This study examined the implementation and effectiveness of a Serious and Violent Offender Reentry Initiative (SVORI) program.
The Serious and Violent Offender Reentry Initiative (SVORI) program appears to be reaching its target population and identifying potential participants within an appropriate time frame. While reentry participants completed a high percentage of their institutional programming referrals, they completed a significantly smaller proportion of these referred programs than did comparison offenders. Overall, it appears that this SVORI program could benefit from additional efforts to increase offenders’ referral to and completion of institutional programming, since to date offenders in the program have not received any enhanced institutional programming, other than the increased attention paid to their case planning itself as part of the reentry program’s processes. Spurred by large increases in prison populations and other recent sentencing and correctional trends, the Federal Government has supported the development and implementation of SVORIs nationwide. Prisoner reentry programs in general, seek to maximize the offender’s positive release from prison and successful reintegration into society. Focusing on the effectiveness of the State of North Dakota’s SVORI program on in-program and post-parole recidivism, this study examined the program’s operation and its impact on recidivism for all program participants dating back to the start of the reentry initiative in 2003. Seventy-one SVORI participants were compared with 106 offenders who did not participate in enhanced reentry initiatives, but rather received traditional prerelease services prior to being paroled. Tables, references