BRANCH OF THE VINCENTIAN FAMILY INVOLVED IN THE PROJECT: Daughters of Charity
NAME OF SYSTEMIC CHANGE PROJECT: Roarke Center
PROJECT ADDRESS: 107 4th Street, Troy, New York 12180
CONTACT PERSON: Sr. Linda O’Rourke
LENGTH OF TIME THE PROJECT/PROGRAM HAS BEEN IN EXISTENCE: 7 years
PROJECT WEBSITE: N/A
The Roarke Connection within the Center serves women during and after their incarceration. It was begun to interrupt the cycle of recidivism. For those who participate actively for a year the success rate is 83%. So that is a change in the system of releasing women with no support or resources. Also Judges have begun to divert women from a jail sentence if they join our program.
The director of inmate services asked the Daughters of Charity to “do something” for the women. He had a “time filler” activity in mind but we saw the problem of recidivism and set about changing that.