Resource: PRESS RELEASE: Berks County Abruptly Empties Men’s Community Reentry Center Rather Than Provide Incarcerated Women With Equal Access

In a severe step backward for gender equality and reentry services for incarcerated people, the Berks County Commissioners abruptly emptied the Berks County Community Reentry Center (CRC), which provided rehabilitation and reentry services to incarcerated men with the lowest-risk status. This was a brazen act by Berks County on the eve of trial, three weeks after a federal court already found Berks County violated the Constitution by excluding incarcerated women from receiving the same rights and privileges as the men housed in the CRC, solely on the basis of their gender. “It appears that the Berks County Commissioners would rather have no reentry center at all than a reentry center open to women,” stated attorney Matthew A. Feldman of the Pennsylvania Institutional Law Project.