Sheriff’s Office Offers Employment Assistance
KANKAKEE, IL – A kiosk that will permit inmates who are being released from the Jerome Combs Detention Center has been installed in the public lobby of the jail to assist both inmates and the general public in the search for employment. The kiosk is from a company based out of Minnesota called Jobview 2nd Chance and is currently being used in approximately fifty federal institutions nationwide. With the installation in Kankakee, the Jerome Combs Detention Center becomes the first county jail in Illinois to offer such services and at the present time, there are less than ten county jails across the country that offer these services to inmates. “Kankakee County is expanding the use of this system and inviting those individuals not incarcerated to utilize this resource” said Kankakee County Undersheriff Mike Downey. Jobview 2nd Chance allows individuals to search through current job listings locally, statewide, and nationwide, and the system is updated daily. “If a person has prior work experience in a particular field, a search by employment category can also be done as well as searching different geographic locations” added Downey.
Warehousing inmates is no longer an option to reduce jail population. Along with this initiative, the Sheriff’s Office offers many programs designed to assist inmates in leaving the jail with tools to assist them with the goal of not returning to jail. “Programs such as Thinking 4 a Change, Justice and Mental Health Collaboration Program (JMH), a grant funded program that pays for some salaries and mental health treatment, Outpatient Drug and Alcohol Treatment, and GED provides opportunities for inmates to enter back in the community upon release with some skills that they may not have had when they were arrested” said Chief of Corrections Chad Kolitwenzew.
“Not only is this system available to inmates being released from jail, it is available for the general public in search of employment to come out to the lobby of the Jerome Combs Detention Center and search for employment” according to Undersheriff Mike Downey. Users are able to print out information on the jobs that an individual may be interested in so they can follow up. There is access to not only local jobs of all types and levels of experience, but searches can be done nationwide.
The Jerome Combs Detention Center is located at 3050 South Justice Way in Kankakee.
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