

designed to help corrections staff deliver staff deliver targeted services and programs necessary to 

reduce the inmate’s likelihood of recidivism and support each inmate’s successful reintegration upon 

release.

Principle II: While incarcerated, each inmate should be provided education, 

employment training, life skills, substance abuse, mental health, and 

other programs that target their criminogenic needs and maximize their 

likelihood of success upon release. 

Evidence-based Programs. Recidivism risk can be effectively reduced through proven 

evidence-based programming that targets individuals’ criminogenic needs, such as courses on anger 

management, parenting, and cognitive behavioral therapy. The curricula for these programs should 

be grounded in hard evidence that the program reduces recidivism, rather than speculation about a 

program’s positive outcomes or a desire to keep inmates busy while in prison. Moreover, there 

should be standardization of evidence-based programming across facilities so that an inmate can 

complete programs even if they are transferred from facility to facility. 

Education. Low levels of education achievement are directly tied to higher rates of 

recidivism. To remedy gaps in education and employment skills, prisons must ensure its education 

programs are grounded in a concrete, evidence-based strategy that will expand the quality, scope, 

 1 Criminogenic needs are characteristics, traits, problems, or issues of an individual that directly relate to the individual’s 

likelihood to commit another crime, such as low levels of educational and employment performance, or substance abuse.
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and delivery of the agency’s academic and job training curricula, particularly for those with literacy 

and special learning needs.

Job Skills. Providing inmates with vocational training is critical to helping them find a job 

upon release, which is one of the most effective ways to reduce recidivism. For example, Federal 

Prisons Industries (FPI) is a voluntary industrial work program housed within BOP that helps 

federal inmates develop essential life skills and provides them with sustained job training. FPI is 

BOP’s largest reentry program and has a superb record of reducing recidivism. The Department has 

hired a new CEO to shape and lead FPI’s business strategy and to execute transformation and cost 

containment initiatives that will strengthen FPI for years to come.

The Department, through BOP, has launched an effort to assess its education programs, life

skills programs, and job skills programs to ensure these programs are evidence-based and targeted to 

the criminogenic needs of inmates.

Principle III: While incarcerated, each inmate should be provided the resources and

opportunity to build and maintain family relationships, strengthening 

the support system available to them upon release.

 

Research shows that close and positive family relationships reduce recidivism, improve an 

individual’s likelihood of finding and keeping a job after leaving prison, and ease the harm to family 

members separated from their loved ones. To help ensure that all returning citizens have a robust 

support system, prisons must have significant opportunities for family engagement. To this end,

BOP is:

• Expanding an existing pilot program that provides video services for visitation

(videoconferencing) to BOP female facilities by June 2016, and developing an 

implementation plan to expand the video services visitation program to all BOP

facilities.

• Launching a children of incarcerated parents pilot program at four BOP 

facilities. BOP is working with the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency 

Prevention on this program, which engages children of incarcerated parents in 

positive youth development activities and includes their parents in these activities. 

$1.3 million in grant funding was awarded to service providers in September 2015, 

and the programs are scheduled to begin in June 2016.

• Issuing best practices guidance and training for BOP staff regarding interacting 

with children in a developmentally appropriate way during visitation and creating 

visiting spaces at BOP facilities that are welcoming to children.

Principle IV: During transition back to the community, halfway houses and supervised 

release programs should ensure individualized continuity of care for 

returning citizens.

 

Individuals experience the highest risk for recidivism in the first days, weeks, and months 
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immediately following release from custody. Providing continuity of care and support during this

important reentry time period is crucial to preventing individuals from reoffending.

Upon release from federal prison, more than 80% of individuals who return to U.S. 

communities reside at Residential Reentry Centers (RRCs), also known as halfway houses. RRCs 

play a central role in federal reentry strategy because they help stabilize the newly-released individual 

as he or she readjusts to life outside of prison; seeks employment, housing, and healthcare within the 

community; strengthens his or her relationships with family members and others; and faces a host of 

reentry challenges. As such, RRCs should be held to the highest standards for improving the 

experience of residents during the critical first weeks and months outside prison.

In order to ensure that RRCs are fulfilling their vital role in the reentry process, the 

Department, with assistance from outside consultants, is undertaking a robust evaluation and 

assessment of the RRC experience to develop a specific plan for implementing improvements to the 

existing RRC model that will provide residents enhanced reentry support and reduce recidivism.

Principle V: Before leaving custody, every person should be provided comprehensive 

reentry-related information and access to resources necessary to succeed 

in the community.

Providing useful information and meaningful guidance to newly-released individuals—many 

of whom have spent years or decades in prison—is essential to reducing the likelihood that they will 

struggle during their transition and reoffend. For this reason, the Department has coordinated a 

multi-agency, multi-disciplinary effort to: 

• Reduce barriers to reentry. In her capacity as chair of the Federal Interagency Reentry 

Council, Attorney General Lynch has worked to remove federal barriers to successful 

reentry so that returning citizens are able to compete for a job, attain stable housing, support 

their children and their families, and contribute to their communities.

• Reduce barriers that interfere with a person’s ability to secure valid government-issued 

identification upon release. To this end, Attorney General Lynch has asked every state 

governor to accept BOP identification as a predicate for obtaining state-issued identification 

upon release.

• Publish a new standard reentry manual that provides specific, detailed instructions and 

advice on issues commonly experienced during reentry that will be provided to all U.S. 

citizens leaving federal facilities. The reentry manual was printed by inmates working in the 

FPI program. 

• Launch a new reentry services hotline (1-877-895-9196) to provide assistance to recently 

released individuals. This hotline is staffed by inmates working in the FPI program who are 

specially-trained to provide assistance to recently released federal inmates as they navigate 

various reentry challenges and seek community resources. 

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Each year, some 40,000 individuals are released from the Federal Bureau of Prisons. By 

issuing this Roadmap to Reentry and working vigorously to enhance federal reentry practices, the 

Department of Justice reaffirms its view that each and every one of the individuals committed to 

custody at BOP presents us with an opportunity to turn around a life, avoid a future victim, repair a 

family, and support a community. All of these individuals deserve the federal government’s best 

efforts to help them start anew when they return home.

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