Community-Based Centers

Characteristics and Goals

Although community-based centers are extremely diverse, four basic characteristics can be distinguished. First, all of the programs are housed in buildings located in or near residential areas that can easily be accessed by offenders under supervision. Second, there are a number of practitioners—such as professional and paraprofessional correctional staff (officers or agents), counseling personnel, social workers, and medical personnel—who provide services to the offenders. Another characteristic is that there is a well-defined system of accountability to sentencing courts, parole boards, or juvenile authorities; this accountability is maintained and reported to officials by community corrections personnel working in these programs. Fourth, community-based centers are aligned with community resources, and staff members act as liaisons between the centers and community resources. Last, the management of these programs is assumed by administrators who are available for crisis and special needs assistance, should crisis situations arise.

The goals of these community-based programs vary by type, mission, and philosophy but generally exist to assist persons under community corrections supervision with four main objectives: (1) to reintegrate offenders back into society, (2) to facilitate rehabilitation of these offenders, (3) to provide sentencing and punishment options (particularly when overcrowding in institutional correctional facilities exists), and (4) to assist offenders in becoming more accountable for their actions. Reintegration, in which criminal offenders who have been institutionalized attempt to resume normal activities with their communities, has been a goal in recent decades for the correctional system generally, and this responsibility has particularly fallen to the community-based centers. Rehabilitation has long been a goal of the correctional system, and helping offenders with problem solving and issues such as addiction is addressed in these centers. Sentencing and punishment options for courts and parole boards are extremely important, especially when overcrowding in correctional institutions occurs and alternatives to incarceration are needed. Community-based centers are particularly useful when graduated sanctions (increased or decreased punitive and restrictive sanctions that are imposed in accordance with offender behavior) are deemed beneficial. Community-based centers also provide such high levels of supervision that offender accountability is much greater than in regular community corrections facilities.

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