People who return to society from prison don’t have enough support, advocates say. That’s why a Northeast Pennsylvania church wants to open a vocational business, and a district parole office’s network is expanding as part of the effort.
Reentrants, as they’re often called, don’t have it easy, whether they’re looking for housing or employment, said Rev. Rebecca Barnes of St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in Scranton. It’s been a long-term goal of St. Luke’s to open a vocational bakery that would train former inmates.
“If you will – I’m a clergy – the spirit led us to look into doing the bakery,” Barnes said. The idea came after Barnes learned about the region's incarceration rates.
“Statistically, Lackawanna County has one of the highest levels of minority incarceration in the Northeast quadrant of the United States,” Barnes said, referring to a story from the Vera Institute of Justice, published in 2017. “We were really looking to… help build bridges and break down barriers hopefully.”
The parish still needs to raise about $250,000 for kitchen renovations before the program can begin, she said. Their business will be modeled after Homeboy Bakery in Los Angeles, which opened in 1992.
On Tuesday, Barnes and a coalition of reentry partners set up tables and circled chairs inside St. Luke’s. Members of the Scranton and Williamsport district parole offices manned booths for a reentry simulation for about three dozen community members.
Their goal was to open more eyes to what Barnes called the “horrific obstacles” reentrants face, including landlords hesitant to rent, employers skeptical to hire and banks unwilling to lend.
“[The simulation] helps people and expands, hopefully, their hearts and their imaginations to what people go through,” Barnes said.
STRIVE: Two years in
St. Luke’s also has partnered with a voluntary program of the Scranton district parole office.
Modeled after a federal reentry program, STRIVE, or State Transition Reentry Initiative Validating Endeavors, kicked off as a pilot back in 2022.
Mary Brotzman is community reentry parole agent with the Scranton office. She said STRIVE’s original pilot program has flourished, partnering with over a dozen business entities. Its monthly meetings with returning citizens outgrew the parole office. Now, they meet at St. Luke’s. An upcoming expansion, possibly this spring, will bring additional meetings to Monroe County.
“We’ve had two graduates [of the program] already and they’re now acting as mentors, Brotzman said. “So they’re coming in on the interviews of the new reentrants that want to be a part of STRIVE and we’re getting their perspective.”
STRIVE initially partnered with ESSA Bank & Trust, Northampton Community College, and Pyramid Healthcare to ensure reentrants have access to education, employment training, loans and health needs. PathStone, a career training and housing services company, is a more recent partner.
Denise Traver is director of PathStone’s reentry programs, which contracts with the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections.
“People who have criminal justice backgrounds are just that – they’re people,” Traver said. “The majority have addiction issues or were raised in a social environment that perpetuates a cycle of involvement. They’re just people.”
STRIVE accepts people who are within two years of finishing state prison sentences.
Baking with reentrants in Williamsport
It’s been two years since 76-year-old Marty McCormick founded the Rise Up Village Bakery to help reentrants in Lycoming County.
The church-based training program is run out of United Churches of Lycoming County in Williamsport. McCormick served as an associate chaplain at Lycoming County Prison, but retired in 2008. He wanted to continue working in some capacity with former inmates. He started to do some research.
“The food service industry, especially bakeries and restaurants, is the largest employer of people with a criminal record,” McCormick said. He got tips from reentry-focused restaurants and shops around the country. He gave a shout out to St. Louis-based Laughing Bear Bakery, started by a Buddhist priest. McCormick aspires to expand to online sales like they have.
Rise Up works with up to five trainees at a time and bakes two days per week. McCormick hopes he can add a third day soon, as the bakery's list of returning customers is up to 120 people.
“We’re a little bit crowded, but we know how to work as a team,” he said. He’d eventually like to move into a larger space and see the bakery become employee-owned.
His message to other projects looking to get off the ground?
“I found that once I got started, the community just came right behind it. I think that’s one of the keys, if you get out there and start something and it’s meeting a good need in the community, you’ll get that support that you’re looking for,” he said.
“I wanted to have all my ducks in a row, too. I knew that was not gonna happen unless I just got out there and got my feet wet.”
