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Danielle began her addiction to heroin as a teenager. Now, at the age of 24, she is clean and sober—and living on the streets of Chicago.

She said she has been in and out prison for drug possession and stealing. After she cleaned up, she said she was determined not to go back to prison.

“I panhandle so I don’t get caught stealing again,” she said. “The longest time I spent in jail was four months, and I don’t want to go back.”

According to the Illinois Department of Corrections’ annual report from 2008, there are 23,611 prisoners in Cook County alone. Prisoners from Cook County account for 51.8 percent of the prison population in Illinois of 45,548.

Data released by the U.S. Department of Justice indicates 16 percent of prison inmates reported a mental or emotional condition. Mentally ill prisoners were more than twice as likely as other inmates to report living on the street or in a shelter within 12 months before being arrested.

Danielle said she spent two weeks in a Chicago shelter, but describes city shelters as “no good,” so she refuses to go back.

“I woke up one morning and all of my stuff was gone.”

Instead, she sleeps on the Chicago Transit Authority’s Blue Line or in O’Hare Airport.

Individuals who have experienced homelessness often cycle between homelessness, hospitals, jails and other institutional care, according to the National Alliance to End Homelessness. They often have a complex medical problem and a serious mental illness.

Severe mental illness includes schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and major depression, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services

“I’d like to try to get off the streets,” Danielle said. “But that requires a place to sleep and clothes to wear, and all of that requires money.”

For people in Danielle’s situation, there are organizations providing support.

The Corporation for Supportive Housing’s Returning Home Initiative, its Web site says, “aims to end the cycle of incarceration and homelessness that thousands of people face by engaging the criminal justice systems and integrating the efforts of housing, human service, corrections and other agencies.”

John Fallon, the senior program manager for the CSH said the non-profit began the Returning Home Initiative three years ago to help people with histories of incarceration and homelessness by placing them with supportive housing and counseling services.

Keeping inmates in prison uses much more taxpayer money than preventative measures, Fallon said.

Through the initiative, $12,000 per year for each individual provides permanent supportive housing and services for people, Fallon said, “who are cycling in and out of the jail system and have mental health difficulties.”

It costs nearly $24,000 per year to incarcerate each person, according to January Smith, communications manager for the Illinois Department of Corrections.

Fallon said that depending on the level of medical attention, the yearly cost of incarceration could cost upwards of $60,000 per inmate, including healthcare and legal expenses.

“We know how to keep people out of jail and keep them healthy,” Fallon said. “But we continue to invest in building more prisons instead of investing in prevention.”

In an effort to identify those in need of assistance, the CSH has funded an expansion of a data matching system at Cook County Jail that is designed to identify users of both Cook County Jail and the State of Illinois Division of Mental Health.

According to the CSH, modifications in 2000 and 2005 of the mental health and developmental disabilities code allowed the DMH and any Illinois county jail to disclose a recipient’s record to each other with the purpose of admission, treatment, planning or discharge.

“We need to persuade people it’s a good long-term investment or just continue paying tax dollars to send people to jail,” Fallon said. “Two-thirds of people go back within three years [without counseling], so we need to make better use of federal resources.”

CSH, Heartland Alliance and Supportive Housing Providers Association teamed up to analyze 177 supportive housing residents in Illinois over the course of two years. They identified supportive housing as “permanent affordable housing coupled with supportive services that enables residents to achieve long-term housing stability.”

The study, released in April 2009, says supportive housing led to a savings of more than $850,000 from pre- to post-supportive housing.

“The sample of 177 residents saved close to $400,000 from a decrease in state mental health hospitalizations, over $215,000 from a decrease in state prison admissions and $183,000 from a decrease in use of Medicaid-reimbursed services.”

Fallon said one of the priorities is ensuring that inmates have medical insurance after they get out of jail. He said he plans to soon see a law passed that would ensure inmates receive Medicaid upon release.

“If a person goes to jail disabled, they don’t leave without a disability,” Fallon said. “So they need health insurance to get necessary services.”

Chicago Metropolis 2020 is an organization whose mission is “ensuring that the Chicago region is one of the places in the world where people most want to work and live,” according to its Web site. One of the organization’s initiatives, called the Collaborative on Re-entry, names “alternatives to incarceration and no entry strategies.”

Individuals re-entering communities after confinement face difficulties that hinder adjusting to life outside of bars. According to a study by Stephen Metraux, Caterina G. Roman and Richard S. Cho titled Incarceration and Homelessness, prisons are often located in rural areas hundreds of miles from where the prisoners were first arrested.

As a result, the research finds that “this geographic mismatch renders it difficult to connect returning prisoners to the available housing market or for discharge staff and social workers to even attempt to provide housing assistance, as they are unlikely to have sufficient knowledge of the housing landscape to aid returning prisoners.”

The study says inmates leaving prison lack savings, literacy skills and access to immediate employment benefits. While these may be substantial obstacles to obtaining employment and housing, possessing a criminal history provides an additional blockade for those with skills and experience.

“Employment opportunities,” according to the study, “become more restricted when criminal backgrounds, particularly a history of a felony conviction, bar people from being employed in a number of sectors.”

The Salvation Army is contracted by the federal government to help those leaving prison adjust to society, said Jim Van Dyke director of correctional services. However, he said, the program is not walk-in accessible. Individuals finish their prison sentences according to the terms defined by the government.

“When a person comes here, he or she gradually moves from no movement to very restricted to gradually freer movement for specific purposes,” Van Dyke said, “as residents complete requirements of each level.”

Specific purposes, Van Dyke said, include job seeking, housing, re-connecting with families and religious worship.

Not all inmates exiting confinement are connected with programs such as the Salvation Army Correctional Services.

A felony conviction disqualifies a person from receiving housing subsidies through the Chicago Housing Authority. Individuals with criminal backgrounds cannot live in public housing and would be ineligible for the Housing Choice Voucher Program, a national rental assistance program, funded by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Matthew Aguilar, the CHA’s manager of media relations, said the CHA is prohibited from extending housing opportunities to people with felonies.

“HUD sets tenancy guidelines, which prohibit convicted felons from obtaining public or HCV housing,” he said.
While convicted felons cannot qualify for public housing, the CHA assists with suggesting alternative housing options for individuals who are not eligible.

Restrictions on housing programs barring individuals with a criminal history are unwarranted, said Daniel K. Malone in his research on criminal history and housing, released last February.

“Criminal history appears to be largely unrelated to the ability of homeless persons with behavioral health disorders to succeed in supportive housing,” Malone said. “Suggesting that policies and practices that keep homeless people with criminal records out of housing may be unnecessarily restrictive.”

Since the Chicago Housing Authority doesn’t accommodate people with a criminal record, they’re left at a standstill. However, programs such as the Returning Home Initiative pick up where the CHA leaves off.

“A man who urinated on state property served a mandatory two-year sentence,” Fallon said, “so we taxpayers paid $60,000 to detain him. We need to make better use of federal resources.”

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