Holding people who commit a crime accountable for their actions is a constant theme in this Report. At the same time, the successful implementation of many recommendations in the Report depends in part on the willingness of service providers, employers, and the community at large to take some responsibility for the reintegration into the community of each person released from prison or jail. Many of these stakeholders, however, are reluctant to take such responsibility due to concerns that personal interaction or contact with a person who has been incarcerated could jeopardize their safety. It is therefore important to disabuse people of the notion that they have managed to avoid people with criminal records to date.

Few people recognize (unless they happen to work in the criminal justice system) the numbers of people who pass through prison and jail each year, and how those figures accumulate over time. Advertising and explaining these numbers helps the public appreciate the prevalence of people with criminal records in society; it also teaches community members that these individuals are a greater part of their daily lives than they had perhaps assumed. The Georgia Department of Corrections (DOC), for example, conducted a study which determined that one out of every 15 adults in Georgia is under some form of corrections supervision. This statistic has been used in press releases from both the DOC and the Criminal Justice Coordinating Council, an initiative based in the governor's office that oversees the Georgia Reentry Project (funded in part by the US Department of Justice's Serious and Violent Offender Reentry Initiative), as well as in articles in the Macon Telegraph and the Atlanta Journal Constitution.

Furthermore, it is important for the public to understand the challenges that keep a person with a criminal record who has completed his sentence from getting on with his or her life.

Example: The National HIRE Network, Legal Action Center

Seeking to increase the number and quality of job opportunities available to people with criminal records, the National HIRE Network makes information about the employment of people with criminal records available to a large number of audiences, including federal and state policymakers, direct service providers, and researchers. Through its range of publications, the HIRE Network reviews legal barriers to employment in an effort to encourage employers to make individualized determinations about a person's specific qualifications and policymakers to eliminate laws that categorically ban qualified people with criminal records from employment.

Putting human faces to re-entry by disseminating individual stories about re-entering prisoners can inspire people to reconsider their stereotype of a person released from prison as incorrigible and inherently dangerous. Policy makers collaborating on a re-entry initiative should enlist releasees in education efforts and provide forums for them to share accounts of their experiences with the general public.

Example: Developing Justice in South Brooklyn Project, Fifth Avenue Committee (NY)

Developing Justice provides job training and housing assistance to people returning from prison to South Brooklyn. To address commonly held misperceptions about people released from prison, project staff disseminate literature and speak at trade conferences about re-entry. Program counselors (former prisoners themselves) speak at churches, schools, and community fairs about the stigma associated with a felony conviction. The Project Director, who himself served time in prison, meets personally with the leadership of community-based organizations in situations where service providers seem reluctant to include people released from prison or jail among their clientele.