Employment & Community Connections

CCA is committed to strengthening the connection between community and the individual. A caring, healthy community plays a critical role in crime prevention and rehabilitation. These values animate all of CCA programs from Mentoring and community service (Service Learning) through health education and employment readiness services.

All but the youngest of CCA's clients place a high priority on finding pathways to employment and economic self-sufficiency. CCA services support clients as they prepare for the world of work through education, vocational training, gaining job search skills and work experience.

CCA has developed employment readiness programs to meet the specific needs of clients: in the NYC women's drug treatment program (Crossroads), in Syracuse Youth Services, for court involved non-custodial parents (Parent Success Initiative) and for participants in the Syracuse Community Drug Treatment Court. CCA also has programs specifically focused on helping former prisoners (Reentry) and other ex-offenders (Syracuse Recovery Community) to re enter the community as productive and participating individuals.

Not only does CCA reach out to communities, but community members reach in to help our clients, who are their family members and neighbors. Hundreds of community members are involved with CCA as mentors, court appointed special advocates, buddies, employers, other volunteers and the beneficiaries of community service.

This engagement between community members and people in the criminal justice system changes attitudes and thinking. Community members find themselves making a difference in lives of people, who they discover are not so unlike themselves. CCA clients learn that community members don't want to "get rid of them," don't want to "call them thugs." The "Us and Them" dichotomy fades away and people work together to repair the damage, to prevent future crimes and to build a strong net of community ties and support. This is why the solutions to crime are rooted in communities.