Jails and prisons across the U.S. have adopted pickleball as a rehabilitation tool, and San Francisco County Jail No. 3 in San Bruno is no exception.

According to a Dec. 26 story in the San Francisco Chronicle, America's fastest-growing sport has become especially popular among those housed in the facility's Road to Recovery dorm.

Reporter J.K. Dineen writes that a dedicated group of volunteers — Anne Stuhldreher, Karen Levine and Adelaide Hulbert — arrives on-site every Monday afternoon to lead 16 players in a series of matches outdoors in a recreation yard.

"One thing we are taught in recovery is that we have to change our people, places and things, to replace our bad habits with new good habits," shared Jonathan Ratcliff, an inmate serving time for drug distribution. "You have to have new hobbies to replace the past, which was full of negative people and negative habits."

Enter pickleball.

Stuhldreher, who began playing during the COVID-19 pandemic, is adamant that it can be a difference-maker for incarcerated people like Ratcliff because of its social and joyful nature.

"I started thinking if it could do that for me, what could it do for people on the inside and could it help them be more successful when they got out?" explained Stuhldreher, a senior policy adviser in the San Francisco Treasurer’s Office. "There is a lot of research that pickleball reduces loneliness. It boosts mental health. It's a sport that keeps people playing because of social connection."

While some may view inmates playing pickleball at a detention facility as prioritizing recreation over punishment, Stuhldreher strongly disagrees.

Her reasoning is well-founded.

"This is not about being soft on crime, it’s about being smart on reentry," she insisted. “95% of people in jail are going to get out. They are going to be our future neighbors. If we help them build positive skills and healthy habits inside, that is the safe choice for San Francisco."

Levine, a former deputy sheriff who managed education programs at the jail for over 25 years, also recognizes the significant value of the pickleball initiative.

Like Stuhldreher, she applauds the effort.

“The inmates are getting so much out of it," stressed Levine. "They are interacting and having good social experiences with people they might not otherwise. They love it whether they are skilled or not. For the most part, they are really supportive of each other."

Upon their release from County Jail No. 3, inmates even receive a pickleball paddle and a list of places to play in San Francisco along with their personal items.

Stuhldreher is also working to arrange times when former inmates can meet with volunteers at McLaren Park’s six pickleball courts to compete and socialize.

Dineen reports that pickleball in jails and prisons was the idea of Roger BelAir, who launched a pilot program at Chicago's Cook County Jail that quickly gained popularity.

This led to the creation of the Pickleball for Incarcerated Communities League (PICL), which currently runs programs in 76 prisons and jails across 16 states, including Rikers Island in New York and San Quentin in California.