U.S. Department of Justice

Office of Justice Programs

National Institute of Justice

DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE

OFF ICE OF JUSTICE PROGRAMS

BJA NI J OJJDP BJS OVC

National Institute of Justice

P r o g r a m F o c u s

Supporting Women

Offenders and

Their Families

The Women’s

Prison

Association:
PROGRAM FOCUS

2 National Institute of Justice

The Women’s Prison Association:

Supporting Women Offenders and

Their Families

by Catherine Conly

Highlights

With the dramatic increase in the number of

women offenders under correctional supervision, researchers and advocates are calling

for correctional strategies that are gender specific and community based.

This Program Focus provides an indepth

look at the Women’s Prison Association

(WPA), an incorporated nonprofit agency in

New York City that offers a broad array of

institution- and community-based services to

women offenders (i.e., women in prisons and

jails, women on probation and parole, and exoffenders). Through a portfolio of four programs, WPA offers peer education, support,

and transitional services to female inmates

who are HIV+ or at risk for infection; and

emergency and transitional housing, individualized case management services, skills-building workshops, child care, counseling, and

other supports to released women, their children, and their families.

Although WPA, like most of its counterparts

around the Nation, has not been the subject of

rigorous, independent evaluation, its programs

incorporate many features that correctional

experts consider essential to programming for

women, including:

● Program models designed to address the specific needs of women.

● Individualized case management to help

women offenders set and achieve goals.

● Skills-development workshops and exercises.

● Family-focused programming.

● Peer support and the development of peer

networks.

● Highly skilled staff experienced in working

with women and their wide range of concerns.

● Formal recognition of participant achievement.

● Ongoing attention to building community

support.

With an annual budget of nearly $4 million from

private donors and a variety of Federal, State,

and city health, welfare, and criminal justice

agencies, WPA provides individual direct services to hundreds of women each year. The

agency has a strong, positive reputation with its

funding agencies and clients. WPA also gets

high marks from local criminal justice officials,

who report that WPA provides clients with

close supervision and individualized services,

and the criminal justice system with honest

feedback on client progress.

Maintaining sufficient funding is one of the

agency’s greatest challenges. Cuts in funding

and changing governmental priorities, especially regarding welfare reform, are significant threats to the future of WPA’s programs.

In addition, the categorical nature of most

government funding imposes limitations on

the kinds of funds that are available, effectively precluding the provision of services to

some women offenders.

In response to these challenges, WPA is working to demonstrate program effectiveness by

creating new mechanisms for tracking individual clients and measuring their ability to

maintain liberty in the community, maintain

or improve housing, and maintain or improve

their family situations. The agency also continues to disseminate information on women

offenders and to actively recruit the

community-at-large in responding to the needs

of women in the criminal justice system.

Elise walked the winter streets, her hands and face bitterly cold; her mind

filled and distracted; her heart brittle.1 No one had prepared her for the enormity

of the challenges she faced—no place to live; no money; her children scattered and

angry; no true friends; and that burning desire to get back to (and at the same time

avoid) the “people, places, and things” that had landed her in jail in the first

place. Just when success was so important, all she could think of was failure.
Program Focus 3

PROGRAM FOCUS

Women offenders like Elise who return to

their communities from prison or jail must

often simultaneously comply with conditions of probation or parole, achieve financial stability, access health care, locate

housing, and commence the process of

reuniting with their children. Setting priorities and accomplishing goals can seem

overwhelming to someone who is confronted with so many tasks at once. Without strong support in the community to

help them negotiate the rules and regulations of myriad public agencies, many

women offenders quickly spiral back into

a life of substance abuse, prostitution, and

related crimes.

Finding effective correctional strategies

for women offenders is of growing importance nationwide. Increasingly, women

have joined the ranks of those behind bars

or under criminal justice supervision in the

community. Since 1980, the number of

women in custody in State and Federal

prisons has risen more than fourfold.2

During 1997, the number of female prisoners in Federal and State prisons rose 6.2

percent, slightly greater than the increase

in males (5.2 percent). At the close of

1997, 79,624 women were incarcerated in

State and Federal prisons.3

Drug-related sanctions have fueled much

of this increase in women’s incarceration.

Federal Uniform Crime Reporting data

show that during the 1980s, the number of

women arrested for drug violations more

than tripled—a rate of growth approximately double that for men.4

 In the same

time period, women held for drug-related

offenses accounted for almost half of the

increase in the number of jailed females.5

According to data gathered by the U.S.

Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice

Statistics, the number of women in State

prisons who were serving sentences for

drug-related offenses increased 432 percent between 1986 and 1991.6

 By 1991,

one-third of the women in prison were

serving terms for drug-related crimes,

compared to one-fifth of their male counterparts.7

 (See “Differences Between Men

and Women Inmates” for additional comparisons of men and women offenders.)

Those now under criminal justice supervision are typically young, unmarried

women of color.8

 They have children,

few job skills, little or no work experience,

and a significant problem with substance

abuse. A survey conducted by the American Correctional Association in 1990

revealed the following details about the

life histories of women inmates:9

● More than half of the women reported

having been victims of physical abuse;

36 percent reported having been victims of

sexual abuse, which often occurred when

the women were children or adolescents.

● Nearly half used cocaine at least once

or twice a month; 56 percent reported

using marijuana that frequently.

● Although some had completed their

General Equivalency Diploma (GED),

most were school dropouts. One-third had

dropped out due to pregnancy.

● Nearly 75 percent had some work

experience prior to incarceration, but

almost two-thirds had earned no more

than $6.50 per hour, considerably less

than they required to support themselves

and their children.

Concern about the dramatic growth in the

number of women in correctional settings

during the past decade and their need for

gender-specific services has prompted

researchers and advocates to call for increased attention to correctional programming for women and increased use of

community-based interventions and alternatives.10 In a recent national survey of

programming for women offenders sponsored by the National Institute of Justice

(NIJ), corrections administrators recommended that there be more services to

address substance abuse, family relationships, vocational education and work, and

prior victimization and domestic violence.11 In addition, State-level administrators and program directors each saw a

considerable need for more transitional

housing and aftercare services to help

women offenders adjust to living independently in the community.12

This Program Focus describes the

Women’s Prison Association (WPA), an

incorporated nonprofit agency in New

York City that offers a broad array of

institution- and community-based services

to women offenders (i.e., women in prisons and jails, women on probation and

parole, and ex-offenders). Like most of its

counterparts around the Nation, WPA has

not been the subject of rigorous independent evaluation, but its program offerings

address many of the critical issues identified above.13 Through its own services and

by linking women with other providers,

WPA offers education, support, and

transitional services to female inmates

who are HIV+ or at risk for infection; and

emergency and transitional housing,

individualized case management services,

skills-building workshops, child care,

counseling, and other supports to released

women, their children, and their families.

The following sections review WPA’s

history and its portfolio of interrelated

programs, describe promising program

features, and discuss challenges for continued operation. Although the program’s

metropolitan setting necessarily affects its
PROGRAM FOCUS

4 National Institute of Justice

In recent years, researchers and policymakers

have argued that women offenders not only

need more services to put them on a par with

men, but in many instances women require

different services as well. A 1991 survey by

the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS), which

highlighted the following key gender differences among State prison inmates, clarifies

why women may need different services.a

● Women and men inmates differed in

their patterns of drug use and drug-related

crime.b Women were somewhat more likely

than men to have used drugs in the month

before the offense that resulted in their incarceration and to have been under the influence

of drugs at the time of the offense.c

 They were

also more likely than men to have used crack

in the month before the incarceration offense.

Women were considerably more likely than

men to have committed crimes in order to

obtain money to purchase drugs. Women were

also more likely than men to be serving sentences for drug offenses.

● Women inmates had important, and

often unique, health-related needs. At least

2,300 women (6 percent) were pregnant when

they entered prison in 1991. Also, a slightly

higher proportion of women (3.3 percent)

than men (2.1 percent) reported being HIV

positive.d

● Female inmates were more than three

times as likely as incarcerated men to report having experienced physical or sexual

abuse at some time prior to incarceration.

The BJS researchers discovered that 43 percent of the women inmates they surveyed

reported having been victims of sexual or

physical abuse prior to admission, with most

having been victimized before the age of 18.

Differences Between Men and Women Inmates

● Incarcerated women were more likely than

incarcerated men to have children for whom

they acted as caretakers until the time of their

incarceration. They were more likely than men

to have children under the age of 18 who were

being cared for primarily by their grandparents

while their mothers were incarcerated. The data

further showed that the burden on grandparents

is greater when a child’s mother is incarcerated

than when a father is incarcerated because mothers usually care for the children of incarcerated

fathers.

● Female inmates were less likely than male

inmates to have been sentenced in the past.

Of the women surveyed, 72 percent had been

sentenced previously. Among inmates with prior

records, women inmates were more likely than

men to have been sentenced previously for a

nonviolent offense.

● Women were less likely than men to have

been incarcerated for violent crimes. In 1991,

women were about as likely to be serving time

for a violent offense (32 percent) as for a property (29 percent) or drug offense (33 percent). In

contrast, 47 percent of male inmates were incarcerated for a violent offense. From 1986 to 1991

the proportion of women incarcerated for drug

crimes nearly tripled, while the proportions of

those incarcerated both for violent and property

offenses dropped significantly.

● Men and women incarcerated for violent

crimes differed in their patterns of violence.

Women incarcerated for violent crimes were

nearly twice as likely as their male counterparts

to have committed homicide, more than twice as

likely to have victimized a relative or intimate,

and more likely to have victimized men.

a. Beck, et al., Survey of State Prison Inmates, 1991,

Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, March 1993: 5, NCJ 136949.

b. Christine Rasche notes several significant differences in the drug use patterns of women and men

in the general population as well, including: women

tend to be introduced to heroin and cocaine use by

a man in their lives, but thereafter tend to become

more heavily addicted to greater amounts of the

drug in a shorter time; women spend twice as much

money per week on cocaine as do men; nationally,

heroin addiction has increased at a faster rate for

women than for men; and twice as many women as

men end up in hospital emergency rooms because

of drug overdoses. See Rasche, Christine E., Special Needs of the Female Offender, Tallahassee,

FL: Florida Department of Education, Division of

Vocational, Adult, and Community Education Sex

Equity, 1990, Handout #17B.

c. These findings parallel those from an earlier BJS

survey, which showed that women inmates were

more likely than men to have used heroin or cocaine in the month before the incarceration offense,

and to have used those drugs on a daily basis; see

Greenfeld, Larry and Stephanie Minor-Harper,

Women in Prison, Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, March

1991, NCJ 127991.

d. Among those tested, women inmates were more

likely than their male counterparts to report test

results; see Beck, et al., p. 25. Recent studies by the

United Nations Development Programme and the

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show

that AIDS is growing rapidly among young women

in this country and around the world. Although

women accounted for just 14 percent of all AIDS

cases reported in the United States in 1992, the

number of women with AIDS in that year increased

four times as fast as the number of men with the

disease. See Rensberger, Boyce, “AIDS Spreads

Fastest Among Young Women,” Washington Post,

July 29, 1993, A–1.
Program Focus 5

PROGRAM FOCUS

operation, the lessons from WPA’s 150-

year experience will inform anyone seeking to learn more about gender-specific or

community-based programs for women

offenders.

A Century and a

Half of Advocacy

and Programming

The Women’s Prison Association characterizes its mission as follows:

“. . . to create opportunities for change in

the lives of women prisoners, ex-prisoners, and their families. WPA provides

programs through which women acquire

life skills needed to end involvement in

the criminal justice system and to make

positive, healthy choices for themselves

and their families . . . We emphasize:

● Self-reliance through the development of independent living skills.

● Self-empowerment and peer support.

● Client involvement in the community.

● Assistance from dedicated staff,

advisers, and volunteers.”

WPA has been working to fulfill this mission and “increase public awareness of

and support for effective, communitybased responses to crime” since its founding in 1844. Under the leadership of

Abigail Hopper Gibbons, WPA established the Isaac T. Hopper Home to provide housing and training to women

offenders of the 1800s. In its first 3 years

of operation, the Hopper Home sheltered

more than 450 women offenders; and it

has served more than 37,000 women over

the course of 150 years. By the turn of the

century, WPA was calling for the creation

of separate prison facilities for women and

for a State mandate for female matrons in

all facilities with women prisoners. WPA

also protested jail crowding and helped

introduce a bill to establish a reformatory

for women in Bedford, New York. During

the 1940s, it developed a resident aftercare

program at Bedford Hills and established

group therapy programs. In the 1960s,

WPA launched a program for pregnant

offenders.

Since 1992, WPA has focused considerable attention on the needs of homeless

women offenders who have AIDS, are

HIV+, or have histories of substance

abuse, and those who are striving to reunite with their children. WPA now offers

four interrelated programs:

● The Transitional Services Unit,

which provides HIV and AIDS services,

peer group support, prerelease planning,

and housing placement to women inmates

who are HIV+ or at risk for infection; and

transitional and intensive case management services for HIV+ women released

from prisons and jails.

A Hopper Home

ATI program

participant reads

with her son in

the playroom at

Hopper Home.

● The Hopper Home Alternative to

Incarceration Program, a transitional

residence and an intensive reporting program for women who would otherwise be

in jail or prison.

● The Sarah Powell Huntington

House, a transitional residence for homeless women offenders, including those

with HIV or AIDS, who seek to reunite

with their children.

● The Steps to Independence Program, which provides specialized services (e.g., housing and job placement

assistance, independent living skills development, parenting training workshops,

and aftercare services) to homeless

women in the other three WPA programs.

Depending on their circumstances, WPA

clients may participate in some or all of

these programs over the course of many

months or years. For example, a homeless

woman awaiting trial can be contacted in

jail by the Transitional Services Unit,

receive information on HIV prevention,

and be counseled regarding communitybased services. Subsequently, she can be Photo by Meg Handler
PROGRAM FOCUS

6 National Institute of Justice

provided with emergency housing at the

Hopper Home. Then she can be admitted

to the Sarah Powell Huntington House,

where she can work with a case manager,

participate in community-based services

(e.g., drug treatment, individual counseling, and vocational education), and reunite

with her children. Before leaving Huntington House, she can be assisted with her

transition into the community (e.g., locating housing and employment) by staff of

the Steps to Independence Program.

Each year, hundreds of women offenders

and their family members participate in

WPA’s programs. Between July 1, 1996,

and June 30, 1997 (FY 1997), the agency

provided individual, direct services to 344

women and 286 children (under 18 years

of age). During the 1-year period of 1996–

97, WPA placed 99 women in permanent

housing and 84 women in transitional

housing. As many as 3,000 women participated in WPA’s jail- and prison-based

workshops. In addition, WPA staff assisted an unspecified number of other

family members and/or significant others

residing in clients’ homes. For example,

TSU staff estimate that in FY 1997, for

every client served in the Community

Follow-Up Program, they also served an

average of five family members.

Meeting the Needs of

Women Offenders

Following the fivefold expansion of New

York’s female offender population in late

1990, WPA’s staff launched an investigation of the needs of women in the State’s

criminal justice system. The four interrelated programs previously highlighted are

the result of this careful study. Under the

leadership of a newly hired executive

director, WPA staff interviewed women

offenders, summarized their characteristics, and gathered information on available

community-based services.

Characteristics of women

offenders in New York

The interviews revealed that women offenders in New York look very much like

their counterparts across the Nation and

that the following four issues are of particular concern:

● Many women offenders are chronically ill. Prolonged drug and/or alcohol use

with little or no treatment, poor access to

medical care, and low socioeconomic

status place women offenders at considerable risk for a range of infectious diseases,

including tuberculosis, hepatitis B and C,

syphilis, gonorrhea, and other sexually

transmitted diseases. Indeed, the rate of

HIV infection among New York’s criminal

justice population, which is one of the

highest in the Nation, is higher for women

than for men. In a blind serosurvey of jail

inmates conducted by the New York City

Department of Health, the rate of HIV

infection among women was 26 percent,

compared to only 12 percent among men.14

Although the reason for variation in rates

continues to be investigated, part of the

answer may lie in the fact that women

offenders are more likely than men to be

exposed to a combination of HIV-related

risk factors, including their own intravenous (IV) drug use, partners who use IV

drugs, and the exchange of sex for drugs

and income.

● Women offenders who are HIV+ or

have AIDS have considerable need for

health care and social support. Many

women in New York’s criminal justice

system learn that they are HIV+ through

voluntary testing in jail or prison. As a

result, their release from incarceration

may mark the first time they have had to

face the physical and emotional challenges of living on their own with a

chronic and terminal illness. Often they

have no established network for health

care and social support in the community.

Moreover, they may return to the community with inadequate information about

sources of treatment and about transmission prevention that will prolong their

lives and protect the lives of others with

whom they come in contact.15

● Many women offenders are homeless, which impairs their ability to live

crime free. Based on self-reports, it is

estimated that as many as one-third of all

women returning to New York City from

prisons or jails are homeless. In reality,

the rate of homelessness is probably much

higher, since many women are thought to

conceal their homelessness for fear that it

will affect their chances of early release

or parole.

Safe housing is at a premium. Drug use

and other criminal activities abound in

shelters; and many women who return to

their former homes face the substance

abuse, sexual abuse, and domestic violence that preceded their incarcerations.

In some cases, regulations regarding kinship and foster care, which preclude a

woman’s living with her children upon

release, also keep her from living with the

trusted relatives who are her children’s

caretakers.

● Reuniting with children is of crucial

importance for most women offenders,

but it is usually a complex issue. Eighty

percent of the women in New York’s

prisons and jails are mothers, and many

are highly motivated to reunite with their

children. But in many cases, incarceration
Program Focus 7

PROGRAM FOCUS

has followed a period of turmoil for mothers and their children in which family

attachments have been severely strained.

Although women leave correctional institutions hoping to live with their children,

years of separation make women uncertain about how they will be received or

whether they will be able to reconnect.

Their children often feel anxious, angry,

and resentful. Caretakers may resist reunification and feel wary of the mothers’

ability to provide adequate support and

guidance.

Moreover, in situations involving kinship

and foster care, child welfare and housing

regulations may make it difficult for

women to regain custody of their children. Although permanence and family

reunification are important goals, they are

not always easily reconciled, especially in

situations where there has been abuse and

neglect.

Delays in reunification can affect housing

decisions as well. In New York City,

mothers must provide adequate housing in

order to regain custody of their children;

yet, to qualify for subsidized housing that

can accommodate a family, applicants

must be able to show proof that they have

custody of their children.

Availability of services

When assessing services, staff discovered

that women offenders and their families

were effectively precluded from being

well served by agencies mandated to deal

with the issues that women offenders

present (e.g., homelessness, HIV, and

AIDS). Sometimes women offenders were

explicitly excluded because of their criminal histories; but, more frequently, some

aspect of qualifying for service was unrealistic given the women’s circumstances

(e.g., requiring custody of children to

qualify for housing).

WPA carefully studied funding opportunities that would support the creation of

programs to address the diverse concerns

of women offenders and provide opportunities for women to:

● Learn and adopt independent living

skills.

● Obtain more permanent living

arrangements.

● Receive appropriate preventive and

medical care.

● Gain financial independence or support.

● Achieve and maintain sobriety.

● Develop relationships that support the

changes they want to make.

● Reunite with their children and families.

Over the past several years, by assembling

an annual budget of almost $4 million from

private donors and a variety of Federal,

State, and city health, welfare, and criminal

justice agencies (see “WPA Funding”) and

by initiating formal agreements with more

than 44 community-based organizations

that serve women and/or criminal justice

populations, WPA created its four programs for women offenders. In addition,

WPA continues to advocate with State and

city social service systems to ensure that

those systems’ programs and policies include provisions for women offenders.

Using Knowledge and

Innovation to Obtain

Funding

To address the multiple needs of women

offenders, WPA has combined funding

from a variety of sources, including many

noncriminal-justice initiatives (e.g., to aid

persons who are homeless and who have

HIV or AIDS). Each funding stream addresses a specific need or set of needs

(e.g., housing, employment services,

health care, and family support), and in

combination, the different funding streams

help to establish a continuum of care for

WPA’s clients.

By continuously gathering information

on women offenders and existing service

delivery mechanisms, WPA is able to craft

funding proposals that demonstrate a clear

understanding of women offenders and

that outline gender-specific approaches for

meeting clients’ service needs. In turn,

funders value WPA’s insights and innovative approaches. “WPA has a good handle

on this population [women offenders].

They’ve studied what their needs are and

they know how to meet them. You can

see that in the work they do,” observed

Samantha Lopez, a representative from

Medical and Health Research, Inc., which

provides funding for the WPA Transitional

Services Unit. Sally Perryman, a former

contract monitor at the State of New York’s

AIDS Institute, concurs. “WPA collects

information that makes their programs

strong and allows them to be visionary,”

says Perryman. “It is the only organization

I know of that provides a peer education

and empowerment program. Many organizations provide AIDS education, but WPA

provides inmates with operational assignments in the program, so it really is an
PROGRAM FOCUS

8 National Institute of Justice

empowerment program. In addition, WPA

designs their programs specifically for

women. Others offer the same curriculum

in male facilities.”

WPA’s Promising

Programs and Their

Features

WPA targets women who:

● Are age 18 or older.

● Have a past or current involvement

with the criminal justice system.

● Have not been diagnosed with severe

mental illness.16

● Are detoxed and able to attend a

day-treatment program (for residential

programs).

WPA combines funding from private donors

with Federal, State, and city funds to support

its four programs. Funding sources and

amounts for each program are as follows:

The Transitional

Services Unit

● $130,000 from the State of New York

AIDS Institute to provide peer education and

support in two women’s prisons.

● $120,000 from Medical and Health Research, Inc., to provide discharge planning

and transitional case management at two prisons and at Rikers Island.

● $317,465 from Medical and Health Research, Inc., which manages Federal Ryan

White Title I fundsa

 for the City of New York,

for outreach and housing assistance.

● Up to $463,000 in Medicaid funds for the

Community Follow-Up Program, a fee-forservice program to provide intensive case

management.

The Hopper Home

Alternative to

Incarceration Program

● $618,000 from the City of New York’s

Office of Criminal Justice Coordinator.

The Sarah Powell

Huntington House

● $1,017,803 from the City of New York’s

Department of Homeless Services.

The Steps to

Independence Program

● $65,000 from the State of New York’s

Homeless Rehousing Assistance Program for

aftercare for previously homeless women.

WPA Funding

● $230,000 from the U.S. Department of

Housing and Urban Development for life

skills, job placement, and parenting

education.

Private Donations and

Foundation Support

● $810,000 in a combination of restricted

(e.g., for public education and purchase of

computers) and unrestricted (e.g., for staff

development, development of a computer

tracking system, and infrastructure) donations and awards.

a. Funds are available through the Ryan White

Comprehensive AIDS Resource Emergency Act—

Title I, which may be used to provide services to

men, women, and children who are HIV+ or who

are at high risk for infection.

● Have not been charged with arson

(for residential programs).

WPA’s approach has many features that

correctional experts consider essential to

programming for women offenders (see

“Features of Innovative and Promising

Programs for Women Offenders: National

Survey Results”). These include:

● Program models designed to address women offenders’ needs. WPA’s

program models are carefully designed to

address client concerns regarding housing, health and mental health care, family

reunification, and employment. In addition, WPA continues to gather information on women offenders and on the

availability of services to assist them.

The information is used to enhance WPA

services and to educate the public regarding women offenders’ issues and the

importance of gender-specific programming. WPA’s diligence in gathering information on their client population also gets

high marks from local funders.

Speaking about the Hopper Home Alternative to Incarceration Program, Rhonda

Ferdinand, the lead prosecutor in the

Manhattan District Attorney’s Office of

the Special Narcotics Prosecutor, underscored the importance of WPA’s approach. “The work they [WPA] are doing

is very different from a lot of other residential programs. These women have

histories of abuse and don’t respond to a

lot of programs. The popular ones now

operate on the idea that you need to beat

the residents down before you can begin

to rebuild. That just doesn’t work for this

population. Often being beaten is all these

women have known.”

● Individualized case management.

Case management services in WPA’s

programs include the development of
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PROGRAM FOCUS

individualized service plans and the provision of individual counseling.

Case management helps clients organize

and prioritize their needs for service,

receive support while achieving their

goals, and learn how to advocate for

themselves. Through case management,

WPA staff are also able to coordinate the

many community-based service providers

who offer assistance to women offenders,

which may help to reduce duplication of

services, thereby making service delivery

more cost-effective and efficient. To

ensure the accessibility of services, WPA

has negotiated formal agreements with

more than 44 service providers in the

community who are working with women

and/or offenders.

In addition, WPA’s case managers offer

clients one-on-one counseling, individual

coaching, and encouragement. Case managers work with clients to help them

tackle issues of recovery and relapse, fear,

shame, anger, self-doubt, patterns of abusive or negative relationships, and problems of family reunification. In turn,

clients are encouraged by the support they

receive. “My parole officer tells me what

not to do; she’s aggressive and mistrustful,” remarked one client when asked to

compare her relationships with her parole

officer and her WPA case manager. “It

feels more personal with my [WPA] case

manager. She’s more like a human being.

She tells me what I can do.”

● Peer support. WPA’s programs help

women offenders build healthy relationships through peer support. Reportedly,

most WPA clients arrive with very poor

self-images and little sense that they can

make a positive contribution. Through

group workshops, support groups, household work assignments, and recreational

activities, participants support each other

in recovery and in accomplishing their

goals. This redefinition of their relationships with each other can be very

transformative.

● Strategies for building on client

successes. WPA seeks to build on client

experience and strengths (as opposed to

merely addressing deficiencies) and to

With funding from the National Institute of

Justice, researchers at Michigan State University recently completed a nationwide survey of programs for women offenders.a

 Respondents, who included State and local corrections administrators, institution-level directors, and program directors, identified 242

innovative programs for further study. Among

the nominated programs, only 18 (7 percent)

had been evaluated. In 17 States, the researchers found that “there really is no promising programming for incarcerated women.”b

Respondents offered a variety of reasons for

their program nominations, including the following: (1) participant (e.g., offender) satisfaction with the program; (2) participant involvement in program operation; (3) emphasis on skills development; (4) program focus

on a key need; (5) staff skills and dedication;

(6) program intensity and duration; (7) staff

concern for the welfare and success of women;

(8) staff concern for children, families and

parenting; (9) community support; (10) use of

consistent rules and regulations; and (11)

postrelease followup.

Although most of the programs nominated as

innovative concentrate on a particular need

(e.g., substance abuse treatment and psychological services), they also take a holistic

approach to women offenders, thereby addressing a variety of related issues. In addition, the researchers observed the following:

“All of the promising programs focus on

the diversity of women’s needs and personalities, and thus case management—

with individualized selection of program

Features of Innovative and Promising

Programs for Women Offenders:

National Survey Results

activities and services—is of paramount

importance.”c

Interviews and site visits revealed that innovative programs share the following

attributes:

● Well-trained and dedicated staff who care

about the welfare of the women and their

families and who serve as positive role models for program participants.

● Women-only programming.

● Program materials focused on skills development and meeting women’s particular

needs.

● Willingness to tailor approaches to meet

individual needs.

● Treatment with appropriate controls.

● Use of peer support and development of

peer networks.

● Formal recognition of participant

achievement.

● Options for women who fail.d

a. Morash, Merry and Timothy Bynum, Findings

from the National Study of Innovative and Promising Programs for Women Offenders, prepared by

Michigan State University under grant numbers

92–IJ–CX–K027 and 96–IJ–CX–0021 for the U.S.

Department of Justice, National Institute of Justice,

Washington, D.C., December 20, 1995, NCJ 171667.

b. Ibid., 74.

c. Ibid., 75.

d. Ibid., 75.

recognize small successes. Clients are

encouraged to assume a variety of responsibilities that contribute to their viewing

themselves as capable. Each client is

required to define and refine her own case

plan and encouraged to assume increased

responsibility for accomplishing her

specified goals. In addition, clients participate in the development of WPA programs. They also serve as public speakers,
PROGRAM FOCUS

10 National Institute of Justice

peer educators, trainers, and assistants in

the Child Center at the Sarah Powell Huntington House.

● Family focus. WPA’s programs assist

both women and their families. Helping

women offenders reconnect and/or reunite

with their children can motivate the

women to accomplish other goals. Working to build healthy families may also

prevent children who have been exposed

to their parents’ substance abuse and

crime from becoming involved in those

behaviors themselves.

● Skills development. Each WPA

program includes workshops and skillsbuilding exercises to help women

improve their abilities to participate productively and healthfully in their roles as

parents, students, employees, tenants, and

friends. Information presented spans a

broad range of topics including health

(e.g., substance abuse, HIV prevention and

treatment), mental health, vocational training, parenting, and independent living.

● Caring, competent, and well-trained

staff. WPA’s staff have considerable

experience working with women. In addition, their knowledge of issues regarding

HIV, AIDS, substance abuse, housing,

and the criminal justice system make

them well equipped to serve a client

population with diverse service needs.

WPA provides its staff with the training

and consultation skills needed to work

effectively with clients and within the

organization. Clinical consultation is

available on a regular basis to provide

guidance on ways to address complex

client concerns such as incest and child

abuse. In addition, through programs

offered inhouse and by sending staff to

outside trainings, staff are supported in

expanding their knowledge about the

substantive issues confronting WPA clients (e.g., HIV, AIDS, substance abuse,

child abuse, and domestic violence) and

in developing professional job skills (e.g.,

using computers and managing meetings).

WPA staff are also involved routinely

in helping to design and refine WPA

programs.

● Long-term commitment. WPA’s set

of interrelated programs can assist women

offenders over a period of several years,

from the point of their initial incarceration

through drug treatment, reunification with

their children, and moves to permanent

housing. Because it has the capacity to

make a long-term commitment, WPA is

able to help women offenders address

their many serious concerns regarding

sobriety, prior abuse, parenting, employment, housing, and health care. Dealing

with these issues is thought to improve

significantly each woman’s ability to

make positive choices for herself and her

family.

WPA operates four primary programs; two

provide residential services and two offer

a variety of other services:

● Transitional Services Unit (TSU)

offers a variety of services to women

offenders who are HIV+ or at risk for

infection.

● Hopper Home Alternative to Incarceration offers transitional housing

services under close supervision.

● Sarah Powell Huntington House offers

transitional housing to women and their

children.

● Steps to Independence (STI) targets

homeless women and provides help with

parenting skills, independent living skills,

and finding housing and employment.

The Transitional

Services Unit

Susan sat at a table with a group of clients

involved in the Transitional Services Unit’s

Community Follow-Up Program. A selfdescribed “menace to society for 15 years”

who is also HIV+, she was still visibly

shaken when she recalled her first days on

parole: “That first weekend out, I felt every

step would be my last. I felt cold and kept

thinking, ‘Wow, I really need some help.’

I was terrified. If I didn’t get help, there

was a good chance I’d go back.”

During that first weekend, she had landed

in a shelter where she was quickly confronted with drug use and violence.

“Thrown in a place like that,” she observed, “it’s like a setup. I had heard

about WPA when I was upstate at Albion,

and thank God I did. On Monday, I contacted them.”

Susan immediately received temporary

shelter in the Hopper Home and eventually moved into a halfway house. With

assistance from her Community FollowUp case manager, she is now receiving

treatment for HIV and attending school.

As she put it, “When reality hits, WPA

offers you a chance. I still have a long

way to go, but I have hope.”

Susan heard about WPA from staff in the

Transitional Services Unit, which offers

individual counseling, outreach workshops, and discharge planning to incarcerated women who are HIV+ or at risk for

infection.17 In the community, the TSU’s

Transitional Case Management and

Community Follow-Up Programs (CFPs)

provide transitional and intensive case
Program Focus 11

PROGRAM FOCUS

management services to HIV+ women

who have previously been arrested and

who may be on probation or parole when

services are rendered. With more than $1

million in funding from State and Federal

sources, TSU has 18 staff members who

provide services to women in city and

State correctional facilities and in the

community.

Outreach and counseling

Each week, the TSU’s Outreach staff visit

the city jail at Rikers Island and four State

correctional institutions for women.18 Once

a year, for a period of several days, staff

also visit the Albion Correctional Facility

near Buffalo, which has a large population

of inmates from New York City, to offer

HIV education workshops and information

on transitional services for women returning to the city following their release. (See

“Transitional Services Unit Outreach Services” for more information.)

Transitional case

management

WPA provides transitional case management for up to 3 months to HIV+ women

who are leaving jail or prison and returning

to the community. Typically, at the end of

that period, the women are eligible to receive Medicaid and may participate in the

Community Follow-Up Program. Case

managers work with clients to address

primary health and living needs, including

housing, financial assistance, medical care,

counseling, drug treatment, and other basic

supports.

Community followup

The Community Follow-Up Program (CFP),

a component of the Transitional Services

Unit, can accommodate up to 90 women

offenders and ex-offenders who are HIV+.

TSU outreach services include:

● HIV education through staff presentations, videos, and peer discussions.

● Workshops on issues important to

women offenders. Topics include HIV risk

reduction, substance abuse and relapse prevention, parenting, community-based services

(e.g., housing, medical care, and financial

assistance), stress reduction, and domestic

abuse. Conducted in Spanish or English, depending on the needs of the participants, each

workshop examines how participants will cope

with a particular issue when they return to the

community. TSU staff develop and facilitate

most of the workshops, but outside experts

also make presentations on occasion.

● Support services, including individual

counseling, advocacy, and facilitation of

inmate support groups. Staff assist with

crisis intervention; help women resolve concerns related to their children and other issues

outside the institution; advocate with correctional officials for the treatment of specific

patients with HIV or AIDS; and through support groups, create opportunities for women

who are HIV+ to talk openly about their

experiences living with the virus.

● HIV peer training and pre- and posttest

counseling. With funding from the AIDS Institute, one TSU staff person is assigned full time

to Bedford Hills, a maximum security facility

that also serves as the diagnostic and classification center for all women sentenced to State

prison terms in excess of 1 year. Two other TSU

staff members are assigned full time to Taconic,

a medium security prison where inmates are

required to participate in a 6-month substance

abuse treatment program. In each facility, TSU

staff work with supervision from the Deputy

Superintendent of Programs, which ensures continuous communication and feedback between

TSU and correctional personnel.

In both institutions, TSU staff provide a full

range of HIV services, including prevention

education, pre- and posttest counseling to inmates who request HIV testing, training of

correctional staff, peer educator training, and

facilitation of peer support. At Bedford Hills,

Transitional Services Unit (TSU)

Outreach Services

TSU staff assist nine inmate volunteers who

are specially trained to provide educational

and support services to other inmates as part of

ACE (AIDS Counseling and Education), an

inmate-initiated HIV and AIDS education and

peer support network. At Taconic, TSU staff

work with six inmate volunteers in a similar

program entitled CARE (Counseling, AIDS

Resource, and Education).

In both institutions, inmate volunteers assume an active role in shaping the programs.

They have organized AIDS walkathons to

raise awareness within the institutions and

raise money for related causes in the community-at-large (e.g., a shelter for HIV+ children). At Bedford Hills, volunteers have produced a series of live dramatic performances

on living with HIV or AIDS, created squares

for the AIDS quilt, and prepared a book entitled Breaking the Walls of Silence, which

describes their experience with implementing an HIV peer education and support program within a correctional institution.a

● Discharge planning for women who have

6 months or less remaining on their sentences. Staff help women prepare for their

release. This includes reviewing the services

that are available in the community, specifying

goals and planning how to accomplish them,

and discussing parole regulations. All paperwork necessary for a smooth transition is collected, including birth certificates and medical

release summaries;b

 appointments for medical

care are arranged; and housing options are

considered and explored. Upon release, women

are linked to TSU’s three-person team of housing experts for assistance in locating housing

(i.e., emergency, transitional, and permanent).

a. ACE program members, Bedford Hills Correctional Facility, Breaking the Walls of Silence: AIDS

and Women in a Maximum Security New York State

Prison, Woodstock, NY: Overlook Press, 1998.

b. To qualify for Medicaid and other financial assistance that is available to those who are HIV+, an

individual must produce medical documentation of

illness. Some women leave prison or jail without the

documentation, which can result in protracted delays in receiving Medicaid and financial assistance

and in receiving appropriate treatment.
PROGRAM FOCUS

12 National Institute of Justice

CFP began in December 1994 as a fee-forservice program authorized by the State of

New York under the Consolidated Omnibus

Budget Reconciliation Act (COBRA), which

allows for the provision of case management

services to nonincarcerated clients who

receive Medicaid.

A case management team works with each

CFP client and with her children to assess

their service needs, develop their individualized service plan, monitor their progress,

and advocate with public agencies. Clients

may participate in CFP as long as they

remain in the community and are eligible

to receive Medicaid.19

According to Bridget Gladwin, Superintendent of the Taconic Correctional Facility, the services of WPA’s Transitional

Services Unit fill an important gap for

women offenders. “WPA does excellent

work, and their focus on women is rare,”

Gladwin notes. “WPA offers more than

treatment and housing. They are providing

women with basic life skills, some things

they may never have had the opportunity

to learn. They do public outreach and

education and are genuinely interested in

this population. WPA is very responsive

to our needs and they do their best to

help out.”

The Hopper Home

Alternative to

Incarceration

Program

Ruth studies a piece of dust on the floor

as she reflects on the years that preceded

her entry into the Alternative to Incarceration (ATI) Program. “Because of

drugs, I missed 8 years of my daughter’s

life,” she remarks sadly. “I don’t know

her likes and dislikes. I don’t always

know what to talk about with her.”

After 8 months as a resident in the Hopper Home, Ruth is the Third Floor Captain, a senior manager in the household

structure. She reports that she has benefited from the ATI workshops on HIV

and self-esteem, and has really enjoyed

learning more about cooking and nutrition. In fact, for several months, she has

been cooking meals for herself and her

peers. Staff recently presented her with a

certificate of excellence for her efforts.

“Before I got here, I had to get high

before doing anything,” she continues.

“Now, I’m learning about myself and

dealing with the world outside. I feel

better about myself and I’m starting to

talk with my daughter. Sure, you get tired

of the routine, but it’s good to finally have

some place to come to that is safe.”

A Hopper Home

participant sits with

her children on the

back patio at the

Home.

Making progress hasn’t been easy. Staying clean, learning to listen, and communicating with other women are on the list

of challenges that Ruth has conquered.

In the process, she has discovered an

unexpected benefit to living in a community of women: “In 34 years of living, I

never had a friend before. Now I have a

girlfriend.”

WPA began the Hopper Home Alternative

to Incarceration (ATI) Program in 1993

with $1.2 million from the Mayor of the

City of New York. In 1991, as part of the

Mayor’s Safe City/Safe Streets Initiative,

money was appropriated to support ATI

programs citywide. Three of these ATI

programs targeted women offenders for

whom it was believed that existing services did not adequately address their

unique needs for service, especially for

substance abuse treatment. Of the three Photo by Meg Handler
Program Focus 13

PROGRAM FOCUS

programs that were funded, only WPA’s

offers residential programming, which is

reportedly very appealing to judges who

believe there is a greater likelihood of

success when all aspects of an offender’s

life are monitored closely.

Hopper Home ATI

program features

WPA’s ATI program includes a transitional residence for 16 women at the Hopper Home and a reporting program for 14

others. Emergency housing (for periods

between 1 and 14 days) is also available

at the Hopper Home for homeless women

offenders seeking transitional or permanent housing. A drug-free environment,

the Hopper Home is staffed 24 hours a

day, 7 days per week. Staff members include a director, an intake coordinator,

two case managers, a house manager for

the residential program, and several fulland part-time resident monitors.

Women accepted into the ATI program

face revocation of probation or parole,

detention, and/or lengthy prison sentences

under New York’s mandatory sentencing

laws. Those laws target predicate felons

(persons with at least one prior felony conviction) for incarceration if they are subsequently found guilty of a felony. Working

with the Drug Treatment Alternativeto-Prison (DTAP) programs operated by

the Brooklyn District Attorney’s Office and

Manhattan’s Special Narcotics Prosecutor’s

Office, ATI staff actively recruit predicate

felons with drug charges and drug histories.20 In addition, some candidates for the

program refer themselves, having heard

about it while detained in jail. Others are

referred by their attorneys, by the District

Attorney’s offices, by judges, or by other

ATI programs. All ATI clients are closely

monitored in the community by WPA staff.

Women who enter the residential program

live at the Hopper Home for approximately

8 months and then move into the community, where they are monitored for up to

6 months. All residents with drug histories

are enrolled in day-treatment programs in

the community and their progress is assessed by a case manager. In the evenings,

residents participate in a regimen of group

counseling, life-skills workshops, and

household work assignments.

To ensure public safety, the clients’ compliance with house rules and with courtordered requirements is closely monitored.

Women are expected to adhere to a strict

curfew. Drug use is tracked through urine

screening conducted three times per week.

Residents are required to comply with all

house rules, sign in and out when leaving

or returning to the building, and earn all

privileges, such as weekend passes. (See

“Core Features of the Hopper Home ATI

Program” for additional information.)

Residential clients proceed through four

program phases. At the conclusion of

each phase, clients must assess their own

progress and make formal presentations to

the case management team outlining the

reasons they are entitled to additional

privileges. During the fourth program

phase, clients transition to living in the

community. Before leaving the Hopper

Home, they must show proof of stable

housing and other prosocial community

ties, including membership in a 12-step

WPA’s ATI program includes several key

elements:

● Discipline. Infractions and their consequences are discussed with all newcomers to

the ATI program. Some violations, such as

having “dirty” urine, staying out without an

overnight pass, or showing disrespect for

fellow residents or staff, are subject to a set of

graduated sanctions. These range from a loss

of privileges (e.g., loss of passes) and more

stringent reporting requirements to termination from the program. Other infractions, including bringing illegal drugs into the Hopper

Home, using drugs or alcohol in the Home,

possessing contraband, or sexual activity in

the Home, result in immediate termination.

● Case Management. Each woman is assigned to a case manager who provides intensive case assessment; counseling; educational

Core Features of the Hopper Home ATI Program

and skills-building workshops; family preservation and reunification assistance; family-oriented activities; and referrals to outside agencies

(e.g., for substance abuse treatment, family counseling, and medical care). In addition, ATI clients are referred to WPA’s Steps to Independence Program (see page 16) for parenting workshops, vocational assessment and placement,

and housing assistance. Each ATI case manager

is responsible for 15 clients and their families.

● Daytime Activities and Evening Workshops. The daytime activities of most ATI clients include participation in community-based

drug and alcohol treatment programs such as

Alcoholics or Narcotics Anonymous. Relapse

prevention, individual counseling, recreational

therapy, acupuncture, and GED programs are

also offered. As their sobriety stabilizes and

with the assistance of their case managers, most

women also tackle issues pertaining to their

past experiences of sexual abuse and incest,

their children, housing, and employment. A

variety of mandatory evening workshops provide useful information and opportunities for

personal growth and discussion of such issues

as HIV and AIDS, substance abuse, independent living, vocational education, parenting,

and women’s health. Each workshop includes

a series of presentations, discussions, and

role plays on various subtopics. Cultural event

days are scheduled once a month and involve

trips to museums, plays, musical performances, or other cultural events in the community. In addition, residents plan and participate with staff in various recreational activities.
PROGRAM FOCUS

14 National Institute of Justice

drug/alcohol treatment program in the

community where they intend to reside.

In addition, they must return to the Hopper

Home three times per week for urine

screening, meet with their case managers

once each week, and attend two group

meetings per week. The fourth phase lasts

approximately 6 months.

The reporting component of the ATI

program serves women who live in their

own homes and participate in structured

day, evening, and weekend activities at the

Hopper Home. Approximately 60 percent

of the clients in the reporting component

are transfers from the residential program;

the remaining 40 percent are directly enrolled into the program. Clients in the

reporting component come to the Hopper

Home three evenings per week. They meet

with their case managers both at the Home

and in the community. A special reporting

support group is also available to address

the concerns of women who live without

the support of a residential community.

During the day, clients in the reporting

program are involved in day-treatment and

other related programs.21

Response to Hopper

Home’s Services

Rhonda Ferdinand appreciates the

program’s scope and its attention to security. “As a prosecutor, my main concern is

public safety, and WPA provides the ideal

structure. They set up curfews, do urine

testing, offer support groups and training

in parenting and self-esteem building. The

initial period offers a lot of supervision

and structure. As women demonstrate they

can handle it, they are allowed more independence. They also know they will be

held accountable. WPA can say, ‘Look,

this is what you have to do or these are the

consequences you face from the prosecutor.’ And then our office is able to help

with the mandate part.”

Women complete the ATI program once

they have met all requirements set by the

court, remained drug free, completed or

continued in treatment, and reported to the

Hopper Home as required. The accomplishments of graduates are then celebrated in a

formal graduation ceremony.

According to Cheryl Welch, who monitored the program for a number of years

for the City of New York’s Office of the

Criminal Justice Coordinator, one of the

best parts of her job was attending the

WPA graduations. “It’s remarkable to

know these women going in and then see

them on the other side of the program. The

scope [of the program] is incredible and

lasts for a long time. WPA deals with

everything: education, employment, housing, and family reunification.”

The Sarah Powell

Huntington House

Five-year-old Anthony is taking his time

coloring the leaves on his tree. He wants

it to look nice when it is displayed along

with those of his classmates on the bulletin board in the Children’s Center at

Huntington House. The fall hues he is

applying so diligently match the colors

in his new shirt—a gift from his mother.

While Anthony colors, his mother, 24-

year-old Charise Walker, is finishing

work as a cook in a restaurant several

blocks away. The work schedule is rigorous for a woman who spent most of the

time between her 16th and 22d birthdays

high on crack cocaine or stealing to support her habit. “Once upon a time, I’d do

nothing for nobody,” she admits.

But a year ago, after completing a courtordered residential drug treatment program, Charise made a vow to change.

“I wanted my son back, and I knew that if

I didn’t stop, next time I’d go away for a

long time.”

Finding shelter was her first priority—

sleeping on sofas in the apartments of her

“drug friends” wasn’t the way out. Having heard about Huntington House while

in jail, Charise applied to the program

as soon as she finished treatment. For a

while, she shared an apartment in Huntington House with another woman who

was also trying to reunite with her children. During that time, Charise continued

drug treatment and completed her GED.

Then, once she and her case manager

convinced the skeptical aunt who had

been caring for Anthony that Charise was

sincere about changing, she moved with

her son into one of Huntington House’s

apartments for families.

“Every day on my way to work, I see

drugs,” she acknowledges. “But I don’t

have to worry now, because I have a safe

place to end up each night and plenty of

people who care about me. Besides, I

don’t want to hurt my baby any more.”

Anthony looks up from his finished product to see his mother standing in the doorway. “Look, mama, at my pretty tree,” he

calls proudly.

“I see it, baby,” she affirms. “I’m just so

glad to see it.”

In 1993, WPA opened the Sarah Powell

Huntington House, a renovated apartment

building in New York City’s East Village

that serves as a transitional residence with

supportive services for homeless women

offenders and their children. Inside the
Program Focus 15

PROGRAM FOCUS

House, away from the drug trafficking and

violence in the surrounding community,

Huntington House residents work with

case managers who help the women assess

their service needs and meet the requirements of the shelter, child welfare, drug/

alcohol treatment, health care, and criminal justice systems. Case managers also

help the women reunite with their families

and locate permanent housing.

With funding from the State Homeless

Housing Assistance Corporation, WPA

began renovation of Huntington House in

1991. The building includes 28 apartments

(27 two-bedroom and 1 one-bedroom), a

Children’s Center, and onsite social services. Nine of the two-bedroom apartments are for women who live two to an

apartment pending reunification with their

children. The remaining 18 two-bedroom

apartments are for mothers and their children. A little more than $1 million in

private and city funding now supports

building operation and maintenance as

well as a staff of 21 full- and part-time

professionals.

An afternoon of fingerpainting at WPA’s Sarah Powell Huntington House

Children’s Center

Program referral and

acceptance

Women are referred to Huntington House

in a variety of ways. Some are recommended by WPA’s Transitional Services

Unit or Alternative to Incarceration program. Others are referred by corrections

officials, by child welfare workers, or by

other community-based organizations.

Still others refer themselves.

The case management supervisor at Huntington House screens each applicant to

determine her homeless status, her likelihood of succeeding in the Huntington

House community, her ability to abide by

the house rules, and the probability of

her living successfully with her children.

Women who do not have a severe mental

illness (i.e., those taking psychotropic

medication or considered suicide risks)

and who are likely to reunite with their

children and provide the children with a

safe home are placed on a waiting list for

acceptance into the program.22 Approximately 85 percent of those referred are

accepted for placement.23 Once admitted,

they may stay up to 18 months.

Program features

Huntington House is carefully monitored

to ensure that it remains free of drugs and

violence. Resident monitors are on duty at

all times. Two are on the premises overnight, on weekends, and on holidays. All

visitors must report to the front desk, show

identification, and agree to leave by curfew. No weapons or drugs are allowed in

the building. All resident absences must be

preapproved.

Key program features include:

● Working with case managers. Most

women begin their stay at Huntington

House by sharing an apartment with a

roommate. During that time, which typically lasts for 6 to 9 months, they work

with a case manager who helps them

identify their needs for service and who

specifies a case service plan. Case managers also assist clients in accessing services

and coordinating with a variety of service

providers (e.g., parole, housing, foster

care, and drug treatment). Often these

providers or the courts (family and criminal) specify activities that must be incorporated into the case plan. Although each

case plan is individualized, most include

drug treatment, counseling, and parenting

instruction. Case plans are reviewed with

residents and updated biweekly.

Each Huntington House case manager has

a caseload of 18 women and their families, which include some children who

live at Huntington House and others who

are elsewhere in the community.

Photo by Leah Kopperman
PROGRAM FOCUS

16 National Institute of Justice

● Family reunification. Over time,

women begin having supervised visits

with their children, if that is required to

satisfy foster-care regulations, and later,

children come to the House for overnight

stays. Somewhere between her sixth and

ninth month in residence, each woman

moves with her children into her own

apartment within Huntington House.

While in the family units, the women

receive assistance in locating and securing

permanent housing for themselves and

their families.

School-aged children are introduced to

Huntington House during an initial orientation and counseling session. Staff separate the children into two groups by age:

6- to 12-year-olds and 13- to 18-year-olds.

Meetings are also convened with the

mother, her child or children, and the

mother’s caseworkers (i.e., other counselors, parole or probation officers, drug

treatment staff, and child welfare workers)

to discuss the family’s goals and familiarize the caseworkers with the program.

Most of the children who live at the Huntington House have spent long periods

separated from their mothers, experienced

frequent, often lengthy, stays in foster or

kinship care, and have been exposed to

parental drug abuse and, frequently, to

other forms of abuse. To help ensure that

these children receive optimal counseling

and support, Huntington House staff meet

regularly with a consulting clinical psychologist who not only helps with assessments and referrals involving children, but

also provides training on issues related to

abuse and treatment, and participates with

staff in weekly case conferences.

● Activities for children. Huntington

House offers a wide range of onsite

activities for children of all ages. For

infants and preschoolers (aged 4 weeks

through 5 years), there is a Children’s

Center, which is staffed by a head teacher

trained in early childhood education, a

classroom teacher, and two assistant

teachers. In addition, mothers are expected to volunteer in the center at least

1 hour per week. Unlike child care in

some other shelter settings, the Huntington House preschool facility is set up as a

classroom, with age-appropriate educational supplies and set lesson plans.

There is also a comprehensive program

for school-aged children, who range in

age from 6 to 18. With direction from a

recreational therapist, these children are

able to participate in a broad array of

afterschool and weekend activities, including homework assistance and tutoring, arts and crafts, and recreational and

cultural activities in the community.

A group of young professionals from the

community-at-large organizes monthly

special activities for the children, including recreational and cultural outings, as

well as inhouse arts and crafts and

celebrations.

Steps to Independence

There’s a celebration going on in the

meeting room at Huntington House,

where a number of residents have gathered to discuss their efforts to find permanent housing. Amid the laughter and

tears, Maria talks excitedly about the

apartment she and her family will soon

occupy. The move will mark the first time

ever that she and all four of her children

will live together. Until now her son,

William, has remained in foster care,

visiting his mother and siblings at the

Huntington House only on weekends.

Maria’s success comes after nearly a year

of waiting—first, to be reunited with her

children so she could apply for housing;

then, to be certified for Section 8 housing;

and finally, to be approved for a lease

by the Emergency Assistance Rehousing

Program. In between, she searched for an

apartment and filed paperwork to ensure

her rental assistance. She worked hard

and is proud of her accomplishments; but

she is also grateful to her case manager

and WPA’s Housing Specialist, who encouraged her and brainstormed with her

at every juncture.

The other women in the room, a mix of

clients from Huntington House and Hopper Home, have encouraged her, too.

In turn, they are buoyed by her success

because it signals that, with perseverance,

they may soon follow.

The Steps to Independence (STI) program

is the most recent addition to WPA’s portfolio of services for women offenders.

Begun in the winter of 1996, STI targets

homeless women offenders who participate in the other three WPA programs.

With input from WPA clients and staff,

the STI program was designed to help

participants improve their parenting skills,

develop independent living skills, locate

permanent housing, and find employment.

Approximately $300,000 in private donations and funding from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development

and the State of New York’s Department

of Social Services Homeless Rehousing

Assistance Program help pay the salaries

of an STI Program Director, three Housing

Specialists, an Employment and Independent Living Specialist, and a Parenting

Specialist. Headquartered at WPA’s Sarah

Powell Huntington House, STI staff offer

an array of skills-development workshops,

counseling, and placement services.
Program Focus 17

PROGRAM FOCUS

Approximately 65 women and their families (most from Hopper Home and Huntington House) participate in the various

STI activities and services described

below.

Program features

● Parenting education and skills

building. STI staff provide several different parenting training, support, and recreational activities for mothers and their

children. A 10-week parenting skills

training class, offered to 15 to 20 women

at a time, addresses topics such as understanding the developmental stages of

children and adolescents; using nonphysical discipline techniques; preparing nutritious meals that meet children’s dietary

requirements; learning interactive play

techniques for the mother and her children; assessing needs for professional

support; and identifying triggers for

anger and stress and developing coping

mechanisms.

● Peer mentoring, relapse prevention,

and women’s support groups. Peer

mentoring training is provided so women

can become support systems for one

another as they develop parenting skills.

The STI Parenting Specialist facilitates a

parent support group, which meets once a

week to discuss parenting topics relevant

to the group, such as parenting with HIV

or AIDS, substance abuse and its effects

on children, and coping as a single parent.

Individual and group counseling sessions

are also held to help women become

responsible as parents. A variety of

other activities, such as play therapy, are

organized for recently reunited families

in an effort to ease some of the stress

involved with reunification.

● Independent living skills and life

management. Because many women who

receive STI services have had little experience in effective problem solving and

decisionmaking, the STI Independent

Living and Employment Specialist conducts 4-week decisionmaking workshops

with 15 to 20 women at a time. Workshop

participants learn how to manage their

time, prepare a household budget, open

and maintain a checking account, access

community services, and other basic

living skills.

● Vocational preparation and employment assistance. The STI Independent

Living and Employment Specialist provides employment readiness training and

job and volunteer placement services.

Through a series of trainings and workshops, clients learn the how-to’s of finding and keeping a job, such as resume

writing, completing job applications,

dressing appropriately, interviewing

techniques, ways to manage job conflicts,

disclosing criminal history, and other

related skills. Each participant also receives employment testing, is referred

for training when appropriate, is offered

individual employment counseling, and

is assisted in locating a job. The employment specialists work closely with the

participant’s case manager to ensure that

the employment services rendered are

consistent with the participant’s case plan.

STI staff also engage in outreach with the

local business community to identify

employment opportunities.

● Housing assistance and aftercare.

Two Housing Specialists assist women to

obtain affordable permanent housing and

access housing resources through realtors,

landlords, and housing developers. Through

housing readiness workshops and individual

counseling, clients learn how to inspect

Women in WPA’s Steps to Independence program learn computer skills to prepare

them for the job market.

Photo by Leah Kopperman
PROGRAM FOCUS

18 National Institute of Justice

apartments, negotiate leases, obtain furniture, and establish a household. Each Housing Specialist has a caseload of 15 to 20

women and their families.

A third Housing Specialist serves as an

aftercare worker and helps clients once

they have moved to permanent housing.

The aftercare worker helps women maintain housing, negotiate with the landlord

for repairs, and access supportive services

in the community. Through services provided largely in the community, the aftercare worker monitors each family’s

progress with independent living for up to

12 months after clients move into permanent housing. With a caseload of approximately 12 families, the aftercare worker

makes regular visits to each family’s

home and to the children’s schools and

receives progress reports from all institutions the family is known to attend.

● Emergency services. Funds from

private foundations are earmarked to pay

for such emergencies as rent arrears, security deposits, utilities, food, and clothing.

WPA’s Services

Receive Favorable

Reviews

During the past 8 years, the Women’s

Prison Association has created and expanded services to assist women offenders

in New York’s criminal justice system.

Consistent with its mission, its programs

are focused on helping women offenders

acquire life skills, end their involvement in

crime, and make healthy choices for themselves and their families. Although there

has been no formal evaluation of WPA’s

programs, funders and clients alike give

WPA high marks. As one client in the

Community Follow-Up Program said earnestly, “A goal can be something you want

deep down in your heart, but it seems so

overwhelming to reach it. WPA helps

you get over that feeling of being overwhelmed—helps you do it.” Her enthusiasm is echoed by Marilyn Alexis-Phillippe,

a former contract monitor in the New York

State Department of Health’s AIDS Institute, “Some of this work, especially the

discharge planning, simply does not occur

outside of WPA. The same is true for their

community followup services. Without this

type of program, or a supportive family,

women don’t have a real chance. And very

few of these women have supportive families; that’s part of the problem. That’s how

essential WPA’s work is.”

In addition, the agency has a strong, favorable reputation with local criminal justice

officials. Reflecting on the Hopper Home

Alternative to Incarceration Program,

prosecutor Rhonda Ferdinand commented,

“There are no other programs for women

like this where housing is provided for a

stabilization period. Most are day reporting or residential programs that do not

provide the same stability. WPA has been

more successful because they individualize their treatment plans. Because they are

small, they can tailor their programs to

meet each woman’s needs. Residential

programs can’t always do that because

they rely on group settings and group

therapy. WPA is more like a family. They

encourage women and help them recognize the importance of community living.”

Superintendent Bridget Gladwin added,

“The WPA is at the forefront in providing

peer education services to incarcerated

women with HIV and transitional services

for women leaving prison. Their halfway

house provides residential services that are

hard to find elsewhere. Our experience

with WPA has been very positive.”

Challenges for the

Future

Despite making considerable strides in

developing gender-specific programming,

WPA still faces a number of challenges.

Cuts in funding and changing governmental priorities are significant threats to the

future of WPA’s programs. Increasing

restrictions on the expenditure of welfare

dollars in New York have affected the

availability of housing, drug treatment,

HIV and AIDS services, and child care.24

Federal welfare reform has placed additional constraints on WPA’s clients by

restricting the level and duration of financial support they may receive.

In addition, although WPA has been successful in piecing together categorical funding streams to construct a continuum of

care that is responsive to the many service

needs of its clients, there are still unfunded

critical needs. Among these are the need for

transitional services (i.e., discharge planning and community-based case management) for incarcerated women who are not

HIV+, and the need for affordable housing

for “singles”—women who do not qualify

for subsidized family housing by having

custody of their children.

Funding constraints have increased the

need for program justification. WPA staff

are now working to develop mechanisms

for tracking individual clients and for specifying more descriptive, objective scales for

measuring client progress. These include

measures of a client’s personal growth

(e.g., achieving goals and improving conflict management) as well as her ability to

maintain liberty in the community, maintain or improve housing, and maintain or

improve her family situation. WPA is also

working with city and State agencies to
Program Focus 19

PROGRAM FOCUS

develop a system for tracking clients’

criminal justice involvement.

Looking Ahead

WPA believes strongly that helping

women offenders requires a broad base

of community support. In 1990, WPA

formed the Women’s Justice Alliance,

which is a coalition of more than 300

public and private agencies and individuals that meets regularly to improve programs and public policy for women

offenders in New York City. Members

gather information and data on women

offenders, support training initiatives,

conduct educational forums and resource

fairs, and exchange information with each

other and with policymakers. The Alliance

also provides a forum for sharing information on the needs of women offenders and

on service opportunities and gaps.

WPA has also launched an initiative entitled “2000 by the Year 2000,” a public

outreach and information campaign to

generate an informed public debate about

crime and poverty. Through regularly

scheduled prison visits, video and panel

presentations, formal and informal events,

and collaborations with other organizations, WPA seeks to create greater public

interest in criminal justice policies by

making 2,000 citizens more aware of the

realities of crime, justice, and imprisonment by the year 2000. Members of

WPA’s Board of Directors support the

initiative by inviting friends and professional colleagues to their own homes for

presentations on the needs of women

offenders. Clients also participate in

WPA’s speakers bureau through which

they describe their life experiences at

community meetings.

As WPA looks to the future, it is working

to establish a community center that can

house a wide range of services responsive

to the different needs of women offenders

at various stages of their reintegration into

the community. For instance, WPA envisions that the center will provide 24-hour

emergency assistance for women just

released from jail or prison; basic services

such as food, shelter, and clothing for

those setting up a new household; and

intensive education and vocational services for women further along in their

adjustment. The organization also aims

to enhance its capacity to work with the

entire family and to provide longer term

support to clients living in the community.

Notes

1. The individuals depicted in this report

were created from information gathered by the author during interviews

with eight participants in WPA’s

programs and observation of group

activities and meetings at the Sarah

Powell Huntington House and the

Hopper Home. All names are fictional; most circumstances and quotes

are authentic.

2. In 1980, 12,331 women were incarcerated in State or Federal prisons. By

1997, the number had risen to 79,624.

For 1980 figures, see Snell, Tracy,

Correctional Populations in the United

States, 1993, Washington, D.C.: U.S.

Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, October 1995: 8, NCJ

156241. Figures for 1997 are included

in Gilliard, Darrell K. and Allen Beck,

Prisoners in 1997, Washington, D.C.:

U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of

Justice Statistics, August 1998: 1, 5,

NCJ 170014.

3. Gilliard, Darrell K. and Allen Beck,

Prisoners in 1997, Washington, D.C.:

U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of

Justice Statistics, August 1998: 1, 5,

NCJ 170014.

4. Greenfeld, Larry and Stephanie

Minor-Harper, Women in Prison,

Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department

of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics,

March 1991: 4, NCJ 127991.

5. Snell, Tracy, Women in Jail 1989,

Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department

of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics,

March 1992: 1, NCJ 134732.

6. Beck, Allen, et al., Survey of State

Prison Inmates, 1991, Washington,

D.C.: U.S. Department of Justice,

Bureau of Justice Statistics, March

1993: 5, NCJ 136949.

7. Beck, et al., Survey of State Prison

Inmates, 1991: 4.

8. American Correctional Association,

The Female Offender: What Does the

Future Hold? Washington, D.C.:

St. Mary’s Press, 1990; Greenfeld and

Minor-Harper, Women in Prison;

Beck, et al., Survey of State Prison

Inmates, 1991.

9. American Correctional Association,

The Female Offender: What Does the

Future Hold?
PROGRAM FOCUS

20 National Institute of Justice

10. Nesbitt, Charlotte, A., “The Female

Offender: Overview of Facility Planning and Design Issues and Considerations,” Corrections Compendium, 17

(8) (1992); Immarigeon, Russ and

Meda Chesney-Lind, Women’s Prisons: Overcrowded and Overused,

San Francisco, CA: National Council

on Crime and Delinquency, 1992;

Bloom, Barbara and David Steinhart,

Why Punish the Children? A Reappraisal of the Children of Incarcerated Mothers in America, San

Francisco, CA: National Council

on Crime and Delinquency, 1993;

Morash, Merry and Timothy Bynum,

Findings from the National Study of

Innovative and Promising Programs

for Women Offenders, prepared by

Michigan State University under

grant numbers 92–IJ–CX–K027 and

96–IJ–CX–0021 for the U.S. Department of Justice, National Institute of

Justice, Washington, D.C., December

20, 1995, NCJ 171667.

11. Morash, Merry and Timothy Bynum,

Findings from the National Study of

Innovative and Promising Programs

for Women Offenders: 43.

12. Ibid., 43.

13. Ibid., 5–6, and 74. Morash and

Bynum comment that, in general,

there is a dearth of evaluation research on programming for women

offenders (pp. 5–6). In addition, few

“promising programs” have been

evaluated (p. 74).

14. See Women’s Prison Association and

Home, Inc., COBRA Community

Follow-up Program Summary, 1,

which also shows that the rate of

infection for women aged 40 and over

was 42 percent; for females under 20,

it was 8 percent. The Centers for

Disease Control and Prevention report

that more than half of the adult female

AIDS cases are reported by States in

the Northeast; and half of these are in

the State of New York. AIDS is also

the leading cause of death for women

aged 30 to 34 in New York City. See

Lawson, W. Travis, Jr., M.D., and Lt.

Lena Sue Fawkes, “HIV, AIDS, and

the Female Offender,” in Female

Offenders: Meeting the Needs of a

Neglected Population, Laurel, MD:

American Correctional Association,

1993: 43–48. For information on the

incidence of HIV among women

inmates in New York State and

New York City, see also Hammett,

Theodore M., et al., 1994 Update:

HIV/AIDS and STDs in Correctional

Facilities, Issues and Practices, Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of

Justice, National Institute of Justice,

December 1995: 12–13, NCJ 156832.

More than one-third of the AIDSrelated deaths among women incarcerated in State prisons in 1993

occurred in the State of New York.

See Snell, Correctional Populations

in the United States, 1993: 111.

15. Researchers have suggested that

working with inmates by offering

education, counseling, early detection,

and treatment is an opportunity to aid

both inmates and society in controlling the spread of communicable

diseases. See Glaser, Jordan and Robert Greifinger, “Correctional Health

Care: A Public Health Opportunity,”

Annals of Internal Medicine, 118(2)

(January 15, 1993): 139.

16. Although WPA recognizes that a

portion of women offenders have

severe mental illness, WPA’s current

programs do not have the capacity to

provide the intensive interventions

and services needed to support and

sustain women in that subgroup of the

offender population.

17. Up to 10 percent of those served are

deemed to be at risk for infection due

to their histories of substance abuse

and/or criminal histories.

18. The four State prisons are Bayview,

Bedford Hills, Parkside, and Taconic.

These four facilities, along with the

city jail, have been targeted because

of their proximity to the metropolitan

area and the likelihood that the

women housed there will return to

New York City following release.

19. CFP cases are closed if the client:

dies; is rearrested and expected to

serve time; is transferred to another

CFP provider (i.e., with another sponsoring agency); relocates outside of

New York City; is hospitalized for

more than 30 days and is not expected

to return to the community; cannot be

located for more than 30 days; is no
Program Focus 21

PROGRAM FOCUS

longer CFP eligible due to loss of

Medicaid; declines WPA’s CFP

case management services; or is

noncompliant (e.g., does not follow

up with scheduled appointments).

When feasible, the case manager or

case management technician provides

referrals to aid a terminated client in

receiving proper care; and with the

client’s consent, a case summary is

prepared for review by a new service

provider.

20. The ATI program has agreed to reserve five residential beds for clients

from Brooklyn’s Drug Treatment

Alternatives Program (DTAP). As

part of its contract with the district

attorney’s office, WPA will retain

Brooklyn DTAP clients for a minimum of 12 months in residential care,

with another 3 to 6 months in the

reporting component.

21. Ninety-eight percent of the ATI

clients are women with substance

abuse histories.

22. A number of factors are used to assess

the mother’s ability to provide a safe

home for her children, including:

child’s age; prior incidents of abuse or

neglect; mother’s intellectual and

emotional abilities to parent the child;

family support systems; reasons for

separation; quality of relationship

prior to separation and at time of

application; age of child at time of

separation; and length of separation.

23. At one time, WPA had more than

100 women on the waiting list—more

than could be admitted in the next 2

years. Policies for managing referrals

were changed so that the number on

the list more closely matches the

number of vacancies likely to occur.

24. Jacobs, Ann L., Policy Update, New

York: Women’s Prison Association

and Home, Inc., February 1995.
PROGRAM FOCUS

22 National Institute of Justice

Sources for More Information

For further information about the Women’s

Prison Association, contact:

Ann Jacobs

Executive Director

Women’s Prison Association

110 Second Avenue

New York, New York 10003

The National Institute of Justice (NIJ) is

one of five principal research, evaluation,

and development agencies of the U.S.

Department of Justice. For information

about NIJ’s efforts in corrections, female

offenders, children whose parents are in

the criminal justice system, and program

development, contact:

Marilyn C. Moses

Program Manager

National Institute of Justice

810 Seventh Street N.W.

Room 7114

Washington, DC 20531

Telephone: 202–514–6205

Fax: 202–307–6256

E-mail: moses@ojp.usdoj.gov

URL: http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/nij

NIJ established the National Criminal

Justice Reference Service (NCJRS) in

1972 to serve as a national and international clearinghouse for the exchange of

criminal justice information. For information about topical searches, bibliographies,

custom searches, and other available services, contact:

NCJRS

P.O. Box 6000

Rockville, MD 20849–6000

Telephone: 800–851–3420 (8:30 a.m. to

7 p.m. Eastern time, Monday–Friday)

URL: http://www.ncjrs.org

For specific criminal justice questions or

requests via the Internet, send an e-mail

message to askncjrs@ncjrs.org.

The Office of Correctional Education

(OCE) within the U.S. Department of

Education was created by Congress in

1991 to provide technical assistance, grant

funding, and research data to the corrections and correctional education fields. To

speak with a program specialist or to be

placed on OCE’s mailing list to receive

grant announcements, OCE’s quarterly

newsletter, and other publications,

contact:

Office of Correctional Education

Office of Vocational and Adult Education

U.S. Department of Education

600 Independence Avenue S.W.

MES 4529

Washington, DC 20202–7242

Telephone: 202–205–5621

Fax: 202–205–8793

URL: http://www.ed.gov/offices/OVAE/

OCE

The National Institute of Corrections

(NIC) was created in 1974 and is unique

as a Federal agency because it provides

direct service, rather than financial

assistance, as the primary means of

carrying out its mission. Its program

responds directly to the needs identified

by practitioners working in State and

local corrections. For information on

technical assistance and training specifically relating to women offenders,

contact:

Andi Moss

Corrections Specialist

National Institute of Corrections

320 First Street N.W.

Washington, DC 20534

Telephone: 800–995–6423, Ext. 140

The Correctional Education Association (CEA) is affiliated with the American Correctional Association as an international professional organization serving education program needs within the

field of corrections. Membership includes

teachers and other community corrections

program staff. Members receive quarterly

journals and newsletters, an annual directory, and a yearbook. Annual conferences

are held in each of CEA’s nine regions and

many of its State chapters. One of the

regions hosts an international conference

that features a variety of substantive workshops on successful educational

strategies. For more information, call

301–918–1915.

The Association on Programs for

Female Offenders is comprised primarily of corrections professionals interested in advancing programming options

for girls and women involved in the

criminal justice system. For information

contact:

Mary V. Leftridge Byrd

President

Association on Programs for Female

Offenders

State Correctional Institution—Chester

500 East Fourth Street

Chester, PA 19013
Program Focus 23

PROGRAM FOCUS

Findings and conclusions of the research

reported here are those of the author and do

not necessarily reflect the official position or

policies of the U.S. Department of Justice.

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This Program Focus was written by Catherine Conly, Associate at Abt Associates Inc. In preparing the document, she met at length with Ann Jacobs, executive director of WPA, and with WPA staff. She also interviewed numerous

clients and observed a variety of program activities. Ms. Conly was assisted by

Kathy Mion, an Analyst at Abt Associates Inc., who conducted telephone interviews with a number of criminal justice professionals and representatives of

organizations that fund WPA’s programs.

About This Report

The National Institute of Justice is a component of the Office of Justice Programs, which

also includes the Bureau of Justice Assistance,

the Bureau of Justice Statistics, the Office of

Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention,

and the Office for Victims of Crime.

NCJ 172858 December 1998
U.S. Department of Justice

Office of Justice Programs

National Institute of Justice

Washington, DC 20531

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