ABOUT US
The Reentry Coalition brings agencies and organizations working on reentry in Philadelphia together to collectively reduce recidivism.
Who We Are
Our 115 members include local, state, and federal government agencies, community-based service providers, researchers, advocates, returning citizens, faith-based groups, and others who partner as Coalition members.
Our Vision
1. Lead with the values of justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion and meaningfully center lived experience in all of PRC's work.
2. Lead the effort to transform the mentality that frames people coming home in terms of criminality. Treat people who have been involved or at risk of being involved with legal system as valuable individuals deserving dignity, self-determination, and pathways to prosperity.
3. Constantly support collaborative efforts between PRC members that are aimed at removing barriers and supporting full, self-determined lives for people involved or at risk of being involved with the legal system.
What We Do
The barriers and collateral consequences faced by returning citizens are many, the services and resources meant to support them in overcoming those barriers are often in siloes, and no single agency can address every need of every returning citizen. The Coalition brings reentry partners together to increase collaboration, reduce duplication, align existing efforts and strengthen stakeholders’ capacity to improve their own reentry programs. The Coalition also creates a permanent space to ensure perpetual communication among participating organizations even through administration, structural, and personnel changes.
Currently, we are implementing our 2021-2023 Strategic Plan.
Our History
The Philadelphia Reentry Coalition was formed in 2012, when the Philadelphia County Criminal Justice Advisory Board (CJAB) voted to convene a subcommittee to focus on countywide reentry efforts, and The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of PA hosted leadership from federal, state, and local levels representing the judiciary, corrections, probation, defense, prosecution, and other key stakeholders, to address growing concern that reentry efforts in Philadelphia needed to be better coordinated. A planning grant from the PA Commission on Crime and Delinquency (PCCD) helped Philadelphia’s Office of Public Safety prepare a Countywide Blueprint and supported a staff person to dedicate time to coordinating the Coalition.
In 2015, the Coalition engaged in an inclusive strategic planning process which resulted in Home for Good, a 5-Year Countywide Plan to Improve Reentry in Philadelphia. During strategic planning, Coalition invited Philly PRISM (Partnership for a Reentry Integrated Systems Model), a local reentry coalition comprised of many groups not involved in the Philadelphia Reentry Coalition, to merge. Formally adopted by the CJAB on September 29, 2015. Home for Good created a new coalition structure, and a staff person from FNC (home of Philly PRISM) joined the part-time Coordinator from the City's Office of Public Safety as Co-Coordinator on a volunteer basis. Since then, the City's Managing Director’s Office (Office of Criminal Justice) has dedicated additional resources and created a full-time position for a Coalition Director. The Reentry Coalition also has a full-time Capacity-Building Coordinator through the SERVE Philadelphia Americorps fellowship program. These two staff work closely with the Steering Committee and subcommittee co-chairs to carry out the goals of the Philadelphia Reentry Coalition by bringing reentry organizations together to collaborate and build a stronger reentry support system together.
In the summer of 2020, the Philadelphia Reentry Coalition (PRC) began a new process of strategic planning, with support from Strategy Arts that was sponsored by the City’s Office of Reentry Partnerships (ORP). PRC was sunsetting its previous five-year countywide plan “Home for Good” and considering updates to its structure, governance, and membership framework, including development of formal bylaws. This planning process was informed by the challenges and obstacles experienced by PRC throughout the implementation of Home for Good, as well as a set of minimum operating standards for county reentry coalitions that Pennsylvania Commission on Crime and Delinquency (PCCD) developed in early 2020.
As of June 16th, 2021, the Philadelphia Reentry Coalition’s membership has elected the initial members of a new Steering Committee, four of seven of whom identify as having lived experience with the justice system. The Chair, Vice-Chair, and five at large members have also appointed five subcommittee chairs and a representative of the Office of Reentry Partnerships to make up the remainder of the Steering Committee for the next 2 years.