43
New Trumbull offender day-reporting program set to open in March
By Ed Runyan
WARREN
Trumbull County’s first government-run day-reporting treatment program for nonviolent offenders will begin operating in the Stone Building on Courthouse Square sometime in March.
The Trumbull County Day Reporting Center will be run by the Northeast Ohio Community Alternative Program, which has operated a multicounty residential program for felony offenders on Pine Street Southeast since 1997.
Funding to operate the center comes from a renewable Smart Ohio grant provided through the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections, said Jake Jones, NEOCAP’s executive director.
Jones said the day-reporting program aims to “stop the revolving-door problem of going in and out of prison” by providing evidence-based treatment to male and female felony and misdemeanor offenders who are at risk of violating probation and going further into the criminal-justice system.
“This is an excellent opportunity for those offenders who do not qualify for placement in [NEOCAP] to address their need areas on a nonresidential basis,” Jones said, adding that it provides options for municipal-court offenders that currently don’t exist in Trumbull County. Similar programming is provided in Mahoning County by the Community Corrections Association.
“I believe we can touch the lives of people who have fallen through the cracks and not received the services they need because they haven’t been convicted of a felony,” Jones said. Through this program, people will have a better chance of avoiding a felony conviction, which can harm a person’s ability to get a job, Jones said.
Day-reporting offenders will take classes during the day on the second-floor space formerly occupied by the Trumbull County Child Support Enforcement Agency. At NEOCAP’s Pine Street facility, felony offenders are sent by judges for residential treatment in a locked facility as an alternative to prison.
Day-reporting center classes will focus on anger-control techniques, substance use, family and social support, high-risk thinking, and problem solving in a group setting. It will serve between 600 and 800 people per year, Jones said.
Offenders will be referred to the program by their probation officer through the common pleas or various municipal courts in Trumbull County. There is no cost to the offender.
“We get calls from parents asking, ‘What do I have to do to get my kid in NEOCAP? I hear you have a great program,’” Jones said. The day-reporting program is a way to provide some of the services of NEOCAP, but the offender still goes home each afternoon.
“There’s been a need for this in our county,” Jones said. “At NEOCAP, we feel there’s a lot of people in the community we can help who don’t need to go to prison.”
NEOCAP is a government agency overseen by the Trumbull County Community Corrections Board, whose chairman is Vince Peterson, a Trumbull County adult-probation officer.