Message from our director
I am often asked how the concept for Community SOLUTIONS came into being. With over thirty years of professional experience with prisoners and their families and my own personal experience with the incarceration of those I greatly care for, I have long been deeply concerned by the debilitating trauma experienced by families when a loved one is incarcerated.
Shamed and embarrassed, typically families of prisoners, having done no wrong themselves withdraw and isolate from the mainstream community believing they are powerless to improve their dire circumstances. As a result, for all too long the prisoner’s family has had no voice to express their pain, let alone to advocate on behalf of themselves, their children or their incarcerated loved ones. Therefore, when the opportunity arose to begin a specialized program that would give the prison family a voice and improve the quality of life for them and their children, and thereby improve the quality of life for our community, I eagerly accepted the challenge.
The incarceration of a loved one profoundly traumatizes the entire prison family. Tragically this fact all too often leads many prison family members down unproductive and even risky paths that ultimately destroy families and diminish the quality of life in the community. Typically the community responds with indifference. Believing justice has been served and the matter is resolved when the perpetrator of a crime receives a prison sentence, the community largely ignores and even shuns the prisoner’s families.
Unfortunately, looking the other way rarely resolves any problem, and in this case stigmatizing the prison family only forces them into an isolation that worsens the problem. As a result, as many as 70% of children of prisoners become prisoners themselves and as many as 85% of returning prisoners, sorely unprepared for community and family life, with families sorely unprepared to receive them, recidivate within three years of their release from prison. This indifference and even disdain actually imperils the safety and quality of life in our community.
To ever improve these tragic circumstances we must rise up to embrace the prison family. Those we serve are not simply families of prisoners, they are FAMILIES OF PROMISE. It is our fervent hope that our community will become accurately informed and boldly step forward to offer the financial and personal support that will truly improve the quality of life for the prison family and our community.
We hope that as you explore our website and learn more about us and about the prison family you will join us in becoming a supporting and involved Community SOLUTION.
Sincerely,
Carolyn Esparza, LPC
Founder and Executive Director