Coinciding with the release of the “Roadmap on programs and services that meet the needs of families affected by incarceration”, the UpFamilies project has also released a Mapping Report, the results of which informed the Roadmap.
The Mapping Report is the result of research conducted by the UpFamilies partners on the existing services available for families affected by imprisonment in each partner country: Romania, Spain, Portugal, Germany and Greece. Through desk research and the administration of a dedicated survey to different organizations, partners have collected information for this Mapping Report, which includes sections on:
■ Existing services that are available to support families affected by imprisonment;
■ The most common needs of families with incarcerated members;
■ Gaps and limitations in the provision of services for these families in each UpFamilies partner country;
■ The key skills and competencies with which service providers must be equipped in order to appropriately respond to the needs of families with incarcerated individuals.
The report is structured in four chapters. The first chapter addresses the needs and challenges of families with incarcerated members and is based on desk research. Three target groups are identified: children, partners, and extended family. The specific needs of each target group are identified at a European level and in the five partner countries: Germany, Greece, Portugal, Romania, and Spain.
The second chapter delivers the results of the survey. The chapter first outlines a profile of the organizations, addressing questions such as: where do the organizations operate (on a national or regional level)? If organizations are regional, which regions/cities do they cover? Which part of the country is left uncovered, if any? What types of services do most organizations provide? Who are the primary beneficiaries of these services? This chapter also distinguishes between organizations which deliver services explicitly to families with incarcerated members or which are aware of having these families among their beneficiaries, and organizations which could provide their services to prisoners’ families but have no record of having done so already.
The third chapter comments on the services that are needed but are not available in the UpFamilies partner countries. It addresses issues such as deficits in collaboration and communication between community-based organizations and criminal justice bodies; insufficient training on services to be delivered to family members, a result of the lack of awareness of the family of incarcerated persons as a distinctive group with distinctive needs; and a critical lack of infrastructure (such as professionals, expertise and funding), which contributes to an excessive workload for staff at community-based organizations.
Lastly, the fourth chapter references best practices encountered in the literature at a European level, with a focus on the partner countries. Moreover, the chapter examines the key skills and competencies which are required for service providers to be able to respond to the needs of families with incarcerated individuals.