Unlike most offenders, those receiving life sentences do not have a fixed release date. They also face much longer sentences - a minimum of 12 years, compared to the average sentence of three and a half years. When they are released, they will be on parole for the rest of their lives. All parties involved in the correctional system recognised that these inmates needed a new approach to help them through their long sentences and re-integrate them successfully into the community once they were released on parole. A grant from the Donner Foundation financed the first study of the LifeLine service, and the first in-reach worker began work in 1991.
Community services assist lifers as they leave the institution to re-integrate into the community.
Public awareness helps to create support in the community by sending in-reach workers to meet with interested groups others in the correctional community. In addition, the in-reach workers carry out preventive work such as trying to deter youth from becoming involved in crime or drugs, assisting in special education initiatives, and developing positive values and role models. All LifeLine partners are committed to fully extending the service to inmates with indeterminate sentences, and in 2001 they will consider expanding the target group to include all inmates serving sentences of 10 years or more.