Our Children's Place of Butner, N.C., will allow mothers to serve prison sentences while caring for their young children and receiving rehabilitation services, Independent Weekly reported on May 31.

By early 2008, a state-owned building will be renovated with a nursery, classrooms, and group living accommodations for 20 mothers and their children.

To be eligible, the women must be charged only with nonviolent crimes, serving sentences of no longer than five years. Up to two children, age six or younger, may live with each mother.

The mothers will receive substance use treatment, health care, parenting classes, academic education, vocational training and re-entry services. Child development specialists will also mentor the mothers.

'Most of these mothers have poor mothering skills,' said Sarah J. Shapard, project administrator. 'The program was designed with the child's best interests in mind.'

State Senator Ellie Kinnaird (D-Carrboro), a key supporter of the program and a former family lawyer for Prison Legal Services, explained that the child of an incarcerated parent is six times more likely to be involved in criminal behavior.

For nearly six years, the program has been in the planning stages, taking lessons from such successful programs as Family Foundation, a similar California program, and Summit House, an alternative sentencing program for mothers and children in Raleigh. Summit House saves taxpayers $1 million annually and reduces the reconviction rate among its participating female felons from 40 to 21 percent.