Community Education Centers profiting by privatizing halfway houses.

After decades of tough criminal justice policies, states have been grappling with crowded prisons that are straining budgets. In response to those pressures, New Jersey has become a leader in a national movement to save money by diverting inmates to a new kind of privately run halfway house. 

At the heart of the system is a company with deep connections to politicians of both parties, most notably Gov. Chris Christie.

William J. Palatucci, the governor’s close friend, political adviser and former law partner, is a senior vice president at Community Education. New Jersey officials have called these large facilities an innovative example of privatization and have promoted the approach all the way to the Obama White House. Yet with little oversight, the state’s halfway houses have mutated into a shadow corrections network, where drugs, gang activity and violence, including sexual assaults, often go unchecked, according to a 10-month investigation by the Times.

Many of these halfway houses are as big as prisons, with several hundred beds, and bear little resemblance to the neighborhood halfway houses of the past, where small groups of low-level offenders were sent to straighten up. 

New Jersey officials have called these large facilities an innovative example of privatization and have promoted the approach all the way to the Obama White House. 

Yet with little oversight, the state’s halfway houses have mutated into a shadow corrections network, where drugs, gang activity and violence, including sexual assaults, often go unchecked, according to a 10-month investigation by The New York Times.

 
Mr. Christie, a Republican who took office in January 2010, has for years championed the company that plays a principal role in the New Jersey system, Community Education Centers. 
Community Education received about $71 million from state and county agencies in New Jersey in the 2011 fiscal year, out of total halfway house spending of roughly $105 million, according to state and company records. 
The company first obtained substantial contracts for its “re-entry centers” in New Jersey in the late 1990s, as state financing began increasing sharply. In recent years, it has cited its success in New Jersey in obtaining government contracts in Colorado, Pennsylvania and other states.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/17/nyregion/in-new-jersey-halfway-houses-escapees-stream-out-as-a-penal-business-thrives.html?_r=3&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120617
 http://www.thecrimereport.org/news/crime-and-justice-news/2012-06-gov-christies-crony-has-key-role-in-mutated-nj-halfw

NY Times part 2: At a Halfway House, Bedlam Reigns:http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/18/nyregion/at-bo-robinson-a-halfway-house-in-new-jersey-bedlam-reigns.html

NY Times part 3: A Volatile Mix Fuels a Murder:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/19/nyregion/at-a-new-jersey-halfway-house-a-volatile-mix-fuels-a-murder.html

Toler House successfully renews Federal Bureau of Prisons reentry center contract.
The Federal Bureau of Prisons (FBOP) re-awarded a Residential Reentry Center (RRC) contract to Community Education Centers, Inc. (CEC) to provide services at its Toler House location in Newark, New Jersey. The company will continue to provide work release, reentry treatment and home confinement services for the Bureau under the terms of the contract which include a two year base year and three options one year renewals. ..

"We appreciate the continued confidence that the Federal Bureau of Prisons has shown in our company and we look forward to providing the same high level of quality service that we have since 2006. The company takes great pride in the reentry services it provides for the FBOP in New Jersey as well as in South Dakota, Wyoming, and Texas," said John J. Clancy, Chairman and CEO of CEC.

Community Education Centers, Inc. (CEC) is a leading provider of offender reentry and
in-prison treatment services in America, operating in 17 states and the Commonwealth of Bermuda, with over 30,000 individuals in its daily care. CEC provides a full range of therapeutic residential and non-residential reentry services with a documented record of reducing recidivism.http://www.cecintl.com/news_2012_009.html