Nonprofits that help people released from prison find employment, housing and other services say they may need to pare back their work, or shutter completely, if more funding doesn’t arrive soon. 

Reentry Welcome Centers have historically kept themselves afloat through a combination of local funding, federal grants and philanthropic donations. Now, they’re finding themselves strapped for cash as grants run out and federal coronavirus dollars, which some of them received from their municipalities, are expiring.

Beth Hines, the executive director of Community Partners in Action, told the state’s Criminal Justice Advisory Committee last week that her organization has paused referrals from the Department of Correction in both its Hartford and Waterbury locations while funding remains unclear. 

Connecticut lawmakers had originally allocated $1.5 million in the state budget for reentry centers each of the next two years, which Hines said made her “ecstatic.” But by the time the final state budget was approved, the centers’ funding for fiscal year 2026 had disappeared. 

Todd Murphy, spokesman for the House Democrats, said the funding was one of several items removed from the budget in an effort to remain within the state’s spending limits.

House Speaker Matt Ritter, D-Hartford, said the reentry centers had previously been funded through coronavirus relief dollars, and that lawmakers hoped to revisit the funding during a special session.

Reentry center leaders have faced this uncertainty before.

Scott Wildeman, president of Career Resources Inc., which helps people returning from incarceration with job training, said the centers have been asking the state for funding for years. 

“ This is a service that the state uses, and that they should, in theory, be paying for,” he said. 

The six reentry centers that operate in some of the state’s largest urban centers serve as hubs connecting people who were recently incarcerated with things like finding housing or a job, getting clothes and basic toiletries, and addressing health care needs.

According to a report released in April, 72% of clients of reentry welcome centers across the state between June 2023 and May 2024 reported having unstable housing situations. Sixty-five percent of the roughly 1,000 people whose sentences ended between June and December of last year did not have a high school diploma. About half had a “serious or extremely serious” problem with substance abuse and about a third had a mental health disorder classified as “moderate or serious.”

The Hartford-based center serves about 400 people each year, and the Waterbury center serves 350. Without additional funding, Hines said, she estimates they’ll be able to serve 120 people in Hartford and 80 people in Waterbury, and she said even that 120 would be tough. 

“If that state funding doesn’t come through … there’s going to be hundreds of people turned away in Hartford and hundreds turned away in Waterbury. We won’t be able to serve halfway house participants anymore. We won’t be able to serve people on probation,” she said. 

Staff at CPA told The Connecticut Mirror that their partner organizations set up shop at the Hartford location on a weekly or biweekly basis, offering things like health screenings, help with taxes and resume preparation, or what are known as “harm reduction services” like clean needles or fentanyl test strips. The organization has a computer lab for people to use, and Career Resources, Inc. — which is one of its partners — helps people find entry-level jobs. 

“ Many of the people coming to the center have been incarcerated for a significant period of time. They’ve unfortunately burnt bridges with family and friends, and so oftentimes the center and our case management teams are the only help that they have,” Hines explained. 

Community Partners in Action currently receives funding from both the city of Hartford and the nonprofit Hartford Foundation for Public Giving. Hines said the organization has applied for a grant from an organization in California, and that she’s not sure what will happen if it doesn’t come through.

CPA received three years of federal COVID-19 relief funding through the City of Hartford, which expired in 2023. This year, two additional grants from the federal government — one for substance abuse and mental health services, and one from the Department of Justice — are also reaching their preordained end dates. 

Wildeman said the center he operates in Bridgeport, which serves about 400 people annually, will remain open until Oct. 1 with the hope that state lawmakers will call a special session. If Career Resources, Inc. doesn’t receive state funding, he said, the center will close. “ We’ve cut way back. I’ve only got one staff on it right now. I have very minimal support dollars,” he said. 

“ Just the other day, we had two individuals that were coming to the center that were homeless, coming directly out of incarceration,” he said. “If that center’s not there, these individuals would literally end up on the streets.”

Pastor Dana Smith, who runs New Life II in New Britain, which offers recovery housing and peer support as well as reentry services, described his budget as held together with “a lot of prayer and duct tape.” 

Smith said New Life relies on churches and donations, as well as funding from the recovery center, to support reentry services. Smith said staff members are doing everything possible to keep the center running, but money is tight. State funding, he said, would go toward purchasing backpacks, supplies and bus passes, which they provide to clients.

New Life is currently working with about 100 people, he said, who staff check in with once a month. He said they also encourage people as they struggle with the challenges of reentry, like the difficulty of getting a job with a criminal record. 

Nichelle Hilton, the director of the Project M.O.R.E. Reentry Welcome Center in New Haven, said the center will likely close its doors by the end of the year without additional funds. 

Unlike other reentry centers, Project M.O.R.E. doesn’t have private donors. Hilton said that’s left the organization with almost no funding, aside from donated clothes and some support from Career Resources that allows them to assist clients with applying for jobs. In the wintertime, she said, she lets homeless people stay in the warmth of the center until it closes for the evening. She can also direct them to places where they can get food or showers in the city.

The center was previously funded by the City of New Haven, but, according to Hilton, city leaders cut funding due to an issue with the nonprofit’s former leadership.

Mayor Justin Elicker said in a statement to CT Mirror that the city was committed to supporting people returning from incarceration, and that leaders recognized the importance of having a reentry welcome center to assist with housing, employment and other services. Elicker said the city planned to issue a Request for Proposals for a reentry welcome center, and would consider an application from Project M.O.R.E., calling the organization “an important partner in this work.”

Without the reentry centers, Hilton said, people often don’t know what resources exist in the city. And without the support that her center offers for people trying to get on their feet, she said, people will be more likely to turn to crime.

“They’re going to get discouraged and now it’s survival of the fittest in their head, and they’re going to go back into the street,” she said.