Sorry! No jobs for ex-prisoners!

Labor Day week seemed the perfect time to discuss the job situation for those who have served time in prison. Channor Lewis, an IT support specialist for DTE Energy in Detroit wrote an article for the Detroit News recently that does a great job of explaining the problem. 

While our specialty is not re-entry, the HFP team still finds that our former clients face real challenges when they re-enter the free world. Employers are not excited about hiring former prisoners. Despite excellent credentials, background and training, Lewis says it took him 6 months to get a job! Think about it. That’s a half-year that these guys could easily get into trouble again. Lewis said he applied for 20 positions before he received one offer, and that offer was rescinded after the company did a background check. 

Yet, those employers who boldly take the risk find that these men and women are excellent employees. My industrialist friend Andy loves to hire them! Companies often find that hiring returning citizens- actually lowers the turnover rate, because these people want to hold down a position. They know what the alternative looks like! A study of job performance shows that employees with criminal records had longer tenure and were less likely to quit. Still, employers continue to resist the concept. 

Lewis has a couple of suggestions for the formerly incarcerated that should help them on the path to gainful employment. His parole officer recommended that he get involved with the Center for Employment Opportunities, a national non-profit that helps persons with a criminal justice history. And while working with that organization, he learned of another: Per Scholas, which provides skills training and access to employer networks. 

While reading Susan Burton’s book Becoming Ms. Burton I could feel the author’s pain as she told about the repeated job application rejections, all because she had to check that little box that indicated she had once been convicted of a crime. 

“We're willing to spend countless dollars putting people who need help in cages, and then when they get out we say you can't have a job, and you can't have housing, and because you don't have either, we're going to take your kids, too.” 

One can only hope that with today’s increased hiring shortage, the trend will change. Those employers who take the risk are in for a pleasant surprise. Those persons who get hired will prove their worth.

 


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Half-a-race!

The HFP Drag-Racing Fund-Raiser had the potential of being extremely successful, and could have raised several thousand dollars. Let's just say it was partly successful. For background purposes I'll explain that I was racing a 1963 supercharged Studebaker Lark that has a reputation of being one of the fastest stock Studebakers in drag racing today. The engine was built by one of the finest Studebaker engine mechanics in the country, and the car many times has achieved quarter-mile runs in less than 14 seconds! We promised to make at least ten passes in the Pure Stock Muscle Car Drags at Mid-Michigan Motorplex in Stanton, Michigan, this past weekend, and we asked for pledges ONLY ON THOSE RUNS REACHED IN LESS THAN 14 SECONDS. On Friday, here's how we fared: Run #1 13.936 @ 101.24 mph Run #2 14.027 @ 101.30 mph Run #3 14.091 @ 100.88 mph Run #4 13.805 @ 102.84 mph Run #5 14.058 @ 101.26 mph By the 5th run we discovered that ...
Read more

Gregory John McCormick: 1964-2008

Itchy is dead. The lifeless body of this talented rock musician, whose band Shock Therapy was a popular group especially in Europe, was found in a field in Detroit last Wednesday, November 5. The Wayne County Coroner's office informed father Glenn McCormick that the body of his son Gregory, better known to all of us as Itchy, bore no signs of trauma. Glenn said that Itchy, who had been living at his father's dental lab in Detroit, had been drinking to excess for some time. While the toxicology report has not been released yet, the general consensus seems to be that he drank himself to death. Our agency, while still named INNOCENT, first got involved with Itchy in 2005. The Detroit native, who called Germany his home, got involved in some unfortunate activity that placed him in the Michigan State prison system on a charge of arson of a dwelling. It was really just a bonfire in an alley, but an alleged parole violation placed him in prison for 1-20 years. I personally sat w...
Read more

Three lives, connected by a divine thread

My kids say it should be a book! The Doug, Pat and Mark story is a doozie!   About 25 years ago, while fighting to free Maurice Carter from prison, I read a newspaper column written by Pat Shellenbarger of the Grand Rapids Press on the topic of eyewitness identification. I contacted Pat re that story. That led to a friendship between Doug and Pat that continues to this day.   In subsequent months, Pat would go on to assist me in an investigation into the Maurice Carter case that eventually led to solving the crime.  That particular episode became a chapter in my book about the Carter case, SWEET FREEDOM, published in 2006.   Fast forward to 2009, A New York businessman claims wrongful conviction, and while serving time in a Michigan prison is handed a copy of my book. Mark Hartman, who was also convicted in Berrien County, was amazed at the similarity of these two stories and tried to reach out to me. His letters bounced.   Persisting in his efforts to c...
Read more