Event Gives Participants Taste Of Adjustment After Prison Life

They’ve done their stint in prison, and now it’s time to assimilate back into society.

Officials from all across the Bucks County criminal justice system and others got a taste of what that process is like during a recent reentry simulation at the county’s new Women’s Correctional Center scheduled to open in June in Doylestown Township.

Participants playing the role of former prisoners included District Attorney Matt Weintraub, Chief Public Defender Ann Russavage-Faust, County Commissioner Diane Ellis-Marseglia, District Judge Dan Baranoski, attorney Sara Webster, corrections department staff, and representatives from various agencies including A Woman’s Place, the Penn Foundation, and the Lenape Valley Foundation.

Organized by Buck County Adult Probation and Parole Department Supervisors Kelly Lange and Maria Duprey, who said they hope to make it an annual event during the “second chance month” of April, the simulation featured 15 volunteers from county Adult Probation running tables representing societal institutions like a bank, pawn shop, employment office, drug and alcohol treatment center and more.

Each participant received a packet containing a life card listing tasks and responsibilities, name card with information on their identities and other items to use during the simulation. The event symbolized one month in the life of someone released from prison, and the simulation proceeded through four 15-minute segments, each representing a week.

After each “week”, Lange and Duprey would check on each participant’s progress, and ask how they felt, what the hardest part about their week was and other questions. Depending on their answers, some participants were sent to jail, a halfway house or a homeless shelter until the next 15-minute session.

“It was an eye opening experience,” Lange said. “I gained an understanding of the barriers that reentrants face when they get released into the community and are expected to complete multiple requirements.

“This experience created a heightened sense of patience and empathy while working with these individuals and helping them navigate the system successfully. I feel it is important to hold simulations like these to educate those who are working to help reentrants be successful. The feelings that this event evoked in people that attended were powerful.”

They sure were, agreed Ellis-Marseglia.

“As a social worker, I have known and worked with clients who faced all the barriers on display at the reentry simulation,” she said. “And I always felt empathy for their frustration. But this experience touched a rage in me.

“So many of the rules seemed silly or cruel, and when we tried to do the right thing if often just wasn’t quite good enough. My reentry was simulated, but the emotions I and the other participants felt were real.”

Ellis-Marseglia came away with a great deal of food for thought.

“I’m fortunate that in my real life, I have coping skills, family, a job and connections,” she said. “But for so many people coming out of the prison system, those helping hands just aren’t always there when they’re needed most.

“This experience taught me that it is amazing offenders don’t give up sooner or completely. It also taught me how much the kindness of just one or two people can buoy your spirit to go another round.”

Enlightening was the main word Weintraub used to describe the simulation.

“As a ‘parolee’, I tried my best to comply with all of my parole requirements,” he said. “It was like one step forward, two steps back. I have a newfound appreciation of how difficult it is for any person just released from prison to succeed, but I remain hopeful that all can succeed at this if they are provided with proper support and encouragement.”

The event also left profound impressions on Russavage-Faust and Lou Emanuele, a drug and alcohol supervisor at the Bucks County Department of Corrections.

“This experience can now be used as a way to better advocate for reentrant services as well as to continue to help better educate and guide reentrants so that they can be successful once in the community,” Emanuele said.

“The simulation made very clear that getting released from jail is only one of the many hurdles clients face trying to get their lives back on track,” added Russavage-Faust.

“I felt anger and frustration by what I was encountering, and I can see why some people just give up. It strengthens my resolve to help wherever I can.”

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