CONWAY — A Faulkner County ministry is helping men and women released from prison find a fresh start in life, but the ministry’s leaders said parolees face challenges in overcoming the stigma of their crimes.
Mike Willbanks, chairman of the board of Life After Prison Ministries, said society does not always help ex-offenders start over.
“We have the right to separate [criminals] from us,” Willbanks said, “but we have an equal responsibility to restore those people to the community. We don’t do that. People who come home from prison are ostracized, pariahs. We place on them undue burdens that guarantee they will end up back in jail.”
Willbanks said the ministry began in 2006 after his son, Shane, committed a felony. Though Shane served no jail time, he was put on probation for six years. While his son served out his time, Mike said he witnessed “the hopelessness of a system that is ill-equipped to help people successfully return to society.”
As members of the Fellowship Bible Church in Conway, Mike said he and his family saw “so many things we thought could be fixed if the church were involved.”
In 2005, Mike and Shane - who both became certified in prison fellowship - began “looking for a practical approach to helping nonviolent ex-offenders who still had the brand of ‘F’ on their forehead.”
Mike said he modeled his idea for Life After Prison Ministries on a program operated in the state’s prisons by Prison Fellowship International. His church embraced the idea.
“I took it to the elders and our pastor,” Mike said. “All seven men confessed they had turned their backs on [ex-offenders] and pledged to do whatever it took to reach that population on behalf of Christ.”
Brad Janowski, executive director of Life After Prison Ministries, was a re-entry manager for Prison Fellowship International.
“I was traveling all over the state doing what we are doing now in Faulkner County,” he said. “I’ve met with hundreds of church leaders to talk about this idea. I have only had one pastor ever tell me he didn’t think [prisoner re-entry] was worthwhile. I’m asking pastors to help us find people in their churches with a passion for our ministry. It’s taking time to gain traction.”
When Prison Fellowship International, an international criminal justice ministry organization, ceased operations in Arkansas, Janowski said he and Mike decided to “marry the work” he was doing with their concept and spread it through the whole state.
“We wanted a forum in which we could interface directly with people on parole or probation,” Shane said. “I needed to tell guys in my position that there is hope through Christ.”
Life After Prison Ministries, which meets at 6:30 p.m. Mondays at the Faulkner County Public Library in Conway, is a nonprofit organization with a “community-level” board of directors. Shane is its re-entry coordinator. He said the ministry works “hand in hand” with the Arkansas Department of Correction and the Arkansas Department of Community Correction . Life After Prison mentors parolees who have been released from prison through the ADC’s chaplaincy program. Mike said the ministry tries to involve churches in helping former prisoners re-enter society.
The ministry reinforces “principles of life as biblically defined” and, in the process, aids the ADCC’s goals in returning ex-offenders to society “safely and successfully,” Mike said.
“That means no new crimes, no police contact,” Janowski said, “for a lifetime.”
He said ex-offenders must achieve three goals upon release: employment, housing and transportation.
“If they have those, they will be successful,” he said.
But convincing prisoners they should seek legitimate work is the toughest part of the ministry’s job.
“I was talking about the need to be willing to take any work just to get into the workforce,” Janowski said. “We had a [prisoner] say, ‘I owe thousands in fines, tens of thousands in back child support, and I have to put a roof over my head. I make one phone call, and I’m making $1,000 a week. There’s a benefit to getting a job at McDonald’s?’”
Mike said ex-offenders must change their thinking in order to change their behavior.
“They need to think about how it would affect their children if they sell dope instead of making $7.25 an hour.”
Janowski, a former parole officer, said he asks ex-offenders to think past their immediate needs.
“I say, ‘You make a thousand a week selling drugs, but how long until you get caught? What will that do to your children?’”
Shane said the ministry mediates between members of society - who believe parolees are owed nothing - and ex-prisoners, who feel they are owed more than they deserve.
“Both sides put up their dukes,” he said. “We’re saying, ‘Lower your guard.’”
All three said ex-offenders should be offered a second chance, as Mike said the Bible teaches.
“We are imprisoning people because we are mad at them,” he said. “We have an exploding prison population, and [the Legislature] keeps passing new laws. We spend almost $2 million a day on prisons.”
Shane said rehabilitation, successful community re-entry and addressing the root of criminal behavior - past trauma - will keep ex-offenders from jail. But Mike said the rules make it hard for ex-prisoners to change their behavior.
“When someone is released early, one stipulation is they have to pick up trash once a week,” Janowski said. “It’s hard to go to a potential employer and say, ‘Hire me,’when on Wednesdays you have to pick up trash. The system front-loads [ex-offenders] with requirements. If they keep hearing no and running into obstacles, they’re going to re-offend.”
Shane said he has experienced those difficulties.
“You can’t get employment, housing, insurance, a driver’s license, food stamps or a student loan. You submit yourself to the law, but you can’t vote. The [state] doesn’t care why you can’t pay your fines; it only wants to know if you are going to. If you go back to jail, the fines multiply,” he said.
All three said the problem is not the fault of those who work for the prison system.
“It’s a legislative problem,” Mike said. “The people in charge of the system do not have the legislative authority or the resources to put together the programs they know would work. They’re doing the best they can.”
Prisoners who show signs of positive “transformation” in the chaplaincy programs are referred to the Life After Prison ministry. Shane said that is a small number of prisoners.
“We’d like to reach every man and woman coming out of the ADC,” he said.
Ex-offenders new to the ministry are invited to the Monday-night meetings, where they meet volunteer mentors.
“We meet them, see what their needs are and get them engaged in the process,” Mike said. “Their mentor will invite them into a one-on-one relationship and is available 24/7.”
The ministry also holds job fairs aimed at placing employers with ex-offenders.
“That’s how we get the community engaged,” Janowski said. “We’re going to hold these fairs in every possible community.”
Since 2006, the ministry has served almost 300 ex-offenders, engaging with each one for a total of about eight hours, Mike said.
“We deal with less than 1 percent of the entire parole population in Conway per week,” he said.
For more information, or to donate to the ministry, visit lifeafterprison.org or call (501) 548-0115.
Staff writer Daniel A. Marsh can be reached at (501) 399-3688 or dmarsh@arkansasonline.com.
River Valley Ozark, Pages 137 on 07/29/2012