Maybe there's a good deal more that America can do to as part of National Preparedness and Response and justice reform "inside prison walls" by proactively teaching non-violent offenders between 18-to-32-years-old how to productively assist in saving lives, distributing materials, site clean-up, and rebuilding homes following natural disasters.
Below is a proposed brief outline for possibly teaching these inmates useful disaster response and relief skills so that they can stand beside and act in the best interest of their fellow Americans in a time of great need:
- Basic medical skills (i.e., Cleaning and Dressing Wounds, Making a Makeshift Splint or Sling, CPR, Heimlich Maneuver, Treating Shock).
- Food and water storage/safety and sanitation procedures.
- Victim coping and stress-management skills.
- Crisis, trauma, and grief-counseling skills.
- Utilization of alternative means of communication (i.e., the "Coordinated Assistance Program" (CAN), the 2-1-1 system - coordinated by the United Way since 1997).
- Capability of speaking more than one language (i.e., Spanish, Chinese, and French).
- Basic computer skills, knowing how to use a camera or take video to help document the work organizations and teams are doing.
- Basic survival skills (i.e., Finding and purifying water, Building A Wilderness Survival Shelter From Scratch, Starting A Fire Without A Lighter, Navigating Your Way Back To Safety, Survival Signaling To Help Rescuers Find You, Food Acquisition To Stave Off Starvation)
- American Red Cross, FEMA, National Guard, Salvation Army, Catholic Charities, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) protocol & operational systems, and quite possibly in collaboration with Habitat for Humanity get the full scope of home repair and construction training and equipping needed to become a functional, contributing member of a disaster rescue, recovery, and relief team so that you can go wherever the crisis is and provide valuable assistance under a team experts direction.
- Learn how to make a long-term commitment to acquiring this knowledge and the varied skill sets that leave a place and people group better off then when you first arrived.
A federal, state, and locally funded program of this nature will not only enhance our nation's National Response Plan (NRP) capacity for saving lives and rebuilding communities but it will transform the lives of former offenders and I assert that it also greatly affirms our best values and provides real and lasting second chances in sharing a good life in America for young non-violent offenders.
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