Macon Cove Campus
5983 Macon Cove
Memphis, TN 38134-7693

Union Avenue Campus
737 Union Avenue
Memphis, TN 38103-3322

Fayette Center

Gill Center

Millington Center

Southeast Center

Whitehaven Center

901/333-STCC * www.southwest.tn.edu

DATE: February 25, 2002
CONTACT: Calvin Burns, 901/333-5338 or Marilyn Duncan, 901/333-4247

STCC Local Site for National Videoconference on Violent
Offenders Initiative

Southwest Tennessee Community College is the local host institution for a nationwide videoconference, Going Home. This 90-minute broadcast will take an in-depth look at the U.S. Justice Department's latest project dealing with high-risk offenders, the Serious and Violent Offender Reentry Initiative. It is free and open to the public.

The broadcast will be aired from 12:30 to 2 p.m., Thursday, February 28, at the Macon Cove Campus, 5983 Macon Cove, in the Farris Building, Conference Room C. The videoconference will be sponsored by the Office of Justice Programs Division of the U.S. Department of Justice.

This informative session is designed for criminal and juvenile justice practitioners, judges and staff, policymakers, community leaders, prosecutors, defense attorneys, and probation and parole officers. In addition, representatives from social service agencies, law enforcement agencies, concerned citizen organizations, and students are also encouraged to attend.

Patsy Anderson, director of STCC's Gill Center in Frayser, is site coordinator for the videoconference. She said the reentry of serious, high-risk offenders into communities across the country has long been a source of violent crime in the United States.

"More than 63,000 adult and an estimated 100,000 juvenile offenders are released from prisons and correctional facilities every year," Anderson said. "The problem of their recidivism has become a crisis that affects all parts of a community."

According to officials at the U.S. Department of Justice, the goal of the Serious and Violent Offender Reentry Initiative is to build on innovative ideas that reduce the recidivism of these offenders, and, thus reduce the overall amount of violent and other serious crime that is inflicted on our society.

A primary focus of the videoconference is to identify and enhance existing successful reentry programs. Topics of discussions will include Funding Levels, Eligible Applicants, Eligible Activities, Institutionally Based Programs, Community-Based Transition Programs, and Community-Based Long Term Support.

For additional information, call the College at 901/333-5970.


Southwest Tennessee Community College is a Tennessee Board of Regents institution.