NCJ Number
187477
Journal
Corrections Today Volume: 63 Issue: 1 Dated: February 2001 Pages: 70-73,127
Editor(s)
Susan L. Clayton
Date Published
February 2001
Length
5 pages
Annotation
This article discusses the history behind the Canadian report Creating Choices, formulated under the task force for federally sentenced woman, and its accepted recommendations by the Federal Government changing the landscape of Federal women’s corrections in Canada.
Abstract
In 1989, a task force for federally sentenced women in Canada was assembled to make recommendations on how to improve the situation facing female offenders. The outcome report, Creating Choices, was submitted and in 1990 the Federal Government accepted the recommendations: to close the Prison for Women (Canada’s only prison for women serving more than 2 years), build four regional prisons, build an Aboriginal healing lodge, develop women-centered programs, and establish a community strategy to expand and strengthen programs and services for women on conditional release. The article continues with the historical perspective behind Creating Choices and proceeds with a review of the components necessary for the success and advancement of the task force’s recommendations: facilities, programming, staffing, cross-gender staffing, and intensive intervention strategy. Creating Choices had a major impact on women’s corrections. It established five principles of change: empowerment, meaningful and responsible choices, respect and dignity, supportive environments, and shared responsibility. Creating Choices remains the philosophy and guiding document for the management of women offenders. The regional institutions provide a real opportunity for women to make positive changes in their lives, to accept responsibility for their lives and their choices while being supported and assisted by staff, with the goal of making a safe, successful transition to the community.