Programs work

Gov. Mary Fallin spoke recently at the Women Unshackled Forum in Washington, D.C., about the negative impact of female incarceration on the state budget and family structures. Fallin said community programs can break the cycle. She’s right. In 2002, I was released from prison. A few days later, I met my Stand in the Gap “family.” For the next year, this small group mentored me through each decision I needed to make to stay sober, get a job and regain custody of my three children. That relationship released me from the prison I carried inside of me. Prisons don’t address the obstacles that inmates will face after release. That task is left to organizations like Stand in the Gap, which offers a course inside eight Oklahoma prisons and jails, called Women in Transition. Women in Transition teaches strategies to deal with addictions, anxiety, grief and anger. The course also provides practical resources for re-entry, culminating in the Stand in the Gap small group experience that changed my life and the lives of my children.

According to the National Institute of Justice, more than 67 percent of exoffenders nationwide will be rearrested within three years. Only 3 percent of those who completed the Women in Transition program have been reincarcerated. Today, I voluntarily return to prison to teach the Women in Transition course. I would never go back to prison without truly believing this program has the power to save lives, mine included.