and public housing either makes it impossible to reunite with their children or prevents them from creating a suitable living environment. These benefits—often in the form of food stamps, Social Security Insurance, or Medicaid benefits—are barred in certain circumstances under the federal Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996. Section 115 of PRWORA denies both TANF and federally funded food stamps to any individual convicted of a felony involving “the possession, use or distribution of a controlled substance.” The federal welfare statute not only requires states to deny TANF benefits and food stamps to anyone who has been convicted of a drug felony, but it also requires state welfare systems to review state and federal penal records systems.
Congress passed the lifetime ban on benefits for individuals with felony drug convictions after a total of two minutes of debate in the Senate, and no debate at all in the House of Representatives. States may opt out of the ban, but to do so the state legislature must vote affirmatively, in state legislation passed after the effective date of the federal bill, to provide benefits to those individuals. Although thirty-six states41 have eliminated or modified the ban in order to reduce recidivism, ensure that drug and alcohol treatment services remain available, encourage family reunification, and support individuals in recovery, the ban remains in full effect in fifteen states. The deprivation of social and welfare rights has further marginalized some ex-offenders.
E. A Gendered Approach to Reentry
Much of what recently released individuals encounter upon returning to their communities can be anticipated and addressed. The standard approach has been to make ex-offenders fend for themselves with little or no support or guidance. Critical to unraveling the tangle of issues facing those being released is open acknowledgment that there are common difficulties. A logical second step involves mapping a reentry path for ex-offenders to follow, given those difficulties. Issues of gender and geography also bear consideration in developing strategies to address the morass of reentry problems. Planning reintegration for women, especially in communities of color, should involve consideration of some of the profound cultural barriers placed in the path of these women. Given the large number of incarcerated women of color, particularly African American women, one of the central issues of reentry is how these women are accepted back into their communities. Because African American men have, for generations, been overincarcerated, there is a basic acceptance that Black men will have some interaction with law enforcement. But prior to the current cycle of increased female incarceration, Black women simply were not imprisoned as often as men. Those who were incarcerated were viewed as outside the norm or the mainstream. As these incarceration rates changed, that information did not make its way into Black communities. The result has been that women are less readily accepted back into their communities. Regina Austin describes the aggressive or antisocial behavior of Black male lawbreakers as functioning within accepted mainstream gender roles.42 Women, on the other hand, do not enjoy this cultural acceptance. Indeed, women who return home from prison are often viewed as acting outside of accepted gender and racial roles.
F. Programming for Women and Reentry
Although women’s needs are different in very central ways, the majority of corrections and pre-release programming still reflects an absence of the information and the policy direction that a truly gendered approach might take. Some long-time, well-informed commentators, such as Myrna Raeder, Judith Resnick, and Judge Patricia Wald have all suggested that corrections officials can and should rethink the approach to providing programming for women. Obviously this programming should acknowledge that women bring a different set of needs and programming challenges in preparing for reentry and should research those needs and challenges. Programming should reflect those instances of success that have been supported by evidence. Evidence-based programming provides the most certainty and optimism for the future of reentry planning.
Programming for women has traditionally provided fewer opportunities for women than for men. In the 1970s, first men and then women in prison responded by launching a wave of litigation targeted at state correctional systems. In a series of class action suits, women prisoners claimed that their rights had been violated under the Fifth, Eighth, and especially the Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution. A number of these suits focused on incarcerated women’s access to basic education, vocational training, work, medical care, and legal assistance. A series of favorable court rulings led to an initial expansion in the range of programming available to women in prison; subsequent cutbacks in spending on prison programs and services, however, have reversed many of these changes. For example, a larger proportion of women than men participated in all levels of educational programming (adult basic, secondary, and college) and had work assignments. However, the nature of prison work remained gender typed. Women were disproportionately involved in janitorial work, kitchen work, and cosmetology, whereas men were overrepresented in farm, forestry, maintenance, and repair. Pay levels also varied by gender, with men being paid more often than women for their prison work.
The most pressing needs for women preparing for reentry are lack of vocational training, history of drug abuse, and tenuous family situations. While studies show that vocational training is an important aspect of reducing recidivism rates for all offenders, female offenders are more likely than their male counterparts to be lacking in such training. Most women beginning a prison sentence have little job experience and few marketable skills. Inside the prison walls, the same woman is far less likely than a male inmate to receive training that will improve her former situation. Much of the relevant case law arising from female inmates relates to claims of disparate treatment in educational programming and vocational training. The number of cases in this area reflects the need for those women who commit crimes to be equipped to function productively outside the prison walls.
Kentucky and Virginia are two excellent cases in point. In Kentucky, female prisoners were denied access to many vocational, educational, and training programs that were available to male prisoners.43 The programs that were made available to the female prisoners were inferior in quality to the corresponding programs at the male institutions.44 In the Kentucky case the court held that the differential treatment between male and female prisoners was unrelated to any important government objective, and therefore violated fundamental notions of fairness embedded in the Constitution and expressed in the Equal Protection Clause.45 The court went on to hold that the Equal Protection Clause requires parity, not identical treatment, for female prisoners in the area of jobs, vocational education, and training.46
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