Maryland Cleanup Campaign Puts Returning Citizens to Work in Prince George's County

Prince George's County is deploying returning citizens on litter crews along county roads and green spaces, connecting its Beautification Initiative directly to its re-entry programs. The county's Bridge Center reported that of 899 returning citizens it served from July 2022 through April 2024, just 10 re-offended, a rate of 1.1%, against Maryland's statewide three-year recidivism rate of approximately 40%.

Michael Williams, director of the county's Returning Citizens Affairs Division, oversees both the cleanup push and the broader service network behind it. The campaign ties into the county's Beautification Initiative, launched January 6, 2020, and aligns with a move by the Department of Public Works and Transportation to quadruple litter collection, mowing, edging, and street sweeping countywide. Rather than leaving that expanded labor entirely to contractors, the cleanup effort channels returning citizens into the work.

Key operational details remain publicly undisclosed. The county has not published how many pounds of trash cleanup crews have removed, which neighborhoods or corridors they have worked, or whether participants receive wages beyond the wraparound services the Bridge Center already provides, including housing referrals, employment placement, and help securing identification documents. Williams has not yet defined the benchmarks, whether measured by tonnage, placement rates, or re-offense counts, that would determine whether the program grows or ends.

The employment gap the cleanup is working to compress can stretch for years. William "BJ" Paige left jail and returned to Prince George's County roughly two decades ago, then spent years navigating outdated technology skills and a fragmented services landscape before landing a position as an executive assistant at Howard University in 2014. Vanessa Bright, executive director and founder of the Maryland Reentry Resource Center, has noted that the typical route back to incarceration is not a new crime but a sequence of practical failures: no housing, no transportation, no identification, no mental health support.

The county is also paying businesses to speed up hiring. In April 2024, it launched the Re-entry Employment Incentive Program, offering employers up to $5,000 annually for every returning citizen they hire. The program was seeded with $500,000 in county funds and $2 million in state money after Governor Wes Moore signed supporting legislation during the 2023 Maryland General Assembly session, with state disbursements adding $500,000 per year for four years starting July 2024. By April 2024, eleven returning citizens had been placed directly into county government positions.

The Community Release Center at 4605 Brown Station Road anchors the housing side: open since 2018, the facility accommodates more than 60 residents, who can work or apply for jobs during the day and return at night.

Prince George's County holds the second-highest concentration of returning citizens in Maryland, where 95% of those incarcerated eventually return to their communities. The Re-entry Advisory Board, created by Resolution CR-49-2019 sponsored by Councilmember At-Large Calvin S. Hawkins II, set the institutional framework through its 2021 final report recommending the Returning Citizens Affairs Division. Former County Executive Angela D. Alsobrooks made reentry a stated priority in 2019 and championed the division before resigning in December 2024 to serve in the U.S. Senate. County Executive Aisha Braveboy now carries the program forward, and the cleanup campaign is its most visible accountability test.