Addressing the needs of women prisoners

Mary Atterholt is the outreach coordinator at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Richmond, Virginia. Her work with St. Paul’s began in 1990 when she was hired as a consultant to develop an outreach program. After three years, she realized that most of the program’s clientele were men. In an effort to reach women and to look at their needs, Atterholt began visiting the women’s prisons.

"When we started," says Atterholt, there were no programs in the community specifically addressing the needs of women prisoners."

When Atterholt began this work in 1993, there was just one state prison for women: the Virginia Correctional Center for Women, housing 700 women. Now, there is also the Pocahontas Correctional Center for Women, a minimum-risk facility that houses about 230 women, and the Fluvanna Correctional Center for Women, a maximum-security prison that houses 1,200 prisoners – both state prisoners and federal prisoners from all over the country.

More than 80 percent of the women in Virginia’s prisons are mothers with children under age 18. Most of the women are young–25 to 35 years old. The greatest percentage are African-American. Many have substance abuse problems. "This population has exploded," says Atterholt, "because of the criminalization of addiction. In addition, 67 percent have mental health issues and rarely are these treated."

Since Virginia is a "no-parole state," says Atterholt, "women serve their full sentences. We run programs that address all sorts of things, like providing housing for women coming out of prison. We have a program called Springhill. This is a house where women can live in community and participate in different aspects of the church when they come out of prison."

Atterholt also runs a program called Ready for Release, for women who are still incarcerated. "It helps them with the transition to the community," says Atterholt. "The program helps women with credit history, living on their own and being responsible. We discuss getting to a job on time and how to avoid cramming too many things into one day.

"We also have a program called Reflections for moms who are there for violent offenses, including homicide, against their children. We address grief issues and also issues about reuniting with their children, for most of the inmates have not lost custody of their children. We started this because women were not receiving any help with their grief. A lot of women don’t get to go to the funeral. Sometimes they don’t know what happened to their children unless their family tells them and often their family has cut them off. They are left without answers."

For women who are released, the parenting program continues with Parenting After Prison. "This reinforces what was discussed before women left prison," says Atterholt. "Parenting is different when you don’t have your children with you. This is hands-on."

St. Paul’s outreach program also works with the Diocese of Virginia to defeat the death penalty. Atterholt explains, "We take people to the prison to tour death row. We are trying to educate the Episcopalians in the diocese to see what the death chamber is really like."

Atterholt, who has a master’s degree in rehabilitative counseling and is currently working on her doctorate, also teaches at Virginia Commonwealth University. She realized in 1993 that "there wasn’t any rehabilitation going on in prison. There was education but not rehabilitation. Education is teaching and helping people get their GED and work skills, but it doesn’t deal with the basic issues that took people to prison in the first place."

The changes Atterholt sees in people inspire her. Women coming out of prison often have high hopes for re-ordering their lives, she says. "Some of these goals are realistic and some are not, but it surprises me the number who get involved in St. Paul’s. They join the parish or are baptized. One-third of the staff at St. Paul’s have been incarcerated."

– Camille Colatosti