Presentation (Community Based Services) for Returning Citizens @ Corrections

On Friday, May 3, 2024, DC Recovery’s Brian Person, Community Outreach Coordinator, Certified Peer Recovery Supervisor, and Certified Harm Reduction and DC Recovery’s Demetrius Jones, Certified Peer Recovery Specialist and Trainer introduced their community-based services to the D.C. Department of Corrections’ Returning Citizens,  Residential Substance Abuse Treatment Program (RSAT).  Mrs. Cathy Voss, LICSW and the Supervisory Correctional Treatment Specialist maintains the program’s current structure which allows a treatment cohort to complete the program every couple of months. Upon successful completion of the program, some participants are released to the community. At Friday’s presentation, Mrs. Voss mentioned, “I have started bringing service providers in, prior to clients being release, so they can have personal introductions to what is “out there” and she further stated, “I would love to be able to do this on a “regular” basis, as each group nears completion.”  This effective strategy not only benefits participants, but also promotes partnership within the provider community.

DC Recovery is looking forward to our next presentation at the Department of Corrections and to intake upon their release, the courageous participants into our programs held at the Peer Operated Center of Excellence located at 5656A 3rd Street, N.W. Washington, DC 20011. The effectiveness of the outreach effort is partially due to the organizational efforts of Mrs. Voss and the Department of Corrections in providing a private setting for DC Recovery’s Peer Specialists to chat with participants. This enabled the Returning Citizens to express a genuine organic response to the hard and fast questions about long-term recovery and an exit plan. The skilled Peer Specialists provided every opportunity for the participants to communicate honest, spontaneous, and unpretentious responses.

We applaud and honor all partnership efforts of the Department of Corrections! Well done.