New jobs, fresh starts

Earlier this year, Philadelphia Christian Church in Lafayette, La., hosted a job fair that sent at least 45 attendees home wearing a smile. Business owners had offered to hire them on the spot: They needed waitstaff, power line technicians, welders, housekeepers, delivery drivers, construction laborers, and more.

These weren’t your typical job seekers, though. They were former prison inmates.

Local pastor Charles Banks helps organize annual “second chance” job fairs like this one. As a formerly incarcerated drug dealer and gang member himself, he can empathize with ex-offenders: “When I look at a convicted felon, I look at myself. The main problem is they ain’t got no hope.” Banks says employment means more than a paycheck to these men and women. “A job is a step back into society. Now they can move forward with their lives.”

Even with “Help Wanted” signs Scotch-taped securely to so many windows, post-prison job hunts can be tough. Today’s labor shortages are still no match for the stigma attached to ankle monitors and criminal ­histories. But much like a dating site for the lovelorn, reentry job fairs match hopeful applicants with hesitant employers. At these first meetings, though, surprises are few. There’s no need to check a box admitting a checkered past. It’s assumed.

Reentry fairs are popular across the country. A Tucson, Ariz., version began in 2014 at the urging of the city’s mayor and a U.S. magistrate judge. One in Bridgeport, Conn., boasts Amazon as a “second chance employer.” In Noblesville, Ind., fairs take place at the county jail and platform the skills of the soon-to-be-released.

Louisiana offers incentives to businesses willing to put ex-offenders on the payroll—tax breaks to the tune of $2,400 for each hire and a 50 percent reimbursement of costs for training a new employee for a ­specific job.

Banks believes the positive interaction with potential employers at job fairs is crucial. “It lets that person know that, hey, you are somebody. We didn’t look at your background, we didn’t look at what you went to prison for. We looked at the person who you are and whether you might be able to join our team.”

A week before the event in Lafayette this past April, Pastor Banks’ church hosted what he calls a job fair “boot camp.” Employment seekers came for the day to prepare to put their best foot forward. The rest of their body, too—in donated business suits, shirts, and dresses. Student barbers from nearby Remington College offered free haircuts. Goodwill representatives proofed and printed résumés.

The effort bore fruit, and not just in the job realm. Banks’ “Crips to Christ” testimony, detailing how God saved him after a rise to the top of the Crips gang and three prison stays, ­resonated with a boot camp participant. The next Sunday, the man visited the church that Banks pastors. He’s now a member.

In the next state to the east, Adam Todd runs the Governor’s Job Fair Network of Mississippi. Three of the more than 30 fairs he conducts each year target the formerly incarcerated. Todd has noticed something about applicants who realize their past is an impediment to job hunting. They make great employees.

“They become loyal to those ­companies that have given them a ­second chance. They show up on time. They do what they are asked to do,” he says.

To maximize those efforts, Todd works in conjunction with Petrice Adams of the Mississippi Department of Corrections. She works alongside the pre-release staff on the inside of the prison system, helping prepare offenders for employment. One class is called “Dress for Success.”

“We tell them, ‘Don’t go into interviews wearing shorts. Don’t go in with your pants hanging down.’ We even teach them how to tie a tie,” Adams explains.

The Mississippi Department of Corrections is also focused on helping inmates get specialty certifications in fields like welding and truck driving, skills needed in the job market. Once offenders are out, ­probation officers inform them of upcoming reentry job fairs. Attendance is voluntary.

In Natchez, Miss., Sheriff Travis Patten is the applied force that set reentry job fairs in motion five years ago. “We got everything in place, from prospective employers to judges and attorneys who could do expungements on the spot,” he recalls. It worked. Now his office is helping organize a fair every quarter.

When the sheriff can vouch for an applicant—that he’s changed and on a new path—it makes a difference. Patten believes social perceptions are changing, too. “In the past, our Board of Supervisors wouldn’t hire felons. Now they work them on road crews,” he says.

“I’m telling you, whether you want these guys and these ladies in your community or not, they’re going to be here. Why not gainfully employ them and give them a chance to stay on the right path?”