Great Reentry Resource

The New Jersey Institute for Social Justice is a non-partisan urban research and advocacy organization founded in 1999. Based in Newark, the Institute promotes the development of economically healthy and vibrant urban communities and challenges practices and policies that prevent urban New Jersey from achieving its full potential.

The Institute conducts a broad range of activities designed to raise the profile of prisoner reentry issues for state decision-makers and local communities, and to help protect communities from the negative impacts of reentry. These efforts began with the convening of the New Jersey Reentry Roundtable, a year-long initiative that brought together government policy makers, researchers, local and national experts, community service providers, victims advocates, and formerly incarcerated people to develop an empirically-based understanding of reentry in New Jersey and propose policy and programmatic responses. The Roundtable’s final report, Coming Home for Good: Meeting the Challenge of Prisoner Reentry in New Jersey, has provided a blueprint for policy change in the state and guides the Institute’s on-going advocacy.

The Institute frequently publishes an excellent electronic newsletter, The New Jersey Reentry Digest, which can be accessed here. The most recent issue contains information about the following topics.

• Second Chance Act Reintroduced in House of Representatives
• Washington State Senate Passes Reentry Bill
• New Report on Reentry and Housing
• Conference on Legal Barriers to Reentry
• National Offender Workforce Development Conference
• New Jersey Update: Criminal Justice Forum at Rutgers-Newark