Great Cities Institute at the University of Illinois at Chicago

Breaking the Cycle of Homelessness and Incarceration

Recent research has found that many of the individuals who are cycling in and out of jails and prisons are also cycling in and out of homelessness. This was a key point made by John Fallon, Program Manager at the Corporation for Supportive Housing ("CSH") during a talk at the Great Cities Institute on September 18, 2007. Fallon manages the Returning Home Initiative, a multi-million dollar national study led by CSH that is designed to extend and develop a model of permanent supportive housing for people who are homeless and disabled and frequently cycling through the criminal justice system.

In Illinois about 59% of individuals released from jails or prisons are back in within a three-year period. Fallon pointed out that for homeless individuals, this problem is often compounded by severe mental illness, substance abuse, poor access to health care, and a lack of jobs. The systems that serve these interdependent problems are disconnected and as a result do not help break the cycle of homelessness and incarceration.

Fallon argues that government can spend money more wisely to address the related problems of homelessness and high incarceration recidivism rates. He suggested that permanent supportive housing would be a better way to provide services to these individuals, as it solves their immediate problem of homelessness first and allows for their long-term treatment and social services needs to be properly addressed. Shifting funding to a supportive housing model would also save money, as indicated by a CSH study of such a shift by the City of New York between 1989 and 1997. The study found that a supportive housing model saved City and State agencies more than $16,000 per homeless person served per year.

View the slides from this presentation.

This lecture was part of the GCI Seminar Series, which invite experts, practitioners, and academics to speak on current issues and innovative research.