Felons hope to regain voice in November

Florida doesn’t need to worry about a year-round daylight saving time law because we’ve always operated on our own time.

And when it comes to restoring felon voting rights, we are late. Extremely late.

All but four states in this country automatically restore voting rights to convicted felons once they’ve served their time, excluding the most heinous offenses like murder and sexual assault.

In November, Floridians, not legislators, will get the final say on the ballot as to whether or not they want to get with the current time regarding this issue.

The fact that close to a million signatures were collected when petitioning for this amendment to be on the ballot coupled with some early polling suggests the majority of Floridians will vote yes to this issue in the fall. Currently, no organizations are registered to oppose this initiative.

However, this is Florida, where you can always expect the unexpected.

So for anyone wrestling with the idea of giving another citizen a second chance to have a voice, I’d like for you to consider Davion Hampton’s story.

He used to be my neighbor in Midway — a small, mostly black community in Sanford — before he was locked up for selling drugs.

Bad choices landed him in prison, so his story doesn’t invite the kind of nonchalant response compared to someone who wrote a bad check. But even the more complicated stories are worth understanding.

Davion grew up with two hard-working parents and with brothers who navigated different paths — which has allowed each of them to work as a police officer, firefighter, construction worker and educator.

But he succumbed to the drug game ravaging communities like Midway in the early 1990s.

“I was in middle school and seeing cousins and friends bringing crack and cocaine to sixth grade,” Davion said. “Eventually, I got caught up in it at a young age.”

Cocaine wasn’t the root of Davion’s problem. His bigger demon was greed.

By the time he was 28, he said he was making $38 dollars an hour working as an electrician for Military Construction, one of NASA’s subcontractors.

His legitimate work income became side money to what he earned selling drugs to his highend clientele, which included doctors, attorneys, scientists and astronauts.

Dealing to a discreet clientele, he said, is likely what allowed him to get away with selling drugs since he was 19.

“I was expecting to live this lavish lifestyle that I felt was promised to me. Things, jewelry, women — and that wasn’t true. I found out the hard way,” Davion said. “Going to prison was the

best thing that happened to me, because I was lost without knowing I was lost.”

Davion served 36 months in a Florida prison, as it was his first offense.

While there, he found God, and then he found himself. Davion also found a great deal of regret over the choices he made and used that as motivation to become a better father, a better son and a legit business owner.

Just six years after his release, he employs 10 electricians at his own company — which he built through a lot of blood, sweat and tears.

When he got out of prison, Davion said he couldn’t even qualify to get food stamps because of his conviction. Getting a job that paid him enough to support his children? Forget about that. And qualifying for a house, well, that option was obsolete.

Again, I know some of you are probably saying why should I feel sorry for that guy. But this story isn’t about sympathy.

“Going to prison was the best thing that happened to me, because I was lost without knowing I was lost.” Davion Hampton

This is a reality that many convicted felons face once they get out of prison.

Davion did the hard work and made the most of his second chance. His family believed in him and helped furnish him with lawn equipment so he could start his own lawn business and do electrical work — a trade he had honed for years before going to prison.

My lawn was among the first ones he cut. We are a Christian household that believes in a God of mercy, grace and loving your neighbor.

Davion is more than the convicted felon box he’s had to check in the past. And I know he’s not the only one deserving a second chance to be fully restored to society with voting rights.

I sat in a Florida Rights Restoration Coalition meeting in Sanford last month and met mothers and grandmothers who made mistakes 20 years ago and are still waiting for the right to vote again. Some convicted felons are even veterans who fought for this country and struggled with drug addictions to cope with the horrors they’d seen.

The stories are all different, but they all wanted the same thing; a second chance to be heard and seen as more than their mistakes.

“Me having my rights back makes me feel like I have a better chance of voicing my opinion and being able to check my box in saying who should be the leaders for the future and betterment of our community and my children,” Davion said. “Everybody deserves second chances.”