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| Wyoming prison nursery could help break cycle of incarceration |
| By trib.com - KRISTY GRAY Star-Tribune staff writer |
| Published: 03/05/2012 |
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LUSK — Sarah Haugen gave up after losing custody of her 1-year-old daughter. Who did she have to stay clean for? She was arrested in Feb. 19, 2009, for child endangerment with possession of methamphetamine, and her daughter went to live with the child’s grandmother. It didn’t matter if she used, Haugen told herself. She knew the baby was taken care of. She was arrested again two years later, then 2½ months pregnant, for violating her probation. She was sentenced to 21 to 42 months at the Wyoming Women’s Center in Lusk. She gave birth to her son Nov. 5, spent two days in the hospital with him, her ankle shackled to the bed, before her mother picked him up and took him home. Haugen, 24, says she doesn’t know how to be a mother. “I haven’t had a child since my daughter was that age, and she’s 4 now,” Haugen said. “I don’t know how to care for a child really.” But when she gets out in May, she’s going to have to learn. She will probably be his full-time mother again someday. Haugen’s challenge is not unique. Seventeen women were pregnant when admitted to the prison between 2007 and 2011, including three births in 2010 and two in 2011. It is why the Wyoming Women’s Center wants to give inmate mothers more time with their newborns, up to 18 months for women who qualify. Both houses of the Legislature have approved a $1.01 million capital construction request that would renovate an unused prison building, turning it into a nursery. It would house inmates and their babies and host overnight stays for children up to 6 years old. The hope is that fostering an early mother-child bond will give mothers a strong incentive against reoffending after release and help break a cycle of incarceration that can be passed through generations. “The reality is that the women here will get out of prison, and they will be back in the communities,” said Phil Myer, warden of the Wyoming Women’s Center. “And we want them to be successful at raising those children so those children don’t repeat the sins of the parents.” Breaking the cycle Prison nurseries are an emerging trend in corrections. Eleven other states have them. Proponents argue that such programs teach critical parenting skills, relieve separation anxiety in children and reduce inmate recidivism — the act of reoffending. It could even save taxpayer money in the long run. “Because of the successes of nurseries in other parts of the country ... and the research that shows that children who are able to bond with their mothers just do so much better throughout their whole lives, we just decided that this was a priority for us,” said Chesie Lee, executive director of the Wyoming Association of Churches, which has supported a prison nursery at the Wyoming Women’s Center for the past three years. Critics say prisons are meant for punishment. Taxpayers shouldn’t pay for inmates to care for their children, especially when they are in prison for breaking the law. “That’s certainly an argument folks will make ... and it’s a valid one, to some extent,” Myer said. “I think it’s akin to what we did when we started locking up people and throwing the key away on folks.” Proponents say the problem is that women inmates are more likely to be the main caregivers for their children. In Lusk, 47 of its 238 inmates are mothers to 55 children younger than 6 years old. Another 67 inmates are mothers to 134 children ages 6 to 17. Research shows that children of incarcerated parents suffer separation anxiety, have more problems at school, come into contact with the juvenile justice system earlier in life and may need foster care, all of which, in the long run, can also cost taxpayers. That’s what happened to Haugen. Haugen entered the system when she was 7. She and her sister went to foster care when her mom was arrested for drinking and driving, she said. While her mother worked to get her life back on track, Haugen’s derailed. She started drinking at 13, smoking marijuana at 14, was addicted to methamphetamine before she turned 18 and started smoking crack cocaine at 21. “Once I got in the system, I stayed in the system,” Haugen said. She figures she’s spent only a year and a half of her life outside a residential treatment facility or group home since she first got in. In 2004, a 10-year study was completed on the nursery program at the Nebraska Correctional Center for Women in York, Neb. — the longest study of any prison nursery program in the country. The study was published in the Spring 2009 edition of Corrections Compendium. Read More. |
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