It isn’t a matter of if prisoners come home — it’s when. And the community needs to be ready to help them.
That was the message that Kevin Starnes, a Savannah man looking for a second chance, received loud and clear Saturday afternoon.
Starnes, currently incarcerated at Coastal Transitional Center, was one of several inmates who attended a conference at Armstrong State University’s University Hall this weekend designed to provide tips and general direction to those who are looking to re-enter the Savannah community.
The second annual “When Is The Debt Paid” conference fosters an ongoing dialogue about how to reduce recidivism — a relapse into criminal behavior.
And the conversation is definitely needed, according to Starnes, who’s had more than one run-in with the justice system for drug possession.
“There’s a lot of things that we’re not told and we don’t know about,” Starnes said.
About 700 of the 18,000 inmates released by the Georgia Department of Corrections in 2015 listed Chatham County as their place of residence, according to police. Georgia has the second highest incarceration rate in the country — just behind Alaska — and nearly 3.8 million people in Georgia have a criminal record.
This annual conference is focused on helping those individuals adjust to life in Savannah, said Maxine Bryant, a professor at Armstrong, who organized Saturday’s discussion.
“People who return from prison return and feel like their hands are still handcuffed,” she said. “There is a difference between re-entry and re-integration. Re-entry is leaving the Georgia Department of Corrections with $25 and a bus ticket back home. Re-integration is when the community gets behind an individual, wraps their arms around that individual, embraces them and supports them in becoming a part of the fabric of society.”
The conference was modeled after an event Bryant facilitated in Indianapolis, where she helped ex-prisoners re-enter that city’s society.
Inmates who attended Saturday heard stories and advice from others who have successfully returned to the community. A group of panelists shared their stories of how they turned their lives around by emphasizing such skills as learning the proper way to deal with conflict and seeking out social services. The panel also discussed how legal care and knowledge can help low-income people climb out of poverty.
Other websites and information on how convicts can adjust to life outside prison also stress skills such as how to search for jobs, refusing drugs and alcohol, finding adequate housing and how to take advantage of educational opportunities.
“The purpose of this panel is let people know recovery is real and recovery is possible,” said Frederic Green, panel moderator. “We are the face of recovery.”
Green, who has served five years in prison, is also the newest addition to the Savannah-Chatham police’s End Gun Violence: Step Forward team as the outreach coordinator. He serves as a liaison between the community members returning home and the social service providers able to help.
And those services are highly anticipated, Starnes said.
“I’m definitely going to take advantage of them while I’m here,” he said.