[House Hearing, 116 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
PRISON TO PROPRIETORSHIP: ENTREPRENEUR-
SHIP OPPORTUNITIES FOR THE FORMERLY
INCARCERATED
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HEARING
BEFORE THE
COMMITTEE ON SMALL BUSINESS
UNITED STATES
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
HEARING HELD
OCTOBER 23, 2019
__________
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Small Business Committee Document Number 116-054
Available via the GPO Website: www.govinfo.gov
__________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
38-061 WASHINGTON : 2020
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HOUSE COMMITTEE ON SMALL BUSINESS
NYDIA VELAZQUEZ, New York, Chairwoman
ABBY FINKENAUER, Iowa
JARED GOLDEN, Maine
ANDY KIM, New Jersey
JASON CROW, Colorado
SHARICE DAVIDS, Kansas
JUDY CHU, California
MARC VEASEY, Texas
DWIGHT EVANS, Pennsylvania
BRAD SCHNEIDER, Illinois
ADRIANO ESPAILLAT, New York
ANTONIO DELGADO, New York
CHRISSY HOULAHAN, Pennsylvania
ANGIE CRAIG, Minnesota
STEVE CHABOT, Ohio, Ranking Member
AUMUA AMATA COLEMAN RADEWAGEN, American Samoa, Vice Ranking Member
TROY BALDERSON, Ohio
KEVIN HERN, Oklahoma
JIM HAGEDORN, Minnesota
PETE STAUBER, Minnesota
TIM BURCHETT, Tennessee
ROSS SPANO, Florida
JOHN JOYCE, Pennsylvania
DAN BISHOP, North Carolina
Adam Minehardt, Majority Staff Director
Melissa Jung, Majority Deputy Staff Director and Chief Counsel
Kevin Fitzpatrick, Staff Director
C O N T E N T S
OPENING STATEMENTS
Page
Hon. Nydia Velazquez............................................. 1
Hon. Steve Chabot................................................ 2
WITNESSES
Mr. Shon Hopwood, Associate Professor of Law, Georgetown
University Law Center, Washington, DC.......................... 4
Mr. Gary Wozniak, President and CEO, RecoveryPark, Detroit, MI... 6
Ms. Corinne Ann Hodges, CEO, Association of Women's Business
Centers, Washington, DC........................................ 7
Mr. Jerry Blassingame, Founder and CEO, Soteria CDC, Greenville,
SC............................................................. 9
APPENDIX
Prepared Statements:
Mr. Shon Hopwood, Associate Professor of Law, Georgetown
University Law Center, Washington, DC...................... 26
Mr. Gary Wozniak, President and CEO, RecoveryPark, Detroit,
MI......................................................... 30
Ms. Corinne Ann Hodges, CEO, Association of Women's Business
Centers, Washington, DC.................................... 34
Mr. Jerry Blassingame, Founder and CEO, Soteria CDC,
Greenville, SC............................................. 40
Questions for the Record:
None.
Answers for the Record:
None.
Additional Material for the Record:
Statement of Hon. Hakeem Jeffries............................ 44
Quotes by Brian Hamilton, CEO and Founder of Inmates to
Entrepreneurs.............................................. 47
PRISON TO PROPRIETORSHIP: ENTREPRENEURSHIP OPPORTUNITIES FOR THE
FORMERLY INCARCERATED
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WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 23, 2019
House of Representatives,
Committee on Small Business,
Washington, DC.
The committee met, pursuant to call, at 11:36 a.m., in Room
2360, Rayburn House Office Building. Hon. Nydia Velazquez
[chairwoman of the Committee] presiding.
Present: Representatives Velazquez, Finkenauer, Golden,
Kim, Crow, Davids, Chu, Veasey, Evans, Schneider, Delgado,
Craig, Chabot, Balderson, Hern, Burchett, and Stauber.
Chairwoman VELAZQUEZ. Good morning. The committee will come
to order.
I am pleased to be chairing this hearing today to discuss
entrepreneurship training opportunities for the incarcerated
and formerly incarcerated. Our committee has a longstanding
tradition of working in a bipartisan manner on behalf of
America's 30 million small businesses. It is through this work
that we strive to ensure programs at SBA are effective and seek
ways to encourage entrepreneurship.
Today, we have the opportunity to delve into an issue that
has the potential to help people who have been traditionally
locked out of the labor market. Let me begin by talking about
our criminal justice system. The United States has one of the
highest incarceration rates in the world. Despite having only 5
percent of the world's population, we have 25 percent of the
world's inmates.
People are locked up in nearly 7,000 facilities across the
country--109 federal prisons, 1,719 state prisons, 1,772
juvenile correctional facilities, and 3,163 local jails. Sadly,
there are more jails than colleges and universities in the
United States. That alone is telling. In our federal prison
facilities today, nearly half of those imprisoned are serving
time for non-violent drug offenses. It is expensive to put
people behind bars. In fiscal year 2017, the average cost to
incarcerate a federal inmate was $36,299 a year, or $99.45 a
day.
Congress took steps last year to enact legislation to
reform our criminal justice system. I am a proud supporter of
the First Step Act, which gives nonviolent offenders a chance
to reenter society. While this legislation is a step in the
right direction, the problem is overwhelming, and solutions
must come from multiple sources.
That is why I am holding this hearing today, so we can
explore innovative ways to give returning citizens the support
they need to rebuild their lives after their release from
prison, and to work to break the destructive cycles of
recidivism which are tragically too high and are tearing apart
too many communities across the country.
After paying their debt to society, former inmates return
to their communities with hopes and goals of starting fresh. In
2018, more than 37,000 incarcerated individuals were released
from federal prisons, and more than 97 percent of the nation's
180,000 federal inmates will eventually be released. The
recidivism statistics are sobering, showing that if we do not
take steps now, nearly half of those released will be
rearrested within 8 years.
That is because returning citizens face steep challenges
when faced with the often daunting task of reintegrating into
society. Many lack the education and skills needed to engage in
a 21st century economy. Many struggle to find stable and
affordable housing. And put simply, many employers do not want
to hire them because of the stigma associated with serving time
in prison. At the end, this serves no one. In fact, it leads to
dim employment prospects, reduced earnings potential--and yes,
it increases the rate of recidivism.
What can we here on this Committee do to be a part of the
solution to this crisis? We can start by looking at the role
that entrepreneurship can play in helping formerly incarcerated
individuals get back on track to pursue meaningful and healthy
lives. Supporting these individuals also offers the potential
to build wealth and create greater economic mobility.
In the coming weeks, the committee plans to introduce
several bills which will require SBA's resource partners to
provide counseling and training to individuals in prison and
post-release. The in-prison services would be carried out by
Women's Business Centers and Small Business Development
Centers. Federal prisoners would be eligible for intensive, in-
depth classroom instruction combined with one-on-one mentoring.
SCORE would be required to provide formerly incarcerated
individuals with regular one-on-one mentoring, workshops, and
on-line instruction specifically tailored to their unique
needs.
SBA's resource partners, with more than 1,000 centers
located across the country, are perfectly suited and very well-
positioned to carry out these services in federal prisons.
Entrepreneurship is the stepping stone to new opportunity
for individuals who are locked out of the labor market.
Unlocking opportunities for the formerly incarcerated will
empower and enable them to rebuild their lives, build wealth,
and promote lasting economic growth.
With that, I thank each of the witnesses for joining us
today, and I look forward to your testimony.
I would now like to yield to the Ranking Member, Mr.
Chabot, for his opening statement.
Mr. CHABOT. Thank you, Madam Chair.
The search for meaningful work up on release from prison
can be a long and difficult journey, particularly for those who
have been removed from society for an extended period of time.
To overcome those challenges, many inmates acquire valuable
skills and work experience through programs like Federal Prison
Industries. I have worked with Federal Prison Industries for
many, many years here from vocational training opportunities
and other educational courses.
Today, we will be hearing from witnesses representing
organizations that help individuals reenter society by
developing their entrepreneurial spirit. Successful reentry
programs utilize various strategies for preparing individuals
to reenter society as productive citizens.
I, like many of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle,
believe strongly that these programs are not only beneficial to
those individuals who will be reentering, but also to our
society overall. We owe it to these returning individuals and
to all of our fellow citizens to make sure that we are good
stewards in this rehabilitation.
As former President Bush noted in his 2004 State of the
Union Address, ``America is the land of second chances, and
when the gates of prison open, the path ahead should lead to a
better life.''
I, and I think many of us, look forward to the testimony of
our panel today and learning more about their recommendations
for alleviating barriers to entrepreneurship when they reenter
society.
I would note that I do have a school group that I have to
take care of for short period of time so I will be leaving but
then coming back, and we will be ably filled in by one of my
colleagues. I believe Mr. Hern will be filling in for me.
And with that, I yield back.
Chairwoman VELAZQUEZ. Thank you, Mr. Chabot. The gentleman
yields back.
If committee members have an opening statement prepared, we
ask that they be submitted for the record.
I would like to take a minute to explain the timing rules.
Each witness gets 5 minutes to testify and members get 5
minutes for questioning. There is a lighting system to assist
you. The green light will be on when you begin, and the yellow
light means there is 1 minute remaining. The red light comes on
when you are out of time, and we ask that you please stay
within that timeframe to the best of your ability.
I would now like to introduce our witnesses.
Our first witness is Mr. Shon Hopwood. Mr. Hopwood is a
distinguished lawyer and professor of law at Georgetown
University. His research and teaching interests include
criminal law and procedure, civil rights, and the
constitutional rights of prisoners. He received a J.D. as a
Gates Public Service Law Scholar from the University of
Washington School of Law. Mr. Hopwood's legal journey began in
federal prison where he learned to write briefs for prisoners
while serving a 12-year sentence for bank robberies. Two
petitions were later granted review by the United States
Supreme Court and he won a number of other cases in federal
courts throughout the country.
Welcome, Mr. Hopwood. I am pleased to have someone with
your expertise on the panel.
Our second witness is Mr. Gary Wozniak. Mr. Wozniak is the
founder and CEO of RecoveryPark in Detroit, Michigan. In his
current role, Mr. Wozniak leads the overall vision and
framework for the nonprofit which exists to create jobs for
people with barriers to employment. Mr. Wozniak has first-hand
knowledge of what it is like to start anew after serving time
in prison. Prior to launching RecoveryPark, he was a successful
stockbroker who became addicted to drugs. He served 4 years in
federal prison for using his clients' money to fuel his
addiction. Mr. Wozniak turned to entrepreneurship and opened up
several pizza franchises.
Welcome, Mr. Wozniak. I look forward to hearing your story.
Our third witness is Ms. Corinne Hodges, the CEO of the
Association of Women's Business Centers, where she is working
tirelessly to secure economic entrepreneurial opportunities for
women. Prior to joining the association in January 2019, Ms.
Hodges led the public relations team for Kia Motors
Manufacturing in Georgia. She also has experience as a small
business owner. Ms. Hodges helped at her mother's woman-owned
trucking company in Michigan and also ran her own advertising
and public relations agency. Thank you for being here.
Now I would like to yield to our Ranking Member, Mr.
Chabot, to introduce our final witness.
Mr. CHABOT. Thank you, Madam Chair. Jerry Blassingame is
the Founder and CEO of Soteria Community Development
Corporation and senior pastor of Soteria Christian Fellowship.
He attended Columbia International University and studied
architecture engineering at Greenville Technical College. In
1995, he received a 20-year prison sentence but served 3-1/2
years after being paroled in 1999. In 2018, he published a book
Reclaimed, a memoir of his journey. He is passionate about
helping those who have been incarcerated through reentry and
helping them to become productive citizens. He has continued to
fight for change in legislation since he was granted that
pardon, and we thank him for being here today.
I yield back.
Chairwoman VELAZQUEZ. Thank you, Mr. Chabot.
Mr. Hopwood, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
STATEMENTS OF SHON HOPWOOD, ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF LAW,
GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY LAW CENTER; GARY WOZNIAK, PRESIDENT AND
CEO, RECOVERYPARK; CORINNE ANN HODGES, CEO, ASSOCIATION OF
WOMEN'S BUSINESS CENTERS; JERRY BLASSINGAME, FOUNDER AND CEO,
SOTERIA CDC
STATEMENT OF SHON HOPWOOD
Mr. HOPWOOD. Well, thank you, Chairwoman Velazquez, and all
members of the Committee for the opportunity to testify and for
the enthusiastic support for the Prison to Proprietor Act.
I will give you my instruction that I give, whether it is
to the President of the United States, to members of Congress,
to churches, to chambers of commerce, and that is my name is
Shon Hopwood. I am an associate professor law at Georgetown
University Law Center, and I committed a violent crime. But I
am not a violent criminal.
And I give that introduction just as a reminder that
character is not static, people change, and the law should
recognize this. And we should be in the business of giving
second changes to people coming out of prison. It is good for
society. It changes lives. It strengthens families. And it
helps make our communities safer.
I served nearly 11 years in Federal prison. I went into law
while I was there. I now litigate cases in Federal court on
criminal law and civil rights issues, including prisoner rights
issues, and I studied the Federal criminal system as a legal
academic at Georgetown. And I was also very fortunate to work
and advise members of Congress and the President on the First
Step Act, which I want to congratulate all of you for helping
to pass because it has--well, I say it is two things at once.
On the one hand, it is still quite modest reform, but on the
other hand, I think it is the best criminal justice reform bill
to come out of Congress in my lifetime. And I do want to thank
you for that.
But as it is called, it is the First Step Act, and we need
so much more if we ever expect to reduce the number of people
in our Federal prisons, and more importantly for this
Committee, reduce the recidivism rate of people coming out of
prison. And everyone should be interested in that. We have
600,000 people that leave American prisons every year. We have
around 30- to 40,000 people that leave Federal prison every
year. We know that around 95 percent of people sentenced to
Federal prison will one day return to the community. And we
also know that the criminal justice system has now impacted so
many more Americans. We have 113 million Americans who have
someone in their close to immediate family who has been to jail
or prison within their lifetime. And so this is often what I
refer to mass incarceration as the civil rights issue of our
day.
So why prison entrepreneurship programs? Well, a couple
things. We know that the biggest factor in reducing the
recidivism rate of people coming out of Federal prison are a
few things. One, employment, and two, stable housing. And this
bill addresses the employment issue. People coming out of
prison have an unemployment rate that is five times higher than
the average American, and even higher than people had in the
Great Depression. And people coming out of prison have a great
deal of difficulty finding employment, both because of the
stigma of having the Federal conviction, but also because there
are 300,000 collateral consequences of a felony conviction. I
thought that when I got out of prison I had served my time and
that I would get to move on and get a second chance in life
until I realized that someone with a felony conviction, you can
be legally discriminated against in housing, employment, public
benefits, voting rights. And just the little things like when
parents of the children that my kids go to school with come and
say, hey, can we send our kids over to your house, I get really
nervous because I worry if they find out about my background
how that will impact whether or not they want to send their
kids over to my house. And so very few people get a true second
chance. It is one of the reasons why I am not a great fan of
the word ``returning citizen'' because returning second class
citizen would be a more appropriate moniker for people coming
out of prison.
Given that we know that employment really reduces the
recidivism rate, this bill really does that. It will help
people. We have had very much success in Texas and other prison
systems with prison entrepreneurship programs. In my written
testimony I talk about the story of Marcus Bullock who served 8
years in Virginia prison and came out and started Flikshop. He
recently did a Tedx Talk, and he is a good example of what can
happen when people get entrepreneurship training in prison. For
many people that come out, particularly those that have
committed violence and sex offenses, entrepreneurship is the
only way for them to get gainful employment.
And so because this bill will get at that particular
problem, I encourage you to pass this into law. Thank you.
Chairwoman VELAZQUEZ. Thank you, Mr. Hopwood.
Mr. Wozniak, you are next.
STATEMENT OF GARY WOZNIAK
Mr. WOZNIAK. Thank you. Good morning. Thank you, Chairwoman
Velazquez, and to the entire Committee for having me here
today. I came to testify because I am full support as well of
the legislation that you intend to pass.
I started an enterprise called RecoveryPark and we are a
social enterprise in the city of Detroit, and our mission is to
create jobs for people with barriers to employment. So people
coming out of prison, people coming out of drug treatment
plans. Obviously, from the introduction that I got it is a
process that is near and dear to my heart because I did serve
3-1/2 years in Federal prison from 1988 to 1991. And when I got
out of prison I spent 3 months actively looking for a job, and
my last job interview was with Enterprise Car Rental and they
turned me down for a desk clerk job. I went home that night and
I looked in the mirror and I said I am tired of people telling
me no and I had to do something different. So I took my
business skills that I developed as a stockbroker and I started
looking at business opportunities.
The easiest way for me to get into business from a capital
standpoint was to go into a franchise operation, so I opened up
a Jet's Pizza franchise. I do not think they are here in D.C.,
but I ended up owning four Jet's Pizza stores, and that was
really the launch of an entrepreneurial career for me. So since
the four Jet's Pizza stores, I have owned seven total
businesses. And when the meltdown happened in 2008, I closed my
businesses down because some of them were financial
institutions that were lending money to people that wanted to
start businesses and I could not borrow money cheap enough and
get it out effectively in the marketplace.
It was at that point that I went back to my roots of drug
addiction to the treatment center that I went to in 1987,
ShareHouse because they were struggling because of the
meltdown, and I helped them reorganize financially. And that
was where RecoveryPark was born. So it was a way to create a
social enterprise that could create jobs for the people that
are coming out of the prison system in the state of Michigan
and give them a leg up with a permanent job and benefits and
wraparound services around housing and transportation so that
they really had an opportunity to become successful citizens.
The last 30 years owning these businesses has been a real
eye-opening experience for me because when I launched the
businesses I did not have access to training and I did not have
access to capital. I went to the people that were closest to
me, my friends and family, to get access to capital, but even
then I could not get traditional lending. I could not get SBA
support. I could not get any of the traditional lines that an
entrepreneur or a business startup would go after.
So the opportunities that you are talking about today, had
I had an opportunity while I was in Federal prison in Duluth,
Minnesota, to become educated around how to run a business, how
to start a business, how to access capital, and then when I got
out of prison actually had microlending to come from the SBA or
an SBA-supported institution I think would have given me a real
leg up.
As Mr. Hopwood talked about, so he talked about the
necessity of jobs when people come out of prison. It is a
little anecdotal, but my work over the last 30 years with
returning citizens, basically, if somebody gets a job within
their first 3 months of coming out of an institution, they are
probably not going to go back and reoffend. If they cannot find
work within their first 6 months, there is a 30 percent chance
that that person is going to reoffend. If they cannot find work
in 9 months, there is a 70 percent chance that that person is
going to reoffend. And if they cannot find gainful employment
and housing within a year, they are definitely going back to
prison.
Those are unconscionable statistics, okay? And we have an
opportunity here today to change that. The First Offender Act,
it was a great first step. This is a great second step to, you
know, start getting rid of some of those barriers.
Today, I sit on five nonprofit boards. I have owned seven
businesses. I have got a social enterprise. I am the treasurer
of two of the boards that I sit on. I am on a Financial
Committee. I still cannot go mop floors in a nursing home by
law because they are afraid I am going to steal money from the
elderly clients that are in there. That is unconscionable. And
there is no way to get around that with the rules the way they
are set up. So this is an opportunity for us today to actually
do something positive to give people the educational
opportunities, to train them with the skillsets that they have.
And I am telling you that educationally, a lot of people in
prison might not have the traditional learning, but I guarantee
you there are a lot of people in prison that understand
customer service, that understand cash flow management, that
understand, you know, supply and demand, the food chain of how
a product gets into the marketplace. And if those skillsets can
be channeled in a positive way and money applied to it, I think
the world is their oyster. Thank you.
Chairwoman VELAZQUEZ. Thank you, Mr. Wozniak.
Ms. Hodges, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
STATEMENT OF CORINNE ANN HODGES
Ms. HODGES. Chairwoman Velazquez, Ranking Member Chabot,
and distinguished members of the Committee, good morning, and
thank you for convening today's hearing.
My name is Corinne Hodges. I serve as the CEO of the
Association of Women's Business Centers.
Our organization supports the national network of women's
business centers providing programming and advocacy to improve
services to women entrepreneurs. So I am honored to be here
today.
The women's business center program is a public-private
partnership with over 30 years of success in providing
training, counseling, mentoring, and access to capital to women
entrepreneurs across the country. What began as four
demonstration sites in 1988 is now a network of 114 centers
with more than 150 locations nationwide in no small part thanks
to this Committee's support. In that time, women business
centers have served more than 2 million women entrepreneurs
leading to the creation and expansion of tens of thousands of
new businesses and jobs. The women's business center program
continues to fulfill its congressional mandate of ensuring that
women's entrepreneurial drive is fueled by adequate resources
to keep the small business engine of the economy thriving.
It is the only program statutorily dedicated to serving
economically and socially disadvantaged women. All of our
centers live up to this mandate. But a number of our centers
take that mandate even further by bringing their services into
the state and Federal prison systems, both to men and women,
and equip them with the training and knowledge needed to start
their own business upon release from custody.
Many more of our centers also offer specific training and
resources to the formerly incarcerated who seek out business
training after their release.
The Missouri Women's Business Center ASPIRE MO class
provide an illuminating example of what can be accomplished
when undertaking entrepreneurship training in prisons. ASPIRE
MO was launched in collaboration with the Missouri Deparmtent
of Corrections Reentry Unit. It is a 20-week entrepreneurship
course for felony offenders in the Women's Eastern Reception
Diagnostic and Correctional Center, a state-run facility. The
course focuses on all aspects of entrepreneurial training, such
as financial literacy, use of credit cards and banking basics,
formulating a business concept, and pitch development. They
have also established systems with several of their bank
partners to provide microloans that are not based on credit
score or felony records. In addition, they utilize KIVA, a
nonprofit that connects entrepreneurs to 0 percent interest
loans and other crowdfunding platforms.
The Women's Business Center at SNAP located in Spokane,
Washington, teaches financial literacy classes in both the
county jail and the local state prison. In their experience
with this population they found a lack of credit history or
poor credit as primary barriers to access to capital. In
addition to business training, they encourage participants to
visit microlenders for access to capital. They also teach
clients about financial scams and predators in order to
position them for success as entrepreneurs, avoiding disastrous
credit terms and costly investments.
There are additional examples of prison entrepreneurship
training programs offered by women's business centers from
California to Tennessee in the written testimony I have
submitted for the record.
Many women's business centers offer services specifically
for the formerly incarcerated. The Women's Business Center of
Northern Ohio, which operates locations in Cincinnati,
Columbus, and Cleveland, recently participated in Reentry Week,
along with a number of community partners. They offered a full
day, small business workshop for formerly incarcerated
individuals looking to start their own business. The workshop
included strategic business planning, marketing strategy and
development, financial literacy, and legal steps for starting a
new business.
The Wisconsin Women's Business Initiative Corporation
(WWBIC) partners with community organizations who serve
returning citizens and lend to individuals with criminal
records. Current WWBIC client and former inmate Ed Hennings
served 20 years in prison and is now the owner of three
businesses. He first sought the assistance of WWBIC by taking
all of the business education courses they offered. He
eventually received a small loan through WWBIC. He now runs a
successful barbershop and salon in Milwaukee, and he was
recently approved for a $65,000 loan for his trucking business.
His story, among many others, is a testament to the success
that the formerly incarcerated can achieve with proper business
training, counseling, and access to capital.
Clearly, entrepreneurship has the power to create pathways
to success while reducing recidivism. We need legislation that
amplifies the work that several of our women's business centers
are already doing for the current and formerly incarcerated and
which allows us to build off that knowledge, expertise, and
passion to take these services nationwide. We are confident
that women's business centers and the Association of Women's
Business Centers can be competent partners in that endeavor to
help Americans returning home from incarceration overcome
barriers to employment by utilizing their talent, skills, and
ideas to start businesses that allow them to provide for
themselves and their families.
Chairwoman VELAZQUEZ. Thank you, Ms. Hodges.
Mr. Blassingame, you are next.
STATEMENT OF JERRY BLASSINGAME
Mr. BLASSINGAME. Thank you so much, Chairwoman, and Ranking
Member.
I really appreciate the opportunity to come here today to
share my story. When I think about my story people wonder, how
can a college-educated person go to prison? My story does not
start with me going to prison; it starts as a 5-year-old kid
who witnessed his mother getting murdered. And a lot of times
we do not talk about the trauma that a lot of us who have been
incarcerated face.
While I was in prison, one of the things that really helped
me was faith and knowing that people who cared about me came
into prison. The faith community was there for me when no one
else was there and it got me to understand that when I got out,
I needed to change my life. I ended up serving on 3-1/2 years
of a 20-year prison sentence. And every day of that 3-1/2 years
I wrote down the plan for what I am doing now. And that is one
thing I look for when I bring men into my program. I look for
guys who have short-term and long-term goals. I look for guys
who have been journaling, and I look for guys when they get
ready to get out, they are ready to get into the community.
So one of the things that helped us, in 1999, when I was
released, there was nothing, no services that were helping
people to start business, especially with criminal backgrounds.
So a young black man in the South trying to start businesses.
So here I am with a nonprofit. I was released in March of 1999,
and in April of 1999, we started a nonprofit, had a charter,
and the faith community rallied around me, pooled money
together to help me to get this nonprofit off the ground.
One of the things we did first was we went to one of the
local nonprofits to partner with us. They gave us a house. They
gave us a three-bedroom, two-bath house. We put four guys in
it. And then we got another house. Now we had eight guys in our
transitional housing program. No one would hire any of our guys
so we started a landscape business. And we started cutting
grass in the community, and the guys were making money.
A local couple in our church donated nine dilapidated
housing in a drug-infested neighborhood, and we got a $100,000
grant from the Deparmtent of Commerce through the South
Carolina Association of Community Development Corporations. So
we were able to take unlikely bedfellows and use resources that
were not allowed for reentry. So we became a community
development corporation, and I soon found out that community
development corporations help low- to moderate-income people
gain wealth and have access to capital. So I am one of those, I
can take something a little and make a lot out of it. And so we
took that $100,000 grant and we leveraged it to $700,000 to
build six three-bedroom, two-bath, low-income rentals for men
once they graduated our program because no one would rent the
guys housing once they graduated a 1-year program.
So we found out that it was more than just housing and
jobs. It was family reintegration. And so I also want to let
you all know who are here that we just cannot look at starting
businesses. We have to look at trauma. We have to look at
financial literacy, family reintegration. The whole community
has to come together. And also, I believe every agency in
Washington has to work together.
One of the things that I realized, too, is that agencies do
not work together. And so if all the agencies could work
together it would be great because we also got home funds from
HUD which was an unlikely bedfellow to give money to a reentry
organization. So these are just some of the things that we have
done over the last few years.
Five years ago, we started a deconstruction business where
we tear down old houses in our city. This lumber was going into
the landfill to be thrown away. Our guys started taking the
lumber and we make reclaimed wood furniture from the lumber. So
we train the guys who are getting out of prison in our
woodshop. And so now we have a business that sells reclaimed
wood furniture. So we are reclaiming wood and we are reclaiming
lives. The wood that would have been thrown away, the men who
are getting out of prison are taking that wood and making
beautiful artwork.
And so I just wanted to be here to let you guys know that
there are a lot of Jerry Blassingames out there who do not have
an opportunity. And if the faith community had not stepped up
to the plate 20 years ago, I would not be here today. So I am
thrilled to know that you all are thinking about doing
something to help those of us who have criminal backgrounds,
and especially, those that do not get education.
And my last thing I want to say is that when I got out, I
went back to finish my degree in architecture and I could not
get a Pell grant because of a drug conviction. And so all these
agencies have to work together to make sure that we get the
proper resources that we need to be productive citizens. Thank
you for your time.
Chairwoman VELAZQUEZ. Thank you very much. Let me take this
opportunity to thank all of you for being here, for having the
opportunity to build, to make contributions to our community
and for sharing your stories so that we can look at ways to
provide tools to help more individuals given the fact that
thousands of people are coming out of incarceration unprepared.
They deal with the stigma. How can we help these individuals
empower themselves and their families? Thank you so much for
taking the time to be here with us.
I would like to ask my first question to Ms. Hodges.
You spoke about some of the women's development centers,
approximately how many are around the country?
Ms. HODGES. One hundred fifty locations.
Chairwoman VELAZQUEZ. How many of those are already
providing services in literacy and training that is needed to
help these individuals?
Ms. HODGES. That is a tough question to answer, Ms.
Chairwoman, because first of all, all 150 locations obviously
provide training and counseling. And so if a returned citizen
enters into a women's business center, of course they are
offered services. In terms of services inside the Federal
facilities, I do not know exactly the number. We are receiving
anecdotes and reports from centers all across the country, but
I do not have specific data to note specifically which ones do
and which ones do not, which ones did this year and did last
year.
Chairwoman VELAZQUEZ. Based on the research that we have,
many incarcerated individuals lack basic literacy skills. It is
important for participants in federal entrepreneurship training
programs to have a strong foundation in financial literacy.
Based on the legislation we are discussing today, do you
feel that the elements in the bill will help address some of
those issues?
Ms. HODGES. Yes, Madam Chairwoman, we feel that the bill is
adequate and it addresses through the comprehensive and
intensive training the access to capital, the financial
literacy, the business plan development and pitching, all of
the elements that have been incorporated successfully with
results throughout the women's business centers. We also
believe that the legislation that has been discussed is
adequate in terms of the resources that it brings to the table
because without those resources, those women's business centers
could not provide these services without sacrificing services
to their existing clients.
And I would also be remiss if I did not thank this
Committee for their support in passing H.R. 4405, the Women's
Business Center Improvement Act of 2019, which increases the
authorization level for women's business centers and also would
have to highlight the efforts of Senator Cardin on this issue
with his bill, the New Start Act of 2019, which AWBC endorsed.
Chairwoman VELAZQUEZ. Thank you.
Mr. Hopwood and Mr. Wozniak, we have heard how veterans
hire veterans because they understand the challenges they face,
but also the training and expertise other veterans have after
returning home. Do the formerly incarcerated who launch their
own businesses tend to hire other former inmates? Do you have
any data or experience in that respect?
Mr. WOZNIAK. So good question. We hire almost exclusively
people coming out of prison. In our 3-1/2 year project to date,
we have hired 20 people. Nineteen of them are still employed.
None have reoffended. None have gone back, violated probation
or parole. We continue to provide support services to make sure
that they are stable in the workforce throughout the first 3
years because we feel 3 years is a good indicator. The $13
million greenhouse we are getting ready to build will employ
another 30 people and the majority of them will be coming out
of the system as well.
Chairwoman VELAZQUEZ. Thank you.
Mr. Hopwood, yes?
Mr. HOPWOOD. Chairwoman Velazquez, I do not have any data
other than anecdotes. And when I see businesses run by people
like Mr. Wozniak or other people that I know who are formerly
incarcerated, they do tend to hire the formerly incarcerated.
One of the people that works for my law firm, Joshua Boyer, is
a person who I served time with in Federal prison and then
hired to work with me on litigation when he got out. Marcus
Bullock, the example I gave before, the owner of Flikshop hires
almost exclusively people who are coming out of prison. So most
prison entrepreneurs hire people coming out of prison in part
because they do not view them with the same stigma that your
average American would.
Chairwoman VELAZQUEZ. Can you explain or discuss the
importance of providing entrepreneurship training in prison?
Mr. HOPWOOD. Yes. Because there are several groups of
people, particularly in the Federal system, that it is
difficult for them to find employment. And the groups of people
I am thinking of people that commit sex offenses, particularly
possession of child pornography which is a large segment of the
Federal prison population. Those people have a very difficult
time finding employment.
I also think prison entrepreneurship makes a whole lot of
sense for the Federal prison population considering so many of
them are in for drug offenses. As Mr. Wozniak was saying, a lot
of the people who committed drug offenses kind of have that
hustle and that inner drive that matches up well with
entrepreneurship. And I have seen a number of former Federal
drug offenders get out and go into that sort of work.
Chairwoman VELAZQUEZ. Thank you.
My time has expired, and now I recognize Mr. Hern, Ranking
Member of the Subcommittee on Economic Growth, Tax, and Capital
Access, from Oklahoma, for 5 minutes.
Mr. HERN. Madam Chairwoman, thank you so much.
It really is an honor to listen to you all. A lot of people
would think that you want people to feel sorry for you but that
is not what it is at all. I mean, it is quite the opposite of
that. They want you to be respected for serving your time and
to get reacquainted with society for whatever those purposes
might be.
I will tell you, I have been a business owner for over 30-
plus years. McDonald's restaurants, banking, all kinds of
things. Probably one of the greatest things that has happened
in recent years was ban the box on applications. I have spent a
lot of time in this area. I am probably guilty like a lot of
entrepreneurs and business owners out there of saying you would
be the employee of last choice. I think this stigma has been
changing. I would like to applaud the previous Congress and
President Trump for the First Step Act. But as you alluded to,
it is really just the first step. I have spent a lot of time in
our one-stop centers, our workforce centers, and had people
tell me that one in three people that come in the door have a
record. And while ban the box has been off of the applications
for a few years now, still employers view that and they always
go Google people so you get sort of the stigma of ban the box
because of Google.
And so it is about training and educating and changing our
workforce centers, and we are working with the state right now
and the governor to actually put somebody in the one-stop
centers to get people back to work because we know that lowers
the recidivism rates dramatically. And being from Oklahoma
where we have if not close to the highest, the highest women
incarcerated in the country, the majority of that is for drugs,
and whether it is the dad or the mom, it has a tremendous
impact on the families, the kids. We have a lot of businesses,
entrepreneurs that are hiring women to get them acquainted back
to the workforce, and the entire place are women who have come
out of prison.
I think all of our hearts changed dramatically, not to be
sympathetic but to be more understanding. And as we go forward
here, we can do more and more. There is a tremendous amount of
workforce. I am not sure what we are going to do with the
issues of the sexual predators. I do not see that being, anyone
softening on those issues. But the other issues, whether it be
for robbery as you did your time for, or whether it be for
drugs, whether it be for, you know, both of you all for drugs.
You die your time, and I applaud you all for going back and
never giving up.
We have to protect that opportunity. We have incarceration
terms for the purpose of paying back your debt to society for
what you did and breaking laws. But you should not have it held
over your head for the rest of your lives. Obviously, there are
certain jobs that it probably will be a long time before people
who have been incarcerated can take, but as we look forward--
and what I would like to do, I am the Ranking Member on the
Subcommittee for Capital Access and Growth, a huge
entrepreneur. I have thoughts on the idea. We have talked about
employment. I would like to just in the remaining time to go
through, and I would like to start with Mr. Blassingame and
just kind of work to our left. I am going to jump over you for
just a second.
What programs out there, I know the SBA is sort of
softening at the opportunity to get loans, the microloans for
people that have been incarcerated, but what are some of the
other areas that you have seen a real detriment in trying to
get help to start businesses?
Mr. BLASSINGAME. Well, every area. You know, we have had to
create our own, you know, streams. You know, one of the things
that helped us back, you know, a few years ago in 2008 and 2009
when the Feds had the IDA program, we used the IDA program
which was not even for people with criminal backgrounds. We
used it to fuel our entrepreneurs in homeownership. You know,
so that people who were getting out of prison could gain
access. So it was not even for us, but as a community
development practitioner, I brought those resources into our
organization and gave them to the people who were previously
incarcerated. So we created a lot of homeowners and business
owners through that.
Mr. HERN. Okay.
Mr. Wozniak?
Mr. WOZNIAK. So most of our funding has come from state
resources, through the Machine Economic Development Corporation
and foundations. I have also brought whatever personal wealth I
could bring into the equation. We just got approved, or the
U.S. Deparmtent of Agriculture for close to $7 million in
funding. We are having a struggle with the SBA because of my
felony background, even though 30 years of being out of prison,
they are having some issues with wanting to fund us. So I mean,
but that is where we are getting our money from.
Mr. HERN. Mr. Hopwood?
Mr. HOPWOOD. the program starts oftentimes in prison. A lot
of the men I served time with have never balanced a bank book,
a checkbook. And so just the knowledge of how to run a
business. In order to reduce recidivism, the process needs to
start in prison, not just when they get out.
Mr. HERN. Madam Chairwoman, if I may. Secretary DeVos
recognized a prison in Oklahoma 2 months ago for a community
college's involvement in doing the soft skills like you are
talking about, and some will not be out for 2 or 3 years, but
they have 40 or 50 folks who showed up for that. So it was
really great.
Thank you so much for your time, and I yield back.
Chairwoman VELAZQUEZ. The time has expired.
Now we recognize the gentleman from Maine, Mr. Golden,
Chairman of the Subcommittee on Contracting and Infrastructure,
for 5 minutes.
Mr. GOLDEN. Thank you, Madam Chair.
I just wanted to say real quickly, Mr. Hopwood, when you
were talking about the issues of stigma surrounding this and
how it can really, well, all of you spoke about it I think
really eloquently about some of the issues and focused in on
employment and housing.
Just maybe 2 weeks ago I was visiting a transitional
housing facility for veterans and, you know, Mr. Hopwood, you
talked about how people change. I was talking to an individual
who got out of the military, was struggling with post-traumatic
stress. Got into a fight and hurt some people. And look, I was
in the Marines. I served. We were taught to accept
responsibility for our actions. And then move on. And you know,
become better people for it. But decades later this guy still
has this charge following him and he cannot get housing. Right?
And he clearly, he managed to stay out of prison for a long
time and is clearly working really hard to be successful but
this housing issue will not, he cannot overcome it. So I
appreciate you sharing that. And I agree with you that we have
to find some way to address this.
I was curious, you did not really talk much about how you
got the educational opportunity when you were in prison, and
Mr. Blassingame did mention that he had trouble with a Pell
grants when he wanted to go and get his education, so I wanted
to know what you did. Because at the University of Maine, in
Augusta, there is a partnership with the Maine State Prison and
the Maine Correction Center, Women's Reentry Center where they
work with the Deparmtent of Education on what they call Second
Chance Pell Initiative so that people can get benefits or, you
know, fund their education costs so they can get that
education. You said it is important that we start in prison. So
I was curious how you were able to do it.
Mr. HOPWOOD. Well, it was not due to the Federal Bureau of
Prisons, I can tell you that. There were very few educational
or rehabilitation programs when I was in prison. I served in
the military, in the U.S. Navy and had a Montgomery GI bill
that I used to take college courses all across the country, and
then when I got out I pooled those courses together and
finished a bachelor's degree and was very fortunate after that
to get into law school. But most people do not have that
ability. And the veterans particularly really struggle with
trauma. And many of them will tell you that the trauma of war
is not that much different from the trauma of serving a long
time in the Federal prison system. And so, you know, we really
have to start, if we want to reduce recidivism, obviously, we
need things, resources for people when they get out of prison.
But I say that recidivism reduction and rehabilitation starts
the day someone enters the prison system. And all too often
people waste years or decades just in prison, and we do not
give them any programs, and then we kick them out with no job
skills and we expect a miracle to happen. And when it does not
we tend to say, oh, see, you were evil always to begin with
when really they just needed some chances. Second chances.
Mr. GOLDEN. Well, I do want to point out it sounds as
though your GI Bill stuck with you despite the fact that you
had committed a crime.
Mr. HOPWOOD. Yes.
Mr. GOLDEN. So there is a policy different right there
between the GI bill and how we treat veterans who do find
themselves in trouble with the law and other people and when it
comes to other Federal education programs. So it is just
something for us to think about.
But I wanted to ask any of you if you wanted to talk about
it, do you see any opportunity for any of the SBA
entrepreneurial development programs, like SBDCs or others, to
work within the prison system to build on educational
opportunities like second chance Pell? I mean, would your
programs be potentially more successful? Ms. Hodges, I am kind
of thinking of yours, if it were tied in hand-in-hand with
educational opportunities.
Ms. HODGES. I certainly think that is an interesting idea.
The more partnerships that we forge throughout all of our
services, whether it is in a facility or out, we know that that
makes the results and the outcomes more successful. So I
welcome the opportunity to really begin to research that more
formally and to engage with the Office of Entrepreneurial
Development on that topic. Certainly, there are already some
examples of those partnerships in place, and I know with the
small business development centers, and my partner over here,
Tee Rowe, his offices are already on campuses. And in some
cases, our women's business centers are as well. And so forging
those partnerships would be natural. It would be easy. But
working more formally with the Office of Entrepreneurial
Development I think could really put some wind in our sails.
Mr. GOLDEN. Thank you.
Madam Chair, I yield back.
Chairwoman VELAZQUEZ. The gentleman yields back.
The gentleman from Tennessee, Mr. Burchett, is recognized
for 5 minutes.
Mr. BURCHETT. Thank you, Chairlady. It is Burchett, birch
like the tree, and it, like I just ate breakfast. So I just
remind you of that.
And I want to commend our Chairlady. The first week we were
here I was reading, saw on the Internet where there was a jail
in her district where they, unbelievably it was cold up there.
I live in Tennessee and it gets down to 32 degrees and we get a
quarter inch of snow and we close the schools. But it was
really cold where she is, and there was a jail and the power
was off. And I felt compelled to bring that to the Committee's
attention then and I feel compelled now because I think it is,
you know, it is easy and it is cool to beat up on people that
are in jail, but eventually, I believe 95 percent of them are
going to get out and we have got to do something about it. And
my background is technical and adult education. And we have got
to do something. The trades are where it is at it seems to me
and that is a perfect thing. And of course, I have skipped all
over. I did not read what my staff prepared for me. I do not
know what I pay them for, Chairlady. I do not ever follow what
they have got. Maybe that is where we need to start. No, I am
just kidding. Do not get nervous.
But anyway, I will just go through my thing there, and I
apologize. It is the Southern Baptist in me. I got to
preaching. Just do not let us be your offering plate. That is
all I got to say.
Thank you all, Madam Chair. Again, I appreciate you for
holding this important hearing. And thank you all for being
here. It is an incredibly important issue, and I believe we
need to work on it more.
Earlier this month I wrote a letter in support of a prison
workforce program in Claiborne County. It is a small area.
Rural folks, just hardworking country people. They are
unbelievably cool people. And it works out to about 3 percent
of the district I represent, but I try to spend as much time up
there as I can.
And ultimately, I wanted to make sure that individuals who
are incarcerated, are ready for a fresh start, they get a new
beginning, they have all the opportunity to do so.
My question, Mr. Blassingame--I believe I said that right.
If not, I apologize--you make a point in your testimony about
government grants being hard to manage, and the people who need
them never seem to receive them. Could you elaborate a little
bit on that and how we can make sure this is not the case
anymore?
Mr. BLASSINGAME. Sure. So there is a lot of reporting and a
lot of staffing that is needed when it comes to managing
government grants. A lot of small, grassroots organizations do
not have the capacity to manage. And then when the money comes
down, we have to hire consultants to manage the grants for us,
and the money that needs to go to programming goes to people,
you know, to pay them. So it is just a catch-22. So I would
like to see more of us getting training on the ground, the
self-taught person. I love to read, and so I taught myself to
write grants. I taught myself business. And so I am an anomaly.
I was one of those. But everybody is not a Jerry Blassingame.
So I would love to see more people get training, even training
while they are incarcerated on how to manage grants and how to
do business.
Mr. BURCHETT. Yeah. A simple bookkeeping class might be in
order. I suggested that in the past and it fell on deaf ears.
Maybe something like that, some basic skills that you will need
to learn in the business community would be good I would think.
Mr. BLASSINGAME. Yes.
Mr. BURCHETT. Mr. Wozniak, you mentioned a couple of
educational opportunities with SCORE mentorship programs. Would
specifically teaching individuals how to start a business work?
Mr. WOZNIAK. It did me. So unlike Mr. Hopwood, we did not
have any opportunities for education when I was in Federal
prison. I could barely get newspapers in to read them to stay
current. Had I had the opportunity to take Business 101 while I
was in prison, you know, how to read a balance sheet, how to do
a P&L, how to do cash flow management, and then had access to
funding and then had access to mentoring through a SCORE
system, I would not have even bothered to look for a job. I
would have had a business model already lined up and had some
seed capital to get into it. So yes, it would make a very big
difference.
Mr. BURCHETT. All right. I just want to thank you all for
being here and to have the courage to be here to talk about
what is going on. Hopefully, we can rewrite some of this in the
future.
And Chairlady, again, I commend you on your noble stand. I
know it maybe does not help you politically, but I think God
likes it. He talks about the least amongst us.
Chairwoman VELAZQUEZ. It is the right thing to do.
Mr. BURCHETT. It is the right thing to do, Chairlady. Thank
you so much.
Chairwoman VELAZQUEZ. The gentleman yields back. Thank you.
Now we recognize Ms. Chu from California, Chairwoman of the
Subcommittee on Investigations, Oversight, and Regulations, for
5 minutes.
Ms. CHU. Thank you. And Mr. Hopwood, Mr. Wozniak, and Mr.
Blassingame, your stories are so compelling.
And Mr. Hopwood, I remember watching you on 60 Minutes
telling your story and it was just so incredibly important for
people in America to understand what this process of rebuilding
your lives is all about.
And so let me ask you, Mr. Hopwood, my home state of
California has taken several steps in recent years to extend
higher education opportunities to incarcerated people. And the
state now enrolls thousands of students in full credit degree
building college courses in 34 of its 35 prisons. As you cite
in your testimony, the RAND Corporation has found that
correctional education programs are correlated with a 43
percent reduction in recidivism.
So how do you think that public colleges and universities
can promote employment and entrepreneur opportunities for
incarcerated and returning citizens? How can they make a
difference?
Mr. HOPWOOD. Well, so many of the best reentry stories I
have seen involve community. And one of the communities that is
very safe for people coming out of prison are colleagues and
universities where people go and they feel like they are
getting a fresh chance at life. And I think those programs have
had success because people coming out of prison get the
education they maybe never had and the chance that they maybe
never had while in prison. Those programs you mentioned reduce
recidivism. And what often you hear is, well, why would we give
these free programs to people who broke the law? But that is so
shortsighted when you think about spending a little bit of
money on education in prison and entrepreneurship in prison, it
saves a whole lot of money on the back end when that person
does not commit a new offense, does not re-victimize someone,
and we do not have to pay for the re-prosecution and re-
incarceration. So spending a little bit of money on the
frontend to make us safer and save a bunch of money on the
backend, I call that good government. And we just have to quit
being so shortsighted when it comes to trying to use
rehabilitation programs. And between the First Step Act and
some of the things that this Congress is doing now, I am
hopeful that people in Federal prison today will have the
opportunities that Mr. Wozniak did not have.
Ms. CHU. And then there is the release upon prison, from
prison. What type of barriers do recently incarcerated people
face as they leverage their training into full-time training or
entrepreneurship?
Mr. HOPWOOD. Well, somebody mentioned how difficult it is
to get employment with the Google age. And yes, we have these
policies that say ban the box, but people do not have to do
deep background checks anymore. Even if the box is banned,
someone does a Google search and finds out that someone has
been convicted of a felony, it is really difficult to sway that
person and convince that person to give them a second chance.
And so we need more public-private partnerships.
Just this last weekend, JPMorgan announced that it is going
to start doing second chance hiring. Koch Industries has done
that for several years, and I think it is going to require new
laws from the Congress, but it is also going to require
businesses to step up and say we are going to affirmatively
hire people coming out of prison knowing that they have felony
convictions. And I think it is going to take us kind of
pressing from all sides in order to get at this recidivism
problem.
Ms. CHU. In fact, Mr. Wozniak, you experienced firsthand
the barriers that formerly incarcerated people face who seek
employment. You have a breadth of experience as a business
owner running both traditional businesses and RecoveryPark
where you offer employment. What would you tell business owners
in breaking down the stigmas associated with hiring a formerly
incarcerated, I mean, what would you tell them in terms of
hiring those who are formerly incarcerated?
Mr. WOZNIAK. So we are working with a couple of
manufacturing companies in Detroit right now because
unemployment is so low. And I mean, people coming out of prison
are a great resource. I tell them the successes that we are
having and all the businesses that I have had, how stable the
employees are, how they follow the rules, how they show up on
time, how they want to work the extra mile. You know, how they
do not exhibit any of the tendencies that probably took them to
prison in the first place. I also talk about the opportunity to
hire people and provide some support services to stabilize the
workforce so that they are not hiring and firing and hiring and
firing people because it is expensive to do that. So if you
hire somebody, my biggest suggest is a guy who went into prison
at 14 years old. He came out 33 years later. In 2 years, he is
on his way to a $60,000 welding job. He is getting married. He
owns two cars. We helped him clean up his credit. I mean, that
is a success story. That is what I tell people.
Ms. CHU. And have you been successful in persuading them?
Mr. WOZNIAK. Yes. I have got one company now, a steel
manufacturer, that wants us to come in and manage the returning
workforce population.
Ms. CHU. Thank you. I yield back.
Chairwoman VELAZQUEZ. Time has expired. The gentlelady
yields back.
The gentleman from Pennsylvania, Mr. Evans, Vice Chair of
the committee, is recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. EVANS. Thank you, Madam Chair.
I, too, like others, want to congratulate you and your
leadership for just giving the opportunity to have this
platform discussion. So I thank you sincerely for your
leadership.
I want to deal with a question I think Mr. Hopwood was
starting to touch on about what does it take? And the question
I ask to members of the panel, what other barriers do ex-
offenders face when trying to start new businesses? You started
down the line of saying a certain type of person. Can you kind
of recall that conversation, pick up on that? You were saying
someone who has been involved in drugs who comes out of prison
is better. Do you want to talk a little bit about that?
Mr. HOPWOOD. Yeah. From my experience, most of the people I
served time with were there for drug offenses and those people
had hustled on the streets. And so I have seen several of them
get out and hustle on the streets but in a different path. And
have been wildly successful starting businesses. They have the
inner motivation. Some of them, you know, are risk-takers. And
most of what they need is just educational opportunities in
prison and some support when they get out. And if they had that
support, I mean, you look at the prison entrepreneurship
program in Texas. It has reduced recidivism there by a third.
There is Defy Ventures. There is, in my home state of Nebraska,
ARISE, which goes in and trains people how to create a business
plan and then helps them get small loans up to like $5,000 when
they are released. I know one gentleman took the prison
entrepreneurship program in prison, got out, got a small grant,
and started a lawnmower service. He now, you know, has eight
employees and 10 different riding lawnmowers and is widely
successful. And so particularly the Federal prison system which
has fewer people in for violent offenses than the state systems
and a lot more people in there for drug offenses. And in my
experience, people who have committed drug offenses are ripe
for doing entrepreneurship when they are out and have had
success.
Mr. EVANS. So in other words, I hear what you are saying. I
mean, that is why I gave the Chairwoman credit for these
initiatives. I mean, we can do our part, but there is another
part you were talking about and I am just trying to understand
how can that connection be made.
Mr. HOPWOOD. Well, I think part of it would, if I could
waive a magic wand, would be not imposing such long sentences
on people to begin with which I think really hampers the
rehabilitation effort. You take a 20-year-old and give him a 20
year mandatory minimum and tell him wake up every day and seize
the day and improve yourself. Well, that is really hard for
that person to do so. And the great irony of the American
criminal justice system is the longer someone tends to spend in
corrections, the least corrected they are. Not necessarily
because, well, in part because of the prison system but in part
because your social skills deteriorate while in prison. And
unless there are programs and educational opportunities and
visitors coming in where you can kind of be tethered to the
outside world, it is hard for people to take advantage of the
programs that are in prison. And so I would tell you, as a
first step, reduce the prison sentences and put in more
programs and you would see a lot more people come out and have
success.
Mr. EVANS. Can I come down the line real quick? So
anything?
Mr. WOZNIAK. Thank you. In Michigan, we have innovation
villages or vocational villages where people can actually go
and they leave the prison for 9 hours a day and they are in an
actual work environment and they are learning the skillsets
that they need and they are coupled with an employer. For the
last 5 years, me and my team have been going into the prisons
and we have been actually teaching entrepreneurship classes in
about five state prisons in the state of Michigan. And they are
probably the most well attended classes out of all the classes
that they offer in the state. People are like sponges. They
want to learn but they need the basic skillsets as well. So
like how to put a business plan together. How to put the
narrative together. How to put the financial spreadsheet
together. And that needs to happen in prison. It needs to
happen quickly because you need to capture people and keep them
motivated to do good things when they get out.
Mr. BLASSINGAME. I went to prison for selling drugs while I
was in college, and so I had about eight people in my community
working for me. So when I got out I took $100,000 and leveraged
the $700,000 to build an affordable housing project. And so you
are exactly right that those of us who have been in the drug
dealing business, we have a business acumen. We just need to
clean it up.
And I also became a Christian while I was in prison, and so
that helped me, too. My faith has also been a great indicator
to help me to do the right thing. I love getting guys who have
been in prison for dealing drugs and putting them in our
business. I have a guy right now who just got out from a
Federal prison and he came right out and he became part of my
leadership team because of his leadership ability that he had
while a gang member on the street.
Mr. EVANS. Thank you.
I yield back. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Chairwoman VELAZQUEZ. The gentleman yields back.
Now we recognize the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Veasey.
Mr. VEASEY. Madam Chair, thank you very much.
This is really great. I wish that more people could be able
to just hear these stories because they really are wonderful
and just talks about a situation that we really do need to
figure out a way how to address head on because, like you say,
most people, 95 percent of the prison population will be coming
back into society. And so how they fit back into society, be
able to earn a living, and some of those I think factors are
very complicated, too. Like how you are able to actually earn a
good living and be able to pay a car note, any sort of back
child support that you may have. I mean, there are lots of
different issues that go out there. It is not as easy as just
being able to go and work at a minimum wage job at a fast-food
restaurant and think that that is going to supply like all of
your needs to be able to function back in society. So I just
wanted to thank all of you.
Mr. Wozniak, one of the things that I missed in your
testimony, and you may have talked about it but I did not catch
it, when you started the pizza franchises, how did you get the
capital or the money to start? Because I know most franchises
cost, you know, at least, what, $10,000 to $20,000. A more
well-known franchise could cost well into the hundreds of
thousands of dollars.
Mr. WOZNIAK. So I needed to raise a couple hundred thousand
dollars to get into the franchise because I had a multi-store
contract. I actually do not have a problem asking people for
money because if I do not ask they cannot tell me now. And I
went to some of the people that I actually stole money from to
support my drug addiction. So some of my former clients and my
relatives. And a number of them told me no but some of them
said yes. And they got paid back. So, you know, that is how it
started.
Mr. VEASEY. What sort of advice would you give to people
that are coming out of prison, people that may be from more,
what is the correct word, marginalized communities, for
instance, that may not have access to those types of friends
that you had, if they wanted to come out of prison and start
their own business? Because that is, I mean, I am talking to a
lot of people that do not have, and people who live in my
district that do not have a criminal background record, that
would like capital to start up a business, would like to be
able to have the relationships needed to go into a bank and get
money and what have you but they cannot do it. And it is a huge
source of frustration. And so I was just wondering what sort of
advice would you have for people that are coming out that need
access to this type of capital?
Mr. WOZNIAK. So my advice would be, you know, if the access
to capital that you need is too great, you know, maybe you need
to just downsize your initial business and figure out how to
leverage the resources that you do have. All of my businesses
have been in the city of Detroit. It is a really challenged
city. A lot of the people that I deal with and a lot of the
businesses that I have helped launch for other people have had
the barriers that you are talking about. So,
undercapitalization. You just have to beat the bushes harder.
You have just got to look for programs that are available and
figure out how to take $5,000 here and $6,000 there and $10,000
from somewhere else and piece it together and then leverage it
like Mr. Blassingame did with his CDC.
Mr. VEASEY. Right. Exactly.
Mr. WOZNIAK. And also, just do not give up. I mean, the
biggest reason that most people fail at getting into business
is they give up. They start listening to the noise around them,
the 85 percent of the people that tell them do not take the
risk. You are going to fall flat on your face. You are going to
make mistakes. Oh, you were a prisoner. Nobody is going to want
you in your community. I do not listen to any of that noise.
And any successful entrepreneur cannot.
Mr. VEASEY. Mr. Hopwood, I think it was you, or it may have
been Mr. Wozniak, that said something that was interesting
about socialization. You know, because your socialization in
prison is completely different than socialization on the
outside. And I know a successful business owner in Dallas that
told me that they have hired a lot of people that have been
formerly incarcerated, and coming to work on time, honesty,
those sorts of things really were not a problem but it really
was the soft skills that was a huge issues because you do not
necessarily resolve problems in prison the same way that you
would in the outside world.
Do you just want to touch on that? And do you think that
there are enough efforts in that area to help people? Do you
think that that is the biggest problem or----
Mr. HOPWOOD. I think that is one of the biggest. There are
not enough programs in the Federal prison system. I am hopeful
First Step will change that. But you know, when you have
conflict in the prison system there is no de-escalation.
And I often tell the story of my poor wife back here who,
we got married shortly after I got out and I had been in prison
for 11 years. And when we had arguments, I tended to revert
back to who I was in prison and that did not make for a very
good husband. And it does not make for, you know, good
coworkers when people get out. And so we do have to do a better
job of helping people with social skills on the inside. And we
have got to get more Americans to go in and teach classes in
prison. And offer, you know, their wisdom and guidance to the
people inside.
Mr. VEASEY. Thank you very much. God bless all of you.
Madam Chair, thank you very much.
Chairwoman VELAZQUEZ. The gentleman yields back.
We recognize the gentleman from Illinois, Mr. Schneider.
Mr. SCHNEIDER. Thank you, Madam Chairman. And thank you for
having this hearing. And I want to thank the witnesses for
courageously sharing your stories and for doing what you do,
for being out there.
A lot of good points made. I am thinking of some of my
experiences in my community. I am from the northern suburbs of
Chicago, and in one of my communities, Waukegan, there is a
disproportionate number of oftentimes young people who were in
the prison system but there has been a compelling and
compassionate effort to address that in an organization called
the Coalition to Reduce Recidivism. And they have been at the
forefront. And I have had the chance to attend many of their
meetings. I have been a long-time supporter of the
organization. And in those meetings I have had the chance to
meet some of the people who are returning citizens and hearing
their stories. And I bring that up because it is hearing those
stories that is so important to understanding not just the
challenges our returning citizens face but the part of the
justice system we need to provide to make sure that these
people have the chance to succeed and be a part of our
communities.
I think it was Mr. Hopwood, you said reentry requires a
community, and it really is true. And that is one of the things
that I hope through these conversations and hearings we can
work to further that along. But also one of my takeaways,
again, Mr. Hopwood, you said it is we need to start the process
when people enter the prison system. It is important for us to
see these young men and women of all ages as part of our
community and it is our responsibility to help them make that
transition.
Is it Mr. Blassingame? Did I get that right? Your story and
your experience, you talked about being an entrepreneur by
being able to channel in the right direction. One of the things
that my colleague, Mr. Veasey touched on is it is hard to be
something or aspire to be something when you do not have a
chance to see that something, whether it is in a role model or
whatever. And so the need for mentoring, whether it is through
SCORE programs or the other programs in prisons is a piece of
the things that we have to do.
But it is incumbent upon us as members of Congress to open
our eyes and be willing to get out of our comfort zones. For
me, it was the first time I had someone talk to me about ban
the box, and coming from the financial services industry I was
like, whoa, I need that box to know. They were, no, you can ask
it later at least give the chance to have the interview. Give
us a chance to tell the story.
And having been an entrepreneur and understanding the
importance of that, I appreciate being your own boss, making
your own destiny, but again, Mr. Hopwood, you talked about
scrappiness. And I think that is a piece of being an
entrepreneur.
In my district in the Chicago area, I had the chance to
meet with a guy named Tom Decker. He is got a company called
Chicago Green Insulation. And what they are doing is installing
insulation mostly in basements, but that is part of the move
towards green technology, green energy. But what he has found
is that it is a skillset that he can teach pretty quickly to
people coming out of prison and they can learn the skill. And
he has hired a number of formerly incarcerated individuals, and
what he has also found is that these people, as you mentioned
Mr. Wozniak, these people show up on time. They do their work.
But the soft skills, he is working on that.
I guess my broad question for the whole panel, anyone can
jump in, is you know, not just the entrepreneurs, the returning
citizens who are becoming entrepreneurs, but the small
businesses who want to reach out and hire returning citizens,
what more can we do to help them? Are there programs we can put
in place to help those companies that say, hey, give these
people a chance. Let them learn the skills. Give them the space
to make their mistakes and grow and maybe grow some
entrepreneurs along the way?
Mr. BLASSINGAME. I do not think it is about programs. I
believe from our experience it is the relationships. You know,
small businesses come to us to hire guys from our organization
because we work on the hard skills and soft skills. The
relationships, conflict resolution, you know, that is something
that somebody mentioned about being in prison, a lot of
conflict. That is the thing that I have had most problems with
with the guys in our transitional houses, how to resolve
conflict. Because if you cannot resolve conflict, you cannot
keep a job. So that is one of the things that we work on on a
daily basis in our program, in our 1-year program is resolving
conflict. And when we talk to small businesses about that, they
want to be able to hire people who can resolve conflict because
they will stay on the job longer.
Mr. SCHNEIDER. Absolutely.
Mr. Wozniak?
Mr. WOZNIAK. I think the biggest thing the Federal
Government can do is actually start issuing contracts to
companies that hire returning citizens and start talking about
the success that they are having. The Federal Government tends
not to do that. I know we are doing it in the state of
Michigan. They banned the box and they actually hire people
coming directly out of prison.
Mr. SCHNEIDER. And as you said, not just do it and support
the companies that do it, but celebrate.
Mr. WOZNIAK. Absolutely.
Mr. SCHNEIDER. We have communication tools at our disposal.
We can work to get the message out.
My time is up but again, I want to thank all the panelists
for being here. And in particular, the Chairwoman, thank you
for having this hearing.
Chairwoman VELAZQUEZ. Thank you.
Mr. SCHNEIDER. I yield back.
Chairwoman VELAZQUEZ. Thank you. The gentleman yields back.
Let me take this opportunity to thank all of the witnesses
for taking time out of their schedule to be here with us today.
Your testimonies were compelling. Your stories are truly
inspirational. I cannot recall a more moving hearing that we
have conducted throughout my 27 years serving on this
committee. Thank you so much. I really appreciate it.
Through hard work and perseverance, you were able to
overcome the barriers to reentry and lead successful lives. I
commend each and every one of you for your commitment to
criminal justice reform, and I would also like to thank Ms.
Hodges for her willingness to testify today and to share her
expertise. And of course, we recognize the presence of Tee
Rowe, the director of the Small Business Development Centers
Network.
In closing, we had a chance to learn more about the
challenges facing formerly incarcerated individuals and how
entrepreneurship can give them a second chance upon reentering
society. I look forward to working with you as well as my
colleagues on the committee to advance legislation that will
provide the incarcerated and formerly incarcerated with
entrepreneurship training services needed to launch and grow a
small business.
Before we close, I ask unanimous consent to enter into the
record testimony submitted by Representative Hakeem Jeffries
from New York.
Without objection, so ordered.
I ask unanimous consent that members have 5 legislative
days to submit statements and supporting materials for the
record.
Without objection, so ordered.
If there is no further business to come before the
committee, we are adjourned. Thank you.
[Whereupon, at 12:54 p.m., the Committee was adjourned.]
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