Building a future with help from Redeem-Her
July 29, 2019 at 12:37 p.m.
With three important pieces of prison reform legislation due to kick-in in New Jersey between May 1 and Aug. 1, the mood at the annual diocesan Prison Ministry Forum March 20 was cautiously optimistic.
The advocates who gathered in St. Anthony of Padua Parish Center, Hightstown, including a number of lay people who devote countless hours to prison ministry, listened to activist Margaret Quern Atkins, who had helped to get the bills into law, talk about what they would achieve.
The Education and Rehabilitation Act will, among other improvements inside the prison system, review vocational programs and establish peer inmate mentoring programs in each facility and provide options for special credits for educational and work force training skills and achievements.
Two of the bills are geared toward helping those who have completed their terms re-join the community and resume their lives in good and meaningful ways, she said.
The Strengthening Women and Families Act, which becomes effective May 1, will, she explained, lift the ban on access to federally funded temporary assistance and food stamps for those convicted of drug-related felonies.
The second piece of legislation, the Reduction of Recidivism Act, will allow for a 90-day grace period for outstanding fines and provide released inmates with information and documentation that can help them as they re-enter the community including: an ID card, birth certificate, list of prison programs participated in and assistance with obtaining a social security card.
As interesting as Atkins presentation was – there will be more on that in an overall article on the forum in the next issue of The Monitor – the riveting panel discussion by several formerly incarcerated individuals that followed showed just how much this legislation will mean to a lot of people trying to rebuild their lives after serving their sentences.
It was staggering to learn that upon discharge, some of them had nowhere to go but homeless shelters, that they lacked access to the documents so necessary to re-enter the community – driver licenses, ID cards and the like – or food stamps or the medicine they needed to stay alive.
Upon release they were faced with the hard fact that payments on their fines were immediately due. Non-compliance meant an immediate trip back to prison and that employment was a condition of release but work was unbelievably hard to come by.
Some of the most compelling insights came from Marcell DelCorpo who faced almost all those circumstances but managed to rebuild her life anyway.
She did it with true grit, determination and a lot of help from Redeem-Her – the non-profit corporation founded by Stacy Kindt who was incarcerated herself for about two years at the Edna Mahan Correctional Facility for Women in Clinton where DelCorpo served her sentence.
Kindt, an elementary school teacher, a wife and mother who was sentenced in a custody-related kidnapping attempt, speaks often on the fact that when inmates are released back into society, their needs are largely unmet.
With help from Redeem-Her, DelCorpo worked her way back into the community, became an outreach director and a mentor/counselor/friend to the women residing in the organization’s transitional housing.
You can often find her at the Redeem-Her Second Chances Thrift Shop located at 1970 Route 9, Toms River where her sense of humor fits in well with the upbeat atmosphere. “You have to laugh,” says DelCorpo. “You have to be happy. I didn’t get clean and sober to be miserable. Even though I hit road blocks along the way, I wouldn’t trade my life for anything in the world.”
The shop, open seven days a week from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., has become popular with bargain hunters along the Route 9 corridor. Shoppers, who appreciate the mission of the store – assisting women in their return to the community – peruse wares ranging from clothing to house hold items, books and furniture.
It’s become a popular destination for donations as well, DelCorpo said. So popular, in fact, that the organization is in real need of a used van for furniture pickups and a shed to store them in.
“Furniture is really a popular item for us,” DelCorpo said. “For us, a used dresser or table is an item that can translate to money that can really help a woman returning to the community.”
On my most recent visit to the thrift shop, DelCorpo and Lisa, who works with her, surveyed the wide field in the back of the shop envisioning how a donated shed would look there and the void it would fill.
“It would be a real help,” said Lisa, who, like DelCorpo, faced severe hardships upon her release from Edna Mahon and overcame them with help from Redeem-Her. “It would enable us to accept more donations which would let us help more women.”
If anyone out there can help meet those needs, please call DelCorpo at 732-504-7467.
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With three important pieces of prison reform legislation due to kick-in in New Jersey between May 1 and Aug. 1, the mood at the annual diocesan Prison Ministry Forum March 20 was cautiously optimistic.
The advocates who gathered in St. Anthony of Padua Parish Center, Hightstown, including a number of lay people who devote countless hours to prison ministry, listened to activist Margaret Quern Atkins, who had helped to get the bills into law, talk about what they would achieve.
The Education and Rehabilitation Act will, among other improvements inside the prison system, review vocational programs and establish peer inmate mentoring programs in each facility and provide options for special credits for educational and work force training skills and achievements.
Two of the bills are geared toward helping those who have completed their terms re-join the community and resume their lives in good and meaningful ways, she said.
The Strengthening Women and Families Act, which becomes effective May 1, will, she explained, lift the ban on access to federally funded temporary assistance and food stamps for those convicted of drug-related felonies.
The second piece of legislation, the Reduction of Recidivism Act, will allow for a 90-day grace period for outstanding fines and provide released inmates with information and documentation that can help them as they re-enter the community including: an ID card, birth certificate, list of prison programs participated in and assistance with obtaining a social security card.
As interesting as Atkins presentation was – there will be more on that in an overall article on the forum in the next issue of The Monitor – the riveting panel discussion by several formerly incarcerated individuals that followed showed just how much this legislation will mean to a lot of people trying to rebuild their lives after serving their sentences.
It was staggering to learn that upon discharge, some of them had nowhere to go but homeless shelters, that they lacked access to the documents so necessary to re-enter the community – driver licenses, ID cards and the like – or food stamps or the medicine they needed to stay alive.
Upon release they were faced with the hard fact that payments on their fines were immediately due. Non-compliance meant an immediate trip back to prison and that employment was a condition of release but work was unbelievably hard to come by.
Some of the most compelling insights came from Marcell DelCorpo who faced almost all those circumstances but managed to rebuild her life anyway.
She did it with true grit, determination and a lot of help from Redeem-Her – the non-profit corporation founded by Stacy Kindt who was incarcerated herself for about two years at the Edna Mahan Correctional Facility for Women in Clinton where DelCorpo served her sentence.
Kindt, an elementary school teacher, a wife and mother who was sentenced in a custody-related kidnapping attempt, speaks often on the fact that when inmates are released back into society, their needs are largely unmet.
With help from Redeem-Her, DelCorpo worked her way back into the community, became an outreach director and a mentor/counselor/friend to the women residing in the organization’s transitional housing.
You can often find her at the Redeem-Her Second Chances Thrift Shop located at 1970 Route 9, Toms River where her sense of humor fits in well with the upbeat atmosphere. “You have to laugh,” says DelCorpo. “You have to be happy. I didn’t get clean and sober to be miserable. Even though I hit road blocks along the way, I wouldn’t trade my life for anything in the world.”
The shop, open seven days a week from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., has become popular with bargain hunters along the Route 9 corridor. Shoppers, who appreciate the mission of the store – assisting women in their return to the community – peruse wares ranging from clothing to house hold items, books and furniture.
It’s become a popular destination for donations as well, DelCorpo said. So popular, in fact, that the organization is in real need of a used van for furniture pickups and a shed to store them in.
“Furniture is really a popular item for us,” DelCorpo said. “For us, a used dresser or table is an item that can translate to money that can really help a woman returning to the community.”
On my most recent visit to the thrift shop, DelCorpo and Lisa, who works with her, surveyed the wide field in the back of the shop envisioning how a donated shed would look there and the void it would fill.
“It would be a real help,” said Lisa, who, like DelCorpo, faced severe hardships upon her release from Edna Mahon and overcame them with help from Redeem-Her. “It would enable us to accept more donations which would let us help more women.”
If anyone out there can help meet those needs, please call DelCorpo at 732-504-7467.
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