By Rock Island (IL) Mayor Mark Schwiebert
July 28, 2008

Rock Island (IL) is a city of nearly 40,000 residents and is part of a larger community known as the Quad-Cities, which is a collection of several cities that traverses two states, Eastern Iowa and Western Illinois. United by its geographical proximity to the Mississippi River, the Quad-Cities region is home to approximately 500,000 residents.

While most of the focus on coordinated reentry initiatives for ex-offenders tends to be on large urban centers, mid'sized cities such as Rock Island are not immune to the challenges that the ex-offender population can present. In Rock Island, we are proud to have a 32-year history of providing coordinated reentry services to residents through a collaborative relationship with the Safer Foundation and Rock Island County.

Founded in 1972, the Safer Foundation is one of the largest community-based providers of services for individuals with a criminal record in the country. Safer is usually recognized for the coordinated reentry services they have been providing in and around the Chicago area, which serves as the location for their main office. However, over the years, Safer has expanded its reach into other Illinois locales, including mid'sized cities such as Rock Island.

Safer has recognized what many mid'sized city mayors, myself included, have come to recognize; that it is essential that the field of reentry develop interventions and strategies for mid'sized cities, as these locations are often overlooked and underserved when it comes to reentry solutions. Currently in Rock Island County, there are 281 people on parole, not to mention the number of residents who are dealing with the stigma of having a prior criminal record. Cities similar in size to Rock Island are often less equipped than major cities to deal with people returning from prison.

Both the city of Rock Island and Rock Island County have been at the forefront of the efforts of mid'sized cities to address this issue. As previously mentioned, the Safer Foundation has been providing services to residents of Rock Island and surrounding Illinois communities since 1976 through their Employment Services Program. To give you an idea of the type of impact this program has had on our community, 277 intakes were performed this past fiscal year. Further, 114 clients were referred for employment and maintained employment for a minimum of 30 days. The significance of a minimum of 30 days on the job can be found in a 2003 study of Safer’s clients. For those clients who were on the job for at least 30 days, the recidivism rate dropped by 30 percent, from a statewide average in Illinois of 52 percent down to 22 percent. As you might imagine, the longer one stays on the job, the less likely they are to reoffend. From the perspective of a mayor, this trend not only saves money in the amount spent on incarcerating those who reoffend, it also increases the local tax base, reduces the burden on local law enforcement and decreases the number of households receiving welfare benefits, such as TANF (Temporary Assistance for Needy Families) and food stamps.

Other initiatives have been created and implemented in Rock Island to creatively respond to the offender population that has made us a model for other communities our size throughout Illinois and the nation. In 2000, Rock Island County successfully implemented one of the first drug courts in Illinois and remains instrumental in assisting in the creation of similar programs throughout the state. Drug courts are an innovative approach to addressing the crimes committed by drug-using offenders, which offers intensive supervision and heightened accountability and treatment to chemically addicted offenders that participate in the program. Currently, Rock Island County Drug Court employs two specialized probation officers and has graduated 84 participants who have successfully completed all of the conditions of the program.

More recently, Rock Island County Court Services began offering a specialized program geared toward the supervision and assistance to the chronically mentally ill or developmentally disabled offender, the first probation department in the state to do so. Similar to drug court in concept, mental health court addresses the crimes committed by clients with an Axis I mental health disorder, providing for intensive supervision and accountability which ultimately allows for proper maintenance and management of the specific disorder of each participant. Currently, 38 clients are enrolled in Mental Health Court and receiving the intensive services needed to address the underlying cause of their offenses. In both programs, the goal of Drug and Mental Health Court is to identify those offenders in the early stages of the criminal justice process that clearly have addictions and/or suffer from mental illness or developmental disabilities, and secure them the intensive treatment, monitoring and management that they need in order to prevent them from becoming the chronic offenders that are such a drain on our communities. Such proactive and aggressive concepts to addressing the offender population go a long way to reducing the social ills associated with recidivism.

In summary, while comprehensive reentry services and strategies are typically associated with the nation’s largest cities, mid'sized cities like Rock Island, working with county agencies and the Safer Foundation, are creating blueprints that address both the needs of offenders attempting to return to society and the mid'sized communities to which they return.

Rock Island’s long-term relationship with the Safer Foundation and the innovative approach of our County Court Services can be used as a model for other similarly sized communities to use in part or in whole to address the growing needs of their reentry population.