Re-entry after incarceration

[00:00:19] Speaker A: Hi all. Welcome back to just a bite. This week we are going to talk about the connection between incarceration, reentry and food insecurity to explore and talk about this vast, nuanced and interconnected problem. Your Justabyte host had a conversation with Professor Karen Benton at Clark State College to talk about the context and connection between access to basic needs and recidivism rates, why food and other basic needs are so critical once someone is released, and what innovative programs are available in Ohio to support system impacted individuals as they are released. After talking with Karen, you will hear us speak with Mary Evans, re entry manager at the food bank, Inc. In Dayton and returning Citizen herself to talk about her experience being system impacted and to share her expertise when it comes to supporting folks post release. Take a listen. [00:01:31] Speaker B: Hi Karen. Thank you for speaking about such a critical issue today. [00:01:37] Speaker C: Thank you for having me. I appreciate it. [00:01:40] Speaker B: Of course. Could you share a little bit about yourself and your background? [00:01:44] Speaker C: My name is Karen Benton and I am an associate professor of criminal justice at Clark State College. I also hold several different roles. Right now, I'm the program coordinator for the criminal justice programs, which includes corrections and law enforcement. And at this moment, I am interim assistant dean for health, Human and public services, and that encompasses the social service area, early childhood education, all of our public safety programs and the nursing programs, and anything that applies to medical training around here. [00:02:23] Speaker A: Awesome. [00:02:24] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:02:24] Speaker A: Big job. [00:02:25] Speaker B: Busy. You're busy. I was wondering if you don't mind sharing. Is there any personal connection or how did you get involved in criminal justice? [00:02:36] Speaker C: Actually, my first degree was in human services, social services here when it was Clark Technical College a long time ago. And so I always knew I wanted to be in a role where I helped people. And what wound up happening is I was at an interview for an internship thinking that I wanted to work with individuals that had developmental delays and I had no experience in that area at all. But it sounded like a group that needed help at the time. And so when I went to the institution, I saw that there was a need for help, but I just didn't feel that was a good fit for me. So, totally by accident, the only site that was left was for me to be a truan officer for Springfield City schools. And I said, sure, I'll take it. Well, so I got to do that. And I'm a little bit of a control. I have control issues at times. I wanted to do the entire project myself if I can. So I would go and make these home visits, and I would see these youth that were basically in distress. On top of not going to school, there were a lot of issues going on in their homes, and I'd file a complaint with the juvenile court, and they'd basically say, we've got it from here. You don't need to be involved anymore. And I don't like leaving anything undone. So I thought, I knew I had another practicum I had to do, so I did it at the juvenile court so then I could be involved in that process. So I wound up going through that for about six months. I got done with my degree, and they actually hired me as a probation case aide at a whopping $8,300 a year. I thought I was really special at that point in time. And then with a lot of adult learners, you only go so far with an associate's degree. And while I was working at the court, they said, you don't have enough initials behind your name, so you need to go back to school. So I went to the McGregor school that was part of Antioch University and got my bachelor's degree in human services administration. So, really, the bigger part of my education is in that human services area because I honestly believe that there's mitigating circumstances as to why people do the things that they do and oftentimes they do have to do with the topics that we're going to be talking about today. So I got that degree, and I thought, well, I had two small children at the time, and I thought, well, I'm already carrying diaper bags and these bags for school. I might as well go for one more degree. So my master's degree is in criminal justice and social issues from Wright state. So I still have that human services bend to me all the way through there. And when I was defending my thesis at the time, they asked me if I wanted to be a researcher or if I wanted to teach. I totally forgot that I already had a job, and so I didn't have to do either one of those did. So I said, well, I guess I'll teach. So Clark State afforded me the opportunity to be at adjunct here. So I've been at adjunct here since 1999, and I've had a wonderful experience here because I've been able to add courses to the curriculum, like victimology, so that we can have an understanding about why the underlying reasons people wind up being on the other side in the courtroom, what we can do for them, because we forget about that in the criminal justice system. We talk about them being offenders all the time, but there's a lot of underlying victimization in there, whether it's food insecurity, domestic violence. We created a community resources class, which I've been able to have my niece Audrey be part of on a regular basis so that law enforcement officers can learn about those underlying mitigating circumstances that can be dealt with in a much easier way than incarcerating someone. You can't incarcerate everyone that you arrested. You shouldn't. And we can actually be putting people on a path that they can't get off of. So I'm a big advocate for diversion type programs and meeting people where they are and finding out what they need. So that's the educational piece for me, and it kind of spreads in the family. I have a daughter that basically she does mental health counseling, so she's involved with that. That's kind of how I got into the field. [00:07:10] Speaker B: Yeah, that's awesome. And I think you're so right about the connection between criminal justice and health and human services and social justice. They're all kind of intertwined together. [00:07:26] Speaker C: When I worked at the court, I was a grant writer, too. Still am. And usually that came about because I was upset because what I like to call my kids weren't getting services. For example, I had an eight year old little boy that got caught shoplifting, and his mom said, I don't have a role model for him, and I'm afraid he's going to get farther into the system. So at that time, although it doesn't happen today, but at that time, I contacted Big Brothers Big sisters, and they said he couldn't be referred because he was court involved. And I said, who better than an eight year old that's court involved to be there? So I wrote a grant that allowed us to have individuals that had been in trouble at one point in time become mentors. They came out of it on the other side. We did a pilot program first. I went around all of Springfield and Clark county and had businesses and movie theaters and restaurants, basically be willing to give discounts to the mentors and the kids. They had to both be together. There was a card that had to come together in order for them to get that discount. And so we measured how they did out of it, and we were able to get, like, 24 different mentors. I wound up having more mentors than big brothers big sisters. I was very proud of that. We had about 25 mentors that basically were involved in the program before the year was out and thankfully say that big brothers big sisters now accepts juvenile court kids to be part of that program. So I was put in a position where I could actually create a lot of programs for people in need to try to keep them out of the court system. My love was being a diversion officer where I could work with the young first time offenders and get them to the resources that they needed to help them. Over the time that I was there, we usually had about 800 kids in the program, and about 50 of them would not make it through. They would wind up having to go on to court and honestly went on to conduct themselves in such a way that they wound up winding up in prison. But that's pretty good averages when you talk about 50 out of 800. So they still have a diversion program in Clark county. Doesn't quite look the same way as it did when I had it, but it shouldn't. After all these years, it shouldn't look like mine. It should have progressed. [00:09:50] Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. I so appreciate all those tidbits about the work that you're doing actually in the community. I know that there's a lot of discussion sometimes about how academia and community organizations never really come together, and I appreciate that in Clark county, that is something that's happening. [00:10:15] Speaker C: With the students that I have. They get to do a practicum at the end of their time in the program. And when I first got here, students were just being plugged into places. It wasn't necessarily where they wanted to be. It was like, whoever signs up first, that's where you get to go. But we really match students with where they think they want to land when they grow up, so to speak. And more often than not, that's where they wind up being employed as well, because they've basically been able to show their work ethic. And I track them all over the place, so we find places for them all over the region, quite honestly. So proud of that aspect. [00:10:57] Speaker B: Yeah, you should be. [00:10:58] Speaker A: That's awesome. [00:10:59] Speaker B: Well, why don't we kind of get into a little bit about the data I know that you had talked about. It's really hard to find up to date data. I've heard anecdotally that most of the crimes that folks do commit are drug related offenses or nonviolent offenses. Could you kind of provide some context about that? [00:11:24] Speaker C: Yeah. In terms of the nonviolent offenders, if an individual commits a crime where there's restitution involved, we really try not to send them to prison because they're never going to get their money back that way. The amount of money that individuals earn when they're in prison, everybody thinks, oh, well, you're going to get rich there. No, you're not. The jobs that they have in prison are oftentimes very low paying jobs. I have a situation right now where there's a young lady that was involved in the court system, went to prison, is in our corrections program, and she spent nine years in prison, and she's trying to get her record expunged and can't because the judge says, we need you to pay your restitution. That was due to an entity. Well, the entity wiped the amount off the books because she'd been incarcerated for so long, they didn't think that they would ever see it. So she's in a catch 22, because the entity is basically saying, we don't have any record that you owe any restitution. And then we have a court docket that says you owe $500. And the thing is that even if she would have paid any of that money, and the state has gotten better about having people, if they owe money and they're in prison, they'll take some portion of it and send it back for child support or send it for restitution. But when you get $0.24 in a monthly check from the state, that's not going to go very far. So. Not at all. So it's hard to get that number of what the drug offenders are, because oftentimes plea bargaining takes place in so many different situations in a courtroom. And so that might be an underlying issue that had to be dealt with, but it might be a charge that never made it to the level where they were incarcerated. [00:13:15] Speaker B: On that charge, Mary had talked about kind of debt that she had accrued while incarcerated a lot, and how that is such a bind. I was wondering if you could expand a little bit more on that, or if you have other examples. [00:13:34] Speaker C: Well, I know, and there's a big difference between the women's prisons and the Marysville prison and the prisons for the males, my guess would be there might be some sort of fee for medical assistance, things like that. Because if it's a condition that is an ongoing, chronic condition, like high blood pressure or something of those lines. But I know in all the prisons, if someone has gone to prison and they don't see it as a medical emergency, they see it as a way of getting out of whatever responsibility that you had in someplace else in the prison, then they make them pay for those. So it might be one dollars, it might be $2. And that doesn't sound like a whole lot, but they're not making a whole lot of money either. And the thing is, we do know in the women's prisons that most of the women that go in, they have a lot of medical issues that had never been addressed prior to going to prison. [00:14:33] Speaker B: That's important context. Thanks for that. I was wondering, what should prisons be doing to make sure that incarcerated individuals are provided the supports they need as they're getting released? [00:14:47] Speaker C: Each prison has at least one case manager, and that case manager is assigned to them the minute they come into prison. And while the individual is in prison, they actually are keeping track of what training they go through, what certificates they've earned. But they're also keeping track of what kind of infractions that they've had, whether they've had to be moved to another part of the prison, had some kind of sanctions applied, things like that, prior to being able to go up for parole. If they're ones that are eligible for that privilege. The case manager is supposed to be working with the parole officer that's assigned to them for that particular region, and they're supposed to be helping determine what housing is going to look like, what employment opportunities there are out there. And one of the more critical areas that bothers me a great deal is the individuals that are on some sort of medication that might be helping them with their health or with their mental health. And oftentimes when they're in prison, they have their conditions under control because they're medically under control, and then they're paroled, and they're supposed to see a psychiatrist or a doctor within 30 days. And the thing is that they have no history in that town, and so they really can't get that connection to get the psychotropic medications that they need. And so one of the suggestions, and some of the Logan county probably does this better than anyone, they have what's called community circles. And so when someone comes out of prison, the parole officers there, they're there with the parolee, and the parolee has to basically give a summary about whatever their crime was and how they progressed to the point of getting to prison. So they're talking about all those mitigating circumstances, what their conduct was in prison, and what they need from the community to help them not go back. And so that circle is comprised of religious leaders and business, social service agencies, food sources and those type of things. And the people that are in these groups are in positions to help them make those connections. When you go to prison, it's kind of like going to another planet because you're so out of touch with everything. And everything's changed. Technology has changed, the clothing has changed, how you get from point a to point b has changed. And the longer somebody stays in prison, the farther behind they really get. When I was a probation officer, I would take my classes up to London penitentiary so that they could basically see, know working in a prison would be like. And I remember talking to a woman. She was sitting on the steps, and she was waiting for transportation to get her to a bus. And she lived in Cincinnati, but she was making the trip up to see her son on visitation day. And she said, I can do this right now, but I'm not going to be able to do it a second time. And that's the problem for a lot of the prisoners. And if they wind up recidivating, and oftentimes it's because they aren't really acclimated to society. They go back to where they know that they'll have basic needs taken care of, that whatever support system they have, they've lost at that point. So I think the community services, community circles, there should be one in every county, and it needs to take place right away. I mean, the minute that they get transported off the grounds of the prisons, it needs to happen within the next day or two so that we can basically know what we're going to do and have true case management taking place. But there's no way that the number of case managers in prisons can basically really help facilitate that in a meaningful way because they can tell how the prisoner is there. They have to depend on a parole officer that might have stopped by to see that particular person two or three times in prison over the course of five or six years, but they don't really know them. And oftentimes what winds up happening is you have a prisoner that says, well, I can go stay with so and so on the street. They usually have to give about three different places that they can stay. But the thing is that they're just guessing from where they are, and then when it gets checked out, that's not possible, then they get to stay in prison longer. Doesn't health matter as much? [00:19:25] Speaker B: Wow. Yeah. That community circle example is such a good one. And you're so right about the point that if you've been incarcerated long enough, you might not have the support when you come out. I'm sure a lot of people are in that sort of situation. [00:19:45] Speaker C: Yeah, absolutely. And the thing is, even the possibility of getting work, and I think the prisons are getting better about this now. I think there's more opportunities, though, for that in the male prisons than what there are in the women's prisons. I think that we get to be a little stereotypical. There needs to be something that's more substantive for females that are coming out of prison. They're more heads of households, and they have to basically find a way of taking care of their children. And interestingly enough, on top of everything, the recidivism rate is actually lower for women in prison than what it is for men. And so what we find with a lot of the women is that they don't recidivate because they know that they won't be able to have that bond with their child, that physical bond with their child if they go back a second time. So it's such a different culture for the women in prison as opposed to the men in prison. And so it's apples and oranges in a lot of different ways. [00:20:50] Speaker B: We know that racism, marginalization, poverty, lack of opportunity, and stigma lead folks to recommit and of course, commit in the first place because of all these forces against you. Once you're released, it's really difficult not to go back to where you were pre incarceration. Everyone pays the price in that situation. That leads to recidivism, unsafe communities, parents not being able to raise their kids, and more unnecessary hardship. The bottom line is you need support. Once you're released, what is the likelihood that someone will reoffend if their basic needs aren't met? And maybe you can talk a little bit about those mitigating factors before someone even commits in the first place. [00:21:38] Speaker C: Yeah, if you're not getting your basic human needs met, you're going to find a way to get them met. And it's not necessarily going to be in a legal way. You've got to have a support system. You've got to develop a support system. And it's interesting just talking about the women's aspect. There are women that wind up going back to prison because they do have those pseudo families in the prison. It's more prominent in the women's prisons than what it is in those that serve males. And so if they are going to go back, it's because they didn't have that support system on the outside any longer. Things had changed too much. The dynamics had changed too much in the family or in the community, and it was just too much. They know how prison works. They know the kinship that they have in a women's prison. And so if they're going to recidivate, that's pretty much the highest percentage of reason why they would do so where that's concerned. So the financial stability, too, is a huge part about why either one of them would go back. Colleges now are actually partnering with the Department of corrections to try to teach skills to individuals in prisons so that they basically can do things like heating and air, those type of things. [00:23:02] Speaker B: We've been talking a lot about employment and the barriers to employment, and we talk a lot about how stability needs to be and should be met before formerly incarcerated folks can access employment. However, it's a real difficult cycle to be caught up in and try to get out of because the system is set up so that folks are required to meet their basic needs, like in the case of snap, but they have an additional barrier with them having a record. So what is the likelihood that someone recommits if they do not have a good job providing living wage and benefits? And then what sorts of jobs are out there for returning citizens? [00:23:49] Speaker C: Yeah, there are different groups, there's different churches that we have. I wrote grants for a church in Springfield that basically the pastor at the time, he had been in prison, he had been paroled. And so he basically was a receiving center for people that came in and he basically had developed on his own before. We were forward thinking enough to try to work on this as a community, but he would have gather suits for people to be able to do job interviews in and basically teach them how to fill out job applications and form a resume. There needs to be a one stop shop for that. My concern as well is actually, even with the adult parole aspect of it, in terms of how often a parole officer even sees a parole. And actually, what I know from a lot of the parole officers, a lot of them are leaving the field because they feel as though they're really not able to do the job that they know that they need to do in terms of being an advocate for their person that they're supervising. But that is not the case. [00:25:02] Speaker B: Other than reducing recidivism, providing access to basic needs is just, bottom line, critical to the health, well being and economic security. For our last question, I was wondering, why is access to food and other health and human services necessary to reentry? [00:25:23] Speaker C: A lot of the people that go into prison have mental health, alcohol and drug issues that really were complicated because of their inability to secure the treatment that they needed to have, and they're getting the basic treatment when they're in prisons. But the thing is that even before they wind up in prison, many of those conditions could have been identified and dealt with a balanced diet or having access to food and medication and counseling and those type of things. And we make that so difficult? When we return people to society without having an employment plan, without having a financial plan for them and an identified support system for them, we're setting them up to fail. And the thing is that I think we can do better. I think that if we don't do better, then we're almost guaranteeing that they're going to recidivate. And I hope at some point in time the criminal justice system. And what I try to impart on my students is that there are always mitigating circumstances. There is always resources that should be tried and tried again, because just because they didn't hear the message the first time doesn't mean you stop delivering the message and that you stop trying to help. I truly believe that we can step up in a lot of different ways in terms of people want to oftentimes just throw money at a situation. We need bodies to do things. We need people to actually be mentors. And maybe that mentoring program I talked about in the juvenile court for the kids, maybe we need to do one of those mentoring programs for the adults that come out. What's the harm? What would you lose in trying that? And oftentimes, one of the conditions for parole is that you can't be with another person that's been in prison. Well, the thing is that other person that came out of prison might actually be the pathway to help you understand. Try this. This worked for me. For each person, it's different. And I think as an institution, we're trying to make sure that case management in social work and in the criminal justice system, that we're empowering these students to go out and become those people, to help connect them with the services that they need prior to or after they get into the system, prior to and trying to hope keep them from getting there. And unfortunately, for those that have wound up winding up in a more secure system and coming back out, help them get acclimated to that. [00:28:21] Speaker A: Hi, Mary. Thanks so much for talking to us today. [00:28:25] Speaker B: I know that re entry and support for those who are formerly incarcerated is threaded throughout your life, both personally and professionally. And it is clear that is more than just a career for you. So I was wondering if you could start us off by introducing yourself, maybe sharing where you're from, what you do for work, and what are some of your interests and hobies outside of work. [00:28:51] Speaker D: So, my name is Mary Evans. I'm from Galpalis, Ohio, a really rural, disparate little town right along the Ohio river. What I do for work is I do equity, diversity, inclusion, workforce development, and reentry here at the Food bank, Inc. In Dayton, Ohio. And I love being part of art exhibitions, so I do multimedia art exhibitions. I just learned installation like six months ago, so I've been doing my own installing. [00:29:22] Speaker E: What is installation? [00:29:24] Speaker D: So installation is where I actually hang the things myself. I mount the pieces of art or the electronics or the digital device that I'm using to go along with my photography or whatever. So, yeah, those are like the things I like to do. Oh, and read. I read a lot. I just read a book called a Piece of Cake by Cupcake Brown, and it was really relatable, most of it. I didn't really battle with addictions throughout my story, but my loved ones, like my mother and stuff, were involved in addiction. And it's really weird, too. Most people deal with addiction with their family members or their parents most of their life. And with me, my mom didn't start her addiction until I was like 15. So it was relatable and a lot, but it was like a contrast. But I really like to read a lot. I like to listen to books and I like to read them. [00:30:16] Speaker E: Let me ask you, Mary, what's the best book that you've read this year? I know you just talked about a piece of cake. [00:30:21] Speaker D: I'd have to say the best book I've read this year, it was by Belle Hooks. All about love. [00:30:27] Speaker E: I read it last year. I read it last year. [00:30:29] Speaker D: That book, man, I'm telling you right now, I wish to goodness that some of my high school teachers would have taught me about Audrey lord and Nikki Giovanni and Belle hooks. I didn't really learn about any of these powerful women until I got to Antioch College. [00:30:45] Speaker B: That is so awesome. You are so creative. I'm learning more and more. I feel like this is a hard left turn. [00:30:54] Speaker D: I got my seatbelt on. I've got on my seatbelt. [00:30:57] Speaker C: I'm ready. [00:30:58] Speaker B: I was wondering if you could tell us about your experience with the judicial and carceral system. Why is this work so personal for you? And of course, please share whatever you feel comfortable with. [00:31:13] Speaker D: Yeah. So I'll just take it from the top. I used to blame myself a lot for the choices I made, but then I had to come to an understanding that if you don't know any better, you don't do any better. So in my small town, like I said, I sold drugs. I mean, there was really not any other outlets for poor black people. You don't really get a lot of chances to get the decent jobs in the town, which would either be at a power plant or working on the boat, or I wish I would have tried to interact and engage myself or put myself more forward, like I am now in my younger years. But like I said, when you're young and you get to a point where you're starting to become an adult and your mother is in active addiction, because that's when the opioid epidemic starts to kick in. She gets hurt at work, and then it's just a spiraling snowball from there. The thing I wanted to do was just get the heck out of that house by any means necessary. And so for me, I picked up cocaine and decided to start trafficking it. And ultimately, it led me to jail, the sentencing part of the situation. So I had got caught with 2oz of cocaine. I had a $500,000 bond. I'm not like a kingpin, but they trumped me up like, I have kingpin status. I was facing 26 years, actually. That's what they were going to try to give me. And they're like, you could take this plea for eight. And then when I talk to attorneys now, they're like, that. Here in Montgomery county would have just been probation then while I was incarcerated, too, a woman had caused physical harm to her child, and the child, it resulted in the child having some development disabilities for the rest of its life. And I watched her go home, and I'm still in prison. So that was the first kind of injust thing that I seen happening in the judicial system in my hometown. And another thing I noticed was there was no people that looked like me in any of the departments, like the stateaway patrol, the city police, the county. No one looked like me. So then I get to prison, and I wish I could say that I wasn't bitter and wasn't still doing illegal activities, but I was. I mean, I had family who was in active addiction, so I had to live off $20 a month. So you do these things called, like, side hustles, where it's like either you're braiding hair, you're doing this, or you're doing that. And so I just got tired of that, though. After about two years, I was like, so I just got sentenced, eight years. And so what am I going to do? I'm going to go home and tell my kids these kind of prison stories. That was not an option for me. And so, with the Ohio department of Corrections, they have a guideline. You can only be five years to your out date or five years to your parole date before you can go to college. I think education for me, was like the foundation to my transformation and pretty much the foundation of my reentry. I tested out, of course, of the GED classes and stuff, and so I ended up being a teacher's aide, and I just kind of, like, rode that job until it was time for me to sign up for college classes. So I sign up for college classes. This time I was at Ohio reformatory for women. I get shipped to Dayton Correctional institution, and I started my classes at Sinclair. And while I was there, I was on the dean's list every time I ended up getting a degree in, oddly enough, information systems technology. So, pretty much like an it thing. But here's the funny part. I never got to touch a computer, and I just kind of felt cheated when it came to that program because it's like I can't even tell someone I got the experience with this certification when I come home. At that time, when I was incarcerated, you were allowed to do two certification programs. So I went back and did supply chain management and learned about RFID and logistics. And I was like, yeah. Because I know one thing's for certain, if I get out, I can get a job at a warehouse. Because I'd already had it made up in my mind that I was never returning to Galpolis. After I graduated from the second program, I was like, well, what can I do? And so then I got universally certified in HVAC, because in my mind, I'm thinking about all the things that I can do to come home and not have to do the things that got me there. And then here's where I started to get radical. Here comes my sharp left. But they have these programs, and that was right around the time the state of Ohio started this 80 20 thing where you get sentenced, and if you're eligible, you only do, like, 80% of your sentence. So they had all this different programming that they were supposed to be doing, but they didn't have the capacity to do it. And so they had incarcerated individuals like myself and a few other women who were excellent students, pretty much like the model incarcerated individual. No infractions, no disciplines kind of like facilitating these classes. But then I got to thinking, like, we need makeup, because how is someone going to take me serious if I don't look the part? Oh, you'll never get makeup in here. Needless to say, they still sell makeup to this day. Because I wrote and wrote and wrote. I wrote to the attorney general's office so much. They're pretty much like, ma'am, can you please stop writing us? We are very aware of the situation. Another thing is, I've always worked, even before my incarceration, I did the yearbook committee and all that stuff, so I already kind of like journalism a lot, and so I was like, we need a newspaper in here. Oh, you'll never have a newspaper that's political. So, needless to say, we had a newspaper called the symbolic interruption, and it was perfect, because about this time is when Antioch College started coming in. So they would fund the newspaper for us. They would take the stuff we would get and take it to their campus and use their print press and make, like, 900 copies and then bring them back in, and then we would distribute them to the women. And it just brought a lot of the women together. And then they ran, like, two more editions after I left. And I think the women just kind of, like, lost hope, because I was kind of, like the one that was always making sure that we did it. And then Covid happened, too, and that kind of put a restraint on people coming in. So I'm meeting all these wonderful people along this journey. Of course, I had people that I had made relationships with from Antioch College, and essentially, that's where I end up paroling to. But, like, all these other wonderful people are coming in, and then Wyso comes in, and they do a season called women's voices. And I was getting ready to join that project, and I was like, no, I can't do it because I'm getting ready to leave. But I meet these people not knowing they're from springs. So, like, I get to, you know, after my incarceration, I get the scholarship, and I parole to Antioch. And I'm walking around one day, and I see Dr. Roma, and so she sees me. She's like, what are you doing here? And I was like, oh, I'm going to Antioch now. I was like, I live on campus. I was like, well, what are you doing here? She's like, I live here. She was like, everybody you've ever met lives here. I've met all these wonderful people while I was there. Then I end up in their town. But even coming home, I came home to debt. I came home to court cost. Even though I had this great opportunity, I have this scholarship, all this stuff, I still had that record with me, and I still had to try to figure out what job I was going to get. So luckily for me, I didn't realize how many people in that town supported system impacted people. And so I got two jobs on campus, and then I got a job at a gas station, and I worked those jobs and was a full time student and doing twelve and 14 credit hours and having a full time job and two part time jobs. I don't even know what kind of energy drink I was drinking in those days, but I made it happen somehow. And then my life changed when we had the Miller fellow opportunity at Antioch, because that's when I interviewed for Wyso, and that was back. I started there January eigth of 2018, and I've never left. And so that's been monumental for me. I think that's probably, like, one of the longest employer employee relationships I've ever ascertained in my life. But it wasn't always easy, too, because, mind you, I'm in Green county, and my probation, oddly enough, would not let me transfer to Green county. So there I am two times a month, driving to Galpolis. Sometimes I would drive all the way down there just for him to be like, okay, see you next time. I'm like, oh, no, you're going to talk to me. I just drove two and a half hours to come down here. I want a urine test. I want it all. I want the works. And so for my first three months home, I had to report twice a month and still pay my supervision fee, pay my fines, do all the things. And at this time, I'm living on campus trying to reunify my relationship with my kids. I don't even have my kids with me, so I'm still paying child support, too. It's really tough trying to navigate through those kinds of hoops and systems and still try to be sustainable for yourself. You know what I mean? But essentially, after about six months of probation, he was like, okay, I'll see you again in six months. And I was like, thank God. Now I don't have to worry about coming down here so much. And I also think that it was just a way to see will she lapse. This is how we'll get her, because she'll think she has it. No, I still had all those jobs, sir. I still don't have time to do anything that you think I'm about to do. So then when January happens, it's, like, almost time for me to file my first tax return. But I essentially gave all my income tax return to them. And then, like, four months later, I got a letter saying, hey, you're off. You're off supervision. You don't have to worry about it. We're done. We wash our hands of you. And the reason why I love doing what I do is because not everyone's story is the same. But I'm going to tell you the two things that always ends up in the story is all I owed court cost, or all I had fines, and I had to do this or do that before I could get my license back, before I could get permission to go out of town to visit family. I mean, they hold things over your head until they have all their money from you. And that's been my experience inside and out throughout the carcinogen. You know what I mean? And I say they as, like, the institutions, the systems, the whole realm, if they would really lean on that rehabilitate and correct piece, there would be so many. I mean, because there's a thousand more Mary Evans's inside there. I'm going to tell you that now there's people getting their doctorates and got way more Alphabet soup after their name than I do. But I think if they would really lean in on that, then I think that would change the trajectory of recidivism and hopefully abolish prisons. Because at the end of the day, I'm an abolitionist. So that's what I would love to see. I would love to see no more carceral systems, no more places of oppression and more oppression. It's just like all these different levels to kind of dehumanize people. And I think that's why the work that I do is so important, because I just like to remind people that they're still human beings and that you're one decision away from being those individuals. One feeling of all, oh, well, I'm going to do this could change your whole life. And some people don't know how to make the right decision because they've never been putting a place or been around people that have showed them how to do that. And so I think leaning on that rehabilitation and correction piece where you're really thinking about the individual and you're thinking about what it would take for this individual to actually thrive and not come back. That's key. And that's why I do the work I do. Because there was times when I wasn't treated as a person. There was times when, I mean, I remember when I came home and people would say my name and I wouldn't even answer because I didn't even think they were talking to me, because I was. Come here. I was a number. It took me a while to adjust to that. Not going to lie to you. Seven years inside there, and that's what you've been reprogrammed to think you are. It's kind of hard sometimes to unprogram that. And a lot of people that come home to unsupported networks and systems. That's why they end up right back in, because they're still programmed. [00:44:06] Speaker E: If you've been listening to this podcast, I'm confident by now you know that food insecurity doesn't stand alone and is simply a symptom of one or more isms. So, racism, sexism, classism, ableism, ageism, capitalism. What you may not know, however, is that other symptoms of these isms include un and underemployment, lack of affordable housing, poor health and crime. Violence and crime is disproportionately higher in areas and communities with poor public education, lack of community investment, and economic opportunity. Additionally, these communities are often over policed, poverty stricken, and traumatized, and crime is often committed to ensure basic necessities are met or so that the pain is eased. Incarceration is rarely the answer to those who just need opportunity. Incarceration does not alleviate the systemic challenges individuals face prior to incarceration. In fact, it fuels it by perpetuating disparities. A rust belt decline hit Ohio as a whole with great force. But in many ways, Dayton and southwest Ohio got the worst of it. When national cash register, Mead paper Company, General Motors, and other companies began leaving the area in the 1970s, the economy tanked, the city shrunk, and those who remained were unable to find work where formal higher education was preferred, such as the air force base, universities, or the hospital systems. They were all left to pick up the pieces alone. The same reasons why Dayton was such a great city to have those companies are the same reasons why it is so impacted by the opioid epidemic plaguing this part of the country, access to major freeways, near state borders, et cetera. Is that consistent with what you know and have seen? Mary, I know I threw a lot at you, so let me ask it a different way from what you have seen, witnessed, and heard. How does the lack of financial resources escalate crime? [00:45:49] Speaker D: Oh, well, that's mean. I'm seeing that right now on a project that I'm working in. So, along Dayton's west side, that's pretty much the more marginalized side of Dayton. It's crime, poor. A lot of it's all the things that you just listed specifically in the area that the food bank is setting in. That's where a lot of these industrial places used to be. Cooper's tires. General Motors had a lot of different subplaces. And so now what you see is these empty spaces of poverty. You see a lot of unhoused, unsheltered individuals in these spaces now. And of course, it's right by the freeway. So there's always that access to drugs. There's always that access to people committing violence to the ones who have the drugs. And so from what I've seen, fires are already burning. And what this stuff does is just, it's like taking that and dousing lighter fluid on it. It just ignites it even more. And it's really unfortunate. And I love Michelle, our CEO, Michelle Riley, because she's like, yeah, it was intentional for me to put this here because this is the poorest zip code in Ohio, where we said in the whole state. And to think that we are the poorest and to know that all these different things was in this area at one time and how thriving it was speaks volumes to everything that you just said. From what, the late 80s, you had an abundance of income and nice spaces, and the buildings were great, and some of the parks actually had some mulch in it for kids to be able to entertain themselves. They had boys and girls club. They had all these things, and now there's nothing. And then the folks that once had stuff who ultimately probably fell victim to the crack epidemic. But see, people don't want to talk about that, but I'm going to take it there. When the crack epidemic was ravaging and eating up marginalized families, homes, and their lives, those people kind of got pushed out. And then gentrification happens, and then another swarm of an epidemic comes in and attacks that population. So now it's just nothing. It's hard to get anyone to even want to invest or develop over here because of the stigma that comes along with what's already happened, when you already had industrial things over here. [00:48:21] Speaker E: And we've talked about this throughout the thread, the conversation today. But let's just take it back there because that's how important it is. I don't think we can talk about reentry without acknowledging that black people are disproportionately incarcerated and therefore overrepresented in our nation's criminal justice system due to a myriad of reasons that all stem from racism and discrimination and prejudice. We spoke earlier about how low income urban neighborhoods are often over police and underresource. We should also acknowledge that they continue to suffer the consequences of redlining where neighborhoods, typically not far from the city center, lack reliable and safe access to public transit and pharmacies and grocery stores and parks. Like you just said. I would argue then that this is a clear demonstration of the criminalization of poverty, where state and local policy choices trap people in the criminal legal system for engaging in activities to survive. What else have you seen in inner city neighborhoods that seem to be a deliberate policy choice? [00:49:16] Speaker D: So, yeah, there's no bike lanes over here on this side of town, but as soon as you start to head towards the north side or the east side, you'll have them. I say north. Right now, they're trying to repopulate that area. And so that's where I bought my house. I'm a first time home buyer. Got it this year, so that's exciting. But they're trying to repopulate areas. But, however, when I go to other subdivisions of Dayton, Ohio, beautiful parks, trails, bike paths, even the RTA buses look different. And then over here, you have the bus stop. They don't even have the things that keep you from getting. What if it would rain? There's not a grocery store, so it's a food desert altogether over here. But when? As soon as you start to cascade to other city divisions of this know, because you have Centerville, you have Kettering, you have huber Heights, you have all these places. I mean, there's nothing but a whole bunch of stores, grocery stores, and different things like that. And when you talk about the redlining and you talk about the voting, another thing that I've noticed, too, is the misinformation that's always placed in this neighborhood. So most people think that they're doing a due diligence because they've seen something that says vote yes or vote no. But then half the time, too, they don't even know where to go vote at because things keep getting pushed and pushed and pushed. And a lot of people in this area are aging. So the folks that were once general motor employees and were once Cooper Town employees, they are older. You know, some of them are in assisted living and without access to even go and cast a vote. I don't know how that works. They probably need to be having education about melling. So it just affects a lot of things, because you get policymakers who are in there not thinking about that population, and then you have that population who can't get to the place they need to, to change and have different policymakers in those positions. So it's just always this back and forth and the just. It's inevitable over here, and you'll see more police over here on this side or over in the marginalized areas of Dayton than you ever would. It would take something like a car wreck a house fire or something like that, for them to show up in those more affluent neighborhoods than you would over here. I mean, I could probably walk outside right now and run into one. I mean, they come around here and patrol, and I understand because we have a lot of system impacted individuals, a lot of programs running and out of here where we work with individuals who are incarcerated, who are still incarcerated, who come here and do community service hours or whatever. So I get it. But at the same know, like, you're. You're patrolling around, mean, honestly, that probably stops. [00:52:15] Speaker E: We've talked about Sarah and, like, kind of talked about this not on the podcast, but just, like, having police at grocery stores or at the food bank may stop somebody from going to get their food for that day, took the day off or took the bus or whatever to come to the food bank to get their box. And they show up and they see a cruise there, and they're like, I don't want to be confronted when I'm trying to. This is one of the most vulnerable moments of my life, trying to go access food for free, and you got a cop car sitting here. [00:52:42] Speaker B: It's all so systemic and intentional. I wanted to kind of get into some of the support, or maybe lack thereof, that you had received when you first left the facility. Did you receive anything in terms of a release packet, and did you think that the support that you were provided was enough when you first were released? [00:53:07] Speaker D: Absolutely not. They used to have this thing that was going around that they would give you when you got out, and it was like employers who hire, and I hate the word felon, but that's what it said on the list. It was like a four or five page document, and it had every county of Ohio listed, and then it listed the agencies that helped it specifically, system impacted people or whatever. Well, then I've seen at the bottom, it tells you where they got these resources. So the first thing I did when I came home was immediately I got a library card. Such a nerd. And I went in there and looked it up, and then. So I'm on the actual document, because the document was like hyperlinks, and I'd say 65% of the links didn't even work. There was no peer support. The case managers are sometimes like, you got 900 women, and then you got six case managers. So you do the math. You don't usually see your case manager until you arrive, and they assign you your state job when you're coming up on review and when you're leaving, you don't get to have, like, a personal relationship or build up a relationship to where you could say, well, these are all the pathways I need, and how can I close these out? It might happen now. I pray to God that it does. And that's why I do the work I do, because I want to be that for those people, because I know how hard it can be. I didn't get to come home and get assistance. I didn't have my children, so I couldn't get any. The owf living on campus and not having a house address, I couldn't get snap. I mean, I may have been food insecure most of my life and didn't realize it. Just because there was a meal at the table, you know what I mean? Even though there was a meal made every day, doesn't mean that we didn't suffer it. So, like, learning about what I'm learning now in the line of work that I am now, I realized that there was food insecurity on that campus, and there was food insecurity at the halfway houses because I've got my friends calling me talking about, hey, do you know someone? Like, here I am in Green county in the middle of a. Okay. And I got people in Franklin county calling me and asking me, like, well, what do you think I should do? How do I do this? How do I do? You're. When you're coming out and you're giving misinformation, I mean, what are you supposed to do? That's why I was just like, it's better off for me to just work. I might as well just work and get five, six jobs than to have to deal with everything that they want you to deal with just to get the assistance and help you need, right? [00:55:43] Speaker B: Yeah. It's clear that the system that you were in was not set up for you to succeed in and out. I think the answer is no. But before you left the facility, were you connected with any resources? [00:56:00] Speaker D: No. So what they do, and I don't know if this is still a practice, but this was my experience. I'm only speaking from my experience. So we'll talk about healthcare. So I used to have really heavy menstrual cycles when I was incarcerated, to the point where it would cause a lot of extreme pain. I had, like, three cervical biopsies while I was incarcerated. Never heard any results. Never heard any results. Okay. So I'm experiencing these same issues as I'm out, and finally I find a gynecologist out here. I ended up having the surgery, and I haven't had any pains or any problems since. And then the process to try to get your medical records after being incarcerated is a whole nother thing, too. But my experience was this. So I had anxiety medicine. They gave me a 30 day supply, and pretty much I had to figure it out. That's all they do. They'll give you 30 days worth of your medicine, whatever it may be, whether you're diabetic, you need blood thinner, whatever it is that you're on in there, you'll get 30 days, and that's it. I didn't have a peer support specialist sitting in there ready to sign me up for Medicaid and snap. And I know that that's the case nowadays for some institutions, but that wasn't what was happening for us women leaving around the time I left, we were just getting our medicine. And you got to go through the whole process. You got to get your insurance, find a primary care provider, find someone that's going to give you the referral to the psychologist, go see the psychologist. Hopefully they refer you to the psychiatrist. That's what I had to go through. And then I just found my own way to provide for my anxiety. And then also, too, with all the misdiagnosis that happens in there, because it's like they want to hurry up and give you medicine to band aid stuff. Do I even really have anxiety or do I just have seasonal depression? Those were the things I had to find out on my own. But, yeah, no, I had nothing in place for me leaving there but 30 days of anxiety meds. They did do that. [00:57:57] Speaker A: Crazy. [00:57:59] Speaker B: I think we talked about this, and you talked about this throughout some of your answers, but how helpful would it have been for you to be released and to know that you had immediate access to health care and food? And maybe what would you change about the situation? What would be the ideal release process? What sort of resources do you think everyone should have when they're being released from prison? [00:58:26] Speaker D: I think when you're being released from prison, you should have your birth certificate and a Social Security card on deck. So then that way you can go right to the place you already have your two forms of id to get you an actual id. What happens is they'll give you that state id, and then a lot of people, they'll take a release photo of you or like a release identification. And so you can supplement that as a picture id, but you still need your two forms of identification. So I think having peer support specialists or whoever connecting those dots, making sure that a copy of the birth certificate is on file making sure that a copy of the Social Security card is on file, signing them up for the benefits. So that way, when they do come out, all they have to do is just go and say, hey, I'm out. And then here's the address to send my medical card to and to send my snap card to, you know what I mean? And, like, the voter registration card and the information about where. Because so much redlining happens. Tell me where I go. [00:59:26] Speaker E: Yeah, I love that. [00:59:27] Speaker D: That's definitely something that should be in there for sure. Everything that, you know that you need to be a citizen out here, I would love to have that. When I say citizen, I mean, like, food secure, medically insured, like, everything that, you know, that a human being needs, that's what should be in that release when that individual, who is still a human being, is coming back out here. [00:59:52] Speaker B: Absolutely. What sort of support did you receive after your release? And I'm thinking in terms of support from family or friends, support from local nonprofits, things outside of the actual prison system. [01:00:10] Speaker D: Yeah. So I had support from, of course, my alma mater. There's a lot of individuals there who met me while I was inside there and got to watch the whole journey and watch me walk across the stage. So definitely my alma mater. I didn't know about farm. I grew up in southern Ohio, and we had gardens and stuff, and so it didn't really come to me how important and impactful farm to table was. And the thing about Antioch College is they are a farm to table college. So everything that they grow comes off that farm and goes inside there. There was sometimes when I was just like, I can't do kale again. You know what I mean? I'm going to probably starve. And how dare me eat a Raymond noodle. I've been eating them for the last seven years, like, I need something. And so I was thankful for that food pantry because they were one of the only food pantries who. It didn't matter that I had an on campus address, I could still get served. And that was a problem, too, coming out, living on campus, and trying to get benefits. I only lived on campus for a year, so the year that I was there, I depended on that food pantry in Zeni, Ohio. I would use what they gave me to supplement for when I didn't go to the chow hall, go over to the cafeteria. Of course, wyso just wanting the best for me in everything that I do and still to this day, wanting that. And they would genuinely check in on me, like, pull up to my dorm room. Hey, we're just making sure you're okay, because it's finals or whatever, and ask me if I wanted something to eat, you know what I mean? But I think back on it now, like, dang, I should have been doing a lot more self advocating for myself, but I kind of just rode the wave because I just had so much to prove to not only myself, but to everybody else, because I was, like, one of the first that had ever been able to have this kind of opportunity, and so I wanted others to have that chance, and so I couldn't mess it up. So I didn't really have a lot of time to realize that I was suffering from food insecurity and that I needed to find a job that could give me benefits or figure out how I could get a medical card. So that way, if something did happen. But I'm glad that those organizations help me out. And then story chain, too. There's an organization from an antioch alum. It's called story chain, and the reason why I say that was support is because he actually gave me my first audio editing gig, and so that was a way for me to have another supplemental income, and I could use that for the things that really meant the most, like paying my cell phone bill, because I was already working all these jobs, but so much was coming out for child support. Then, of course, I had car insurance. I was paying fines. This is, like, right at the beginning, so it was a lot to it. It was a lot. And so for him to give me gigs and let me make that extra money, I mean, that's how I was able to supplement food and different things, like, yeah, and there was another food pantry in Yellow Springs as well, and it was in a church, and I don't know the name of it, and I think they still function sometimes. I'm not really sure that was another organization that I utilized. When I came home, I was in Green county, so things in Green county look a lot different than they do in Montgomery County. Montgomery county had a lot more resources, especially for system impacted people. Green county would direct me to Montgomery county, like, what would have happened if I didn't have a car? There's no public transportation in Green county. They have one bus that comes to Green county from Dayton. The caveat of the RTA. But when you're not from here and you don't know that, I had to find all this stuff out on my own, and I think the reason why I do the work I do is because I don't want someone to have to do that themselves, because a lot of people, they don't know how to use a computer. You got women who are coming home after doing 2030 years, never even held a cell phone. Everything you do. You know what I mean? [01:04:09] Speaker E: Did they even give you a paper of any sort? That was like, this is where the bus stop is. This is where the greyhound station is, and this is where the airport is. Did they even give you that? [01:04:20] Speaker D: Not at all. And I'm not even from here, so I pretty much had to figure things out, and I don't even know if it's changed or not. But I know that when you're released and say, for instance, I'm at Dayton Correctional, but I'm from Cleveland, I think they take you to the bus station. Here's your money. Go get your bus ticket and get on the bus. And then they're out. And so then you're just like, okay. [01:04:42] Speaker E: Do you remember how much money they gave you? Was it like $20, $100? [01:04:46] Speaker D: Also, I didn't even get a gate pass because I didn't complete my whole sentence. I left a year. [01:04:51] Speaker E: So if you get released early, which is a treat, then they really don't. [01:04:55] Speaker D: They charged me $330 to come pick me up and give me the ride to court. They give you a whole printout of what it looks like. So for the judicial release, I had to pay for the transportation back. I had to pay the $45 for them to, it's called a turnkey fee for them to turn the key to let me out of there. $45. That's what that cost back in 2017. It's probably went up since then. Crazy. So I'll never forget that printout. I went in front of the judge in the morning. He granted me my judicial. So finally, about 330 in the afternoon, and I'm getting called upstairs to the clerk's office to sign my papers. They give you a printout of everything you owe, and right then, in that moment, the clerk is like, well, how do you want to pay for this? Do you want to set up a payment plan? Do you want to do $20 a month? I don't even got a job yet, but, yes, sign me up for that $20 a month. But do you see how they set it up? It was intentionally just being stacked and stacked and stacked up against. Because I'm like, well, dang, can I even take a real shower? I ain't even got to even hug my mom, see my kids, nothing. And you all are already talking about a payment plan. The things that I'm talking about are just like my know. No, but I'm just saying that for the listeners, like, I don't want them to think, oh, that's the way it is for everyone. Things have changed since my incarceration because you have people like myself know, it's weird that I go back inside ODRC doing the things that I do, and I'm not going back because of recidivism. And you have a lot of people like myself that are doing those very same things in Franklin and know all these different counties. And so things are happening and food banks are involved. Like, I didn't even get a list to tell me where the food pantries was. I didn't get a list. Yeah, there was no list that said, this is where you can get a hot meal. This is where you could go get a food box. I didn't know where to locate job and family services. I had to look all that stuff up. I didn't know where the bmv was and then figure out how I was going to get there on my own. But now, to answer your question, the gate pass fee is $75, I believe. I want to say. Prior to that, I think it was only 50. And I think the reason why is because I think the institution also pays for your bus ticket. I'm not sure, and I need to ask and figure that out. So don't quote me on that. But I don't know if the bus ticket money comes out of your gate pass money or if you get that gate pass money in lieu of the institution buying you your ticket back home. [01:07:17] Speaker E: So Ohio is a mandatory employment and training state, so that means all snap applicants considered to be abled bodied adults without dependence must work to receive their benefit. But this policy does not acknowledge life after coming home from incarceration. It is stressful and isolating to transition. This policy also doesn't acknowledge how difficult finding work can be, and we've talked a lot about this today. For these folks who now carry a criminal record, however, I think we can all agree in order to find meaningful work, that is, work that will actually pay your bills and make you feel fulfilled, requires a good diet and good health. In our opinion. Snap should be given, and this is actually something I'm working on, but snap should be given literally as part of the release packet without the caveats of having to work immediately in your experience, but also the experience of the people you have interviewed and talked to and met along your journey. How long does it take for somebody to feel ready to return to the workforce. [01:08:12] Speaker D: So I'm going to answer it two ways. So recovery and just returning are two different things. And you got to think about this, too. Drug abuse is still very prevalent. Overdoses are still happening while people are incarcerated. So clearly you have to take into account the location that that individual is going to, the support network that they're going to have around them when they return and are they going to a sober living situation. And so we all know that when you're in these sober living or these halfway houses, there's different phases that you have to go through. Most of the times they want you to be unemployed for 60 days so you can get through the programming, and then after like 60 days, you're allowed to go get a job. You know what I mean? You have a lot of people who end up leaving the silver living house and then the next thing you know, they're in the homeless shelter. What do you do when you don't have a phone and you don't have an address to recertify? You end up losing your benefits. It's like just this revolving door effect that happens especially with system impacted individuals. And here's the thing, too. So then when you have people who are in these recovery houses and all this stuff, and then they are eligible, they make them spend 30% of their snap to communal feeding, which I get because if we're all cooking together, we're all cooking together. But it's like, is that even right? You're pretty much going to have to be food insecure for the 60 days until you can get to a point where you can get a job. I have to agree with you, hope. I think once you are released, you should get them the snap and have the things that you need no matter what. And I see it all too much with system impacted people. So for me it's like we have to consider, what are we considering the requirements for a system impacted in person? And should there even be any? I say no, it should be to a place where as soon as I get out, I should take my state id that has a different background on it. So you know that I just got released. I'm getting emergency immediately. Everybody's talking about economic mobility and scaling people up and inclusivity, and we got to do this and we got to do that. Well, then if that's what you want to do and that's what you're talking about, do it. Not saying that we're putting incarcerating people above people because we already know that people out here are it feel insecure and still need the stuff. What it's saying is it gets that person their foot in the door. They could sit at the table with the rest of you all and then all of us can come together and figure out what we going to do. There's no inclusivity there because the stigma behind incarceration, then getting into the workforce, I got a felony. I mean, even though they don't have the question on the applications, they can still do the background check. And then I've seen this all too much, too. I've seen employers give individuals jobs, then the person's worked, maybe got two or three paychecks. Then the background check comes back, oh, we have to let you go. So I still don't meet the requirements. I'm still food insecure. It's like a deep ditch and it's raining and now it's turning to mud. And I'm trying to climb up out of there and I keep. As soon as I think I'm getting good footing, and that's what happens. Industry has to have an open mind. I can come on with every certificate in the world, but until that one employer offers me the chance to actually have that hands on experience, or it gives me that opportunity to show you that I know what I'm talking about because I've learned it. No one's going to really give individuals like myself a chance. So industry has to be open minded, too. And then the fact that industry needs to know that when you hire a system impacted individual and you get the bond insurance, that's $5,000 worth of protection. So say, for instance, my crime was I stole money off the cash register, but now I'm at the grocery store trying to get this job, but I got this CQE that says that I am eligible to do this job because I haven't been in any trouble. I've completed everything they wanted me to do. And you just got to know how to sell yourself, and then you hit them with this. And then if you get me federally bonded, there's $5,000 to protect, whatever. And I'm sure that there's not $5,000 in that register. And then at the end of the year, you get a $2,500 tax write off for every system impacted individual. But should I have to go through all that just to get the job? What does second chance fair hiring practices look like for me? Being a system impacted person and being marginalized and being. I feel like I got to work twice as hard, if not three times as hard as everyone else, to show you my dedication and to show you that I'm genuine and true. I've not heard one person whose system impacted not feel like they have to give their all all the time. So you're going to have a quality employee. You're going to have someone who's going to show up. And I think if all those things would align hope and Sarah, I think then that's when people could start to be eligible for snap. You know what I mean? Like, they'll have a job, they'll be doing whatever it is that they need to be doing to make those requirements, and then they could be eligible. But is that even something that incarcerated people need to have to worry about? It's really strange. [01:13:05] Speaker B: Yeah. When you talk about hiring practices, I know that the food bank is really dedicated to hiring system impacted individuals, and you're doing a lot of that work now as well. I want you to be really honest. How can food banks and other nonprofit organizations support Ohioans who are reentering into their communities? [01:13:30] Speaker D: I mean, just do the work. You know what I mean? I don't think you need to have 20 meetings to do the work. I mean, being honest. And that's why I love it here, because we do it. We don't just talk it, we walk it. We try to show others how to model it. The fun fact about how I even come to really even know Lee, our CDO, I called one time. It was like, right before COVID a person I was incarcerated with, was employed here, and I was looking for a story, and I was like, well, I can kill two birds with 1 st. And so then Covid happened, and I didn't get to do the interviews. But what drew me to this place was then, like, 35% of the staff was system impacted at that time. No one in this area is doing that except, like, factories. I didn't know anyone else that was giving system impacted people chances except wis, because they gave me my chance. So to hear that this organization had 35%, I was like, yeah, I got to know what made them decide to do this. And then working here. I see why? Because our staff, our leadership team, believe in the individual. When I sat down at that table and had my interview, they knew they wanted me, but they hadn't even created my position yet. And I've never had anyone want to invest that in me. You know what I mean? I started back in April. I've gotten probably 35 certifications since I've been here. So that's what I would say. You have to be willing to invest in that person, see something in them that they don't see in themselves, provide peer support. I get all that here and now. We're up to 43% of our staff system impacted. That's almost half. Nonprofits just need to have an open mind. They need to be willing to invest and provide the needs for that person. I love what the food bank has here. We have a case manager on site, and we have an internal and external care team. You have to have these kind of support things in place. A lot of times you have people in recovery. You need to be tied in with organizations. So if someone comes to you and says, hey, I relapsed, you can get them in a bed, right then that's what I would encourage nonprofits to do, because that's what the food bank does. The food bank is like no other organization that I've ever been employed with, especially on nonprofit side. I worked for my alma mater for two years, and Antioch College is actually a nonprofit. And this place has invested more in me than my own alma mater. I think if other people were interested in doing the work that the food bank is doing, you need to do it. And what better way to do it than to have someone who has that lived experience and the education to help lead it? You can have all the education you want and say that you are this reentry specialist, and this is what you. But I'm telling you right now, even with the doctorates, I'm going to still be more educated than you because I somehow survived the carcel system, got an education while I was doing all that, and was able to get a free one upon my release. So, clearly, I'm onto something, and there's a thousand more Mary Evans's. I'm telling you, inside those walls, that's got way better ideas and way better ways to do this work than the work that I've contributed to here at the food bank. But the food bank was doing the work long before me. They was already giving people a way in. And now to think about what that would look like for someone who's making 1.65 a day, to be able to have an opportunity to make $19 an hour with full benefits, you know what I mean? You need to give people a livable wage. Right now in Montgomery County, $27 an hour is what you need in this town to be sustainable and to live. And we all know that with $27 an hour, you at least need a master's. So they say, if I really value the quality of life, am I willing to make sure this person is sustainable and am I willing to give them a livable wage? You know what I mean? There's a lot to it. There's a lot to it. But I think the biggest thing is trusting and knowing that this individual has the best interest for your organization and for themselves. And it's just opportunity. And you need to have an open mind. You need to be like, okay, this person might run late sometimes because they are riding the bus to work. So we need to figure, you know what I mean? You need to come up with a whole plan and really implement those plans and policies. Do I go ahead and do I write the person up or how long do I keep this person on probation? Are they going to be on probation longer than a regular hire would? You know what I mean? I think you have to implement policy and procedure, but you also have to take in consideration what that individual has went through and how hard they're going to try to prove their self to you. [01:18:03] Speaker B: That was a great answer. Thanks, Mary. And then lastly, can you say a little bit more about the amazing shows you produce through Wyso and where can the listeners find them? [01:18:17] Speaker D: So I produce two shows. My baby is reentry stories. And it was cool how it all came along. So like, Nina was the director of the Eichelberger center for Community Voices at the time. She's like, when I first met you, you said you wanted to give space for people like yourself. So, well, you got mine. So I was like, I want to do a show where I go around and I interview people. I did some research and I found out that 20,000 Ohioans are incarcerated each year and that 1500 of them come back to just this area alone. And that spoke volumes to me. That show just gives me an opportunity to give space to system impacted individuals so they could tell their journey, talk about how hard it was, but how they're still maintaining and being successful. You know what I mean? Then the second project is West Dayton stories. And I'm going to all the african american populated subdivisions in Dayton and I'm collecting the black history about it. I'm talking about how the black neighborhoods were thriving and now how they're struggling and how crime and over policing and violence under investment and all these things are impacting the black community. So I'm just trying to educate people. And then also, too, it's like an educational piece for me, too. I'm getting educated because I'm not originally from here and I'm learning about the communities and the neighbors that I work with in a different way and how we can rewrite people's narratives in a way, because you don't have to stay stigmatized in that lifestyle, because that's what people said you were. You're more than that. You're a human being. And you just fell on hard times. And you know what I mean? Even in your darkest hour, you feel like you can't make it. Trust me, you can. And so that's what this project has been for me. It's been really rewarding. The first episode is going to be airing next week, and I'll just give you like a little snippet about it. So this woman lived in this area for 18 years, and she had cerebral palsy, so she ends up having a child. And at the time, there's this subdivision called Miami'sburg, which is kind of fluent. That was the only area that had housing for disabled parents with children. So she puts an application. Guess how long it took for her to actually get the apartment? Ten? A decade, she said. When they called me, I thought it was a joke. It's a powerful story. I can't wait till people hear this stuff. [01:20:45] Speaker E: Mary, tell us where we can find it all. [01:20:47] Speaker D: I'm on every podcasting app and you can go to wiso.org, click on the community Voices tab, and you can see all the wonderful projects that they do. So, yeah, that's where you can find it. [01:21:06] Speaker A: Thank you for listening to this episode. I hope you enjoyed our conversations with Mary and Karen. I want to encourage you to listen to re entry stories and west Dayton stories produced by Mary at Wyso. To learn more. We have linked those shows in the show notes. Thanks for listening and we'll talk soon.