Ex-convicts get help for re-entry into community

Steven Tatlow uses the analogy of a house of cards when he talks about an ex-convict’s chances of success after prison.

“When they come out, they might get a bus ticket and not have a real plan of where to go next,” said Tatlow, who is community involvement coordinator for the Boone County Community Partnership. “They very well may be homeless.”

On the streets, they may find themselves falling back into old habits.

“Some minor violation could cause the entire house to fall down, and they have to go back to jail,” he said. “We’re trying to provide some glue to keep the house of cards from falling.”

That glue is the newly named Boone County Offender Transition Network, which brings together for the first time many of the people who work with ex-offenders in Boone County. Tatlow will act as the group facilitator of the network.

Although it is just beginning to take shape, the network already has volunteers from the community on board: substance abuse counselors and mental health care providers; representatives of employment, parenting and veterans programs; the Missouri Department of Corrections and the Probation and Parole District 6, which encompasses all of Boone County; faith-based agencies; colleges and universities; and ex-offenders willing to act as mentors.

For the first time in Boone County, the network will also provide a service that inmate activists hope will go a long way toward keeping ex-offenders on track and out of trouble: a day reporting center. Approved last week by the Department of Corrections, the center will be located at 1500 Vandiver Drive. It will open sometime in March and give offenders a place to find out about job opportunities, get counseling and take classes.

“(It) will help alleviate some of the probation and parole responsibilities,” said Michael Harper, a Volunteers in Service to America volunteer for the Missouri Reentry Process. “The offenders will be able to work on their job and life skills and also get their GEDs.”

Joseph Carr, a VISTA volunteer who is part of the Boone County Offender Transition Network and lives in Columbia, personally understands how hard the transition back to the community can be.

“I had been in and out of jail several times over 13 years,” Carr said. “Time doesn’t stop on the outside. If you don’t fit in with the style of clothes or entertainment, then you’re probably going to fall back to what you were in before.”

Carr said he believes that in every community there are people willing to go the extra mile to help offenders make the transition, and the newly formed network brings those people together. He plans to act as a mentor in the network and help recruit volunteers.

The purpose of the network is to promote a healthier and safer community, said Mike Webber, administrator of the Boone County Probation and Parole District. That means “providing some intervention to keep people from going to jail, or going back.”

Giving ex-offenders the knowledge they need to be successful is an important part of the process, Tatlow said.

“You see people getting a 5-, 10-, or 15-year sentence, but when they get out they have a life sentence in the community,” he said.

A job goes a long way toward getting the ex-offender on the right track.

Steak n Shake on Worley Street is one of the businesses in Columbia that hires ex-offenders. Patricia Britts, a manager at the restaurant, estimates that of Steak n Shake’s 55 employees, roughly a third to a half are ex-offenders. The company strives not to discriminate based on a person’s criminal background.

“I’ve hired some very unlikely people that have made great employees,” she said, “and I’ve hired some people with credentials that you wouldn’t believe, and they won’t get out of bed.”

What she has observed is that it’s hard for ex-offenders to succeed without someone who believes in them.

For Carr, that sense of belief has come from church. He has been a minister at the Second Baptist Church in Columbia for three years, but has been pastoring for more than 20 years.

“Religion was my way out,” Carr said. “Preaching gives you a sense of hope and faith. It’s something to strive for to see the better side of yourself.”

If it’s religion that helps offenders back into society, “it will be the passionate people of faith who will help them,” said Mickey Havener, coordinator of the Interfaith Council Boone County Jail Ministries, which will be part of the offender network. The council’s 40 volunteers from 20 Columbia churches go to the jail every weekend and conduct services. Some of the volunteer groups concentrate on Christian music, preaching or simply talking with offenders, she said.

Understanding what social services are out there and how to navigate the social system is important in the re-entry process, said Harper. As part of the network, he is determining what services exist and how to communicate their availability to offenders.

Tatlow hopes the network will give offenders a road map to success in the community.

“I believe people see the common sense in this,” he said. “If you want a safer community, we need to make the resources available after people have paid their dues.”