5) 70x7 Life Recovery

5) 70x7 Life Recovery

70x7 Life Recovery is an organization at 97 W 22nd St, Holland, MI 49423, which "provides mentorship, employment, job skills/life skills, training and recovery support for men and women who have previously been incarcerated" (About Us).

I had the opportunity to interview Carrie Childerston, the Director of Development at 70x7 Life Recovery, about recidivism in the Holland, Michigan area.

70x7 Recovery has been very successful in there work with ex-felons. When asked about recidivism in our community, Childerston said, "The recidivism rate nationwide, I believe, is 40 percent. In Michigan it's in the 30s, they say around 33, 34... Ottawa county it's 11 percent. It's low. And we would like to believe it's in large part due to the programs that we have here. In our program --in 70x7-- it's 6 percent recidivism rate... That's measured on a three year basis." The difference between the recidivism rates nationwide and in 70x7 is about 32 percent, proof that their program really works.

Childerston stated that when convicts are released from prison, "They do not have good skills to survive on the outside... A lot of them return to the past friendships and the things they did in the past." Falling back into old patterns and habits is usually the first step returning citizens take toward recidivism.

Studies have shown repeatedly that ex-felons are less likely to return to prison if they are employed (Cooper), but Childerston says that finding employment is not as easy as it sounds, "...It's really hard for them to find employment, so what they tend to do then is they go back to the life of crime. They go back to selling drugs or stealing things, often they go back to the same community..."

Here we begin to see a cycle, ex-convicts "...make the same life choices they made before they went in that got them in prison in the first place," said Childerston.

Childerston shared what must be done to break the cycle of recidivism: "The first thing they have to learn to do is they have to learn how to navigate the world they've reentered into. It's changed. They always come back and they expect everything to be the same. People are older, people have moved on, and the economy has changed. So it's a different world."

She says ex-convicts aren't used to making choices or being in charge of their life, "In prison, every decision is made for you... You are controlled. So you spend most of your formative years like that, and when you get out you think: 'well I have to find a job,' but you don't know how to make a decision for yourself."

It's clear that ex-felons often need help when reentering society after incarceration. Childerston said that 70x7 offers skill training such as, "Going to work on time, calling in sick if you're not going to be there, doing the job right the first time, not stealing. To some people stealing is just a way of life.. So they have to learn how to live in society again. We work with them and help them to figure out: what are things you do and you don't do. Simple things, showing up for work, working hard, being honest, not stealing, telling the truth... Even as simple as shaking someone's hand."

When asked how we can prevent more people from committing crimes and becoming convicted felons, Childerston presented a statistic, "70 percent of all children of convicted felons will become convicted felons themselves. So we have to end the cycle of criminal activity in a generation. We have to say to men and women coming out, who do not want their children going in, 'how can you stop the cycle of generational crime in your family? How can you make sure your son and daughter don't end up doing the same things you did?' So we have to equip those men and women to be better parents, how to lead better functioning lives." So preventing crime begins with building strong families.

But employment is only part of what 70x7 does to help returning citizens reach their full potential. "In our program," Childerston explained, "If you want to be in our employment pool you have to accept to mentor relationship --a mentor match-- that you and the mentor meet weekly, and you discuss what's going on in your life with them, you do life together. You have to have... a face-to-face weekly and a phone call weekly. You must do that for 9 months while you're in our employment pool." Childerston says that the ex-felons and their mentors usually remain friends after completing the program. Often the mentor is the first real friend, who really cared and did not have a secret agenda, that the ex-felon had ever had.

Some may ask, 'Where does crime come from? Why is there crime?' As Mrs. Childerston put it, "Crime is the offset of poverty, and poverty thinking." Basically, when people are poor, the sometimes get desperate.
"Housing is a big issue, sometimes they have nowhere to go. Here in Holland they end up in the Holland Rescue mission, but they have to do the program there... Cause a lot of times they come back and they don't have place to live, maybe their family has moved on. Their family relationships are severed."

Ex-convicts face 3 major barriers, one of them is transportation, "Many of them do not have driver's licenses." Said Childerston. She explained that the Holland Rescue Mission has a bike repair program to provide bicycles to those who need transportation, especially to commute to work. At 70x7, they have a car program, "...we do low interest rate car loans," said Childerston, "And we have cars that we will sell to people that are donated, we have them fixed up..." So with bikes and cars, the problem of transportation for ex-convicts is being combatted.

The other two major barriers are employment and housing. 70x7 focuses a lot on workplace readiness while the Holland Rescue Mission can provide food and a warm be to ex-felons. Childerston also said that, "...Just living skills, how to have a functioning life, are... barriers that preclude people from being able to renter society successfully. Organizations that work with them and help them --like ours-- are a huge benefit and wherever they exist you see a lower recidivism rate... But you have to... View the world with their eyes and their experience and its different; because we think 'well, you need a job, can't you just go and apply down at 711 or the gas station.' But the truth is they wouldn't know how even to do that."

Childerston shared what she felt was the heart of 70x7, "...I think what we do by offering men and women who've been on that side of the prison wall, that have been there and said... 'I don't want to have to come back here again.' We offer them an opportunity to never go back again."


Below is a link to "Stories of Hope," a short video by 70x7 Life Recovery.
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=cjH0CeQrsQ8