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Chantell Jewell is no stranger to corrections – and not just from more than three decades working within the criminal justice system. “Having lived in the inner city of Milwaukee,” she says, “I’ve seen what the devastating impact of incarceration [has on] a family.”
Jewell was appointed superintendent of the Milwaukee County Community Reintegration Center (CRC) in late 2020, and has since made sweeping, evidence-based changes to the largest county correctional facility in the state, known before a 2022 change as the House of Corrections. “I’ve dedicated my career,” she says, “to creating spaces and helping build bridges for people society may have written off or people who have made mistakes at some point in their lives, because I understand that real change happens through those efforts. If we don’t provide those opportunities, we won’t see the change that we want to see in our communities.”
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A point of pride is her creation of the CRC’s Family Engagement Center, where inmates can, under supervision, visit with their families and children. “We know that one of the drivers of recidivism is family distress,” Jewell explains, “and we know that when someone becomes incarcerated, they are not the only people impacted. Children get left behind. The family gets left behind. How do we begin to repair some of those broken bonds?”
Employment, education, housing and financial wellness are equally important to successful reintegration, Jewell adds, and she’s introduced thoughtful programming, including pathways to higher education with Marquette University and a work-release program alongside the Milwaukee Bucks, to support those needs as well.
“My philosophy is that we are not here to punish people,” Jewell says. “The punishment was being sent here. The punishment was being removed from the community, being removed from your family. Now, we’re here to facilitate change and address those needs so people won’t reengage the criminal justice system. … Reintegrating is public safety. Those two are not mutually exclusive.”
