Welcome to another issue of Community Works, which again shows how diverse and effective the sentence of community work can be. From one-off jobs to long-time projects, offenders serving community work sentences are making a difference to communities large and small.
You may be aware that community work is one of the sentences that will undergo some change from 1 October as a result of the Justice Sector’s Effective Interventions initiative.
Within the Community Probation Service, our focus is on strengthening communitybased sentences – particularly in how our staff manage the people serving these sentences and how we work with our community stakeholders.
Among the changes is an increased focus on how we support community organisations that provide agency placements for offenders, to encourage more organisations to take on this role.
Agencies involved in community work are valued partners that directly supervise suitable individuals and keep records of the offender’s hours served. You also provide offenders with positive role modelling and purposeful tasks.
We’re still working out the best way to acknowledge your contribution; it may be through the provision of a small amount of funding to offset costs, or providing more tools and resources, for example, joint supervision of large projects.
These provisions are part of a much broader range of changes to the sentencing structure, designed to maximise the use of communitybased sentences. We will give you more information about this in the next Community Works.
Got a story for Community Works or want to request the print edition?
Email commdesk@corrections.govt.nz or phone (04) 460 3365.
Community Works is published quarterly by the Department of Corrections. Contact details for Community Probation & Psychological Services can be found here or by looking under C for Corrections in the Government listings of the Telecom White Pages.
ISSN 1178-1327