Returning Neighbors: Healing Memphis Through Better Re-entry

Currently, people released from the criminal justice system in Shelby County re-offend at a rate of about 24.5%, often because they lack access to safe, quality housing and employment options. This year, the Shelby County Office Of Reentry (SCOR) will be receiving an award of $999,101 to fund a study of the Returning Neighbors Program, which seeks to provide safe, affordable housing, employment opportunities, and wraparound services to justice-involved individuals.

Seeding Success joined SCOR, the Center for Research in Educational Policy (CREP) at the University of Memphis, Hope Credit Union, and Hospitality Hub to pursue this federal grant, opening up the opportunity to gather data on the program’s effectiveness and improve chances for expansion. Erica Coleman, policy advisor for Seeding Success, led S2’s involvement in completing the grant application. She believes the value of Returning Neighbors lies in its comprehensive method for addressing the struggles people face when exiting the criminal justice system: 

“Just having employment is not enough if they don't have stable housing. It's not enough if we aren't addressing any type of mental or behavioral or substance use issues. It's not effective if there's a lack of transportation. So we’re really trying to coordinate all of the issues that impact their ability to actually be successful.” 

Partner organizations, such as Hospitality Hub and Hope Credit Union, offer services that help justice-impacted people reintegrate into their communities without having to overcome the big hurdles of meeting basic needs that send our neighbors into chronic cycles of recidivism (the tendency to re-offend after previous criminal conviction). The Memphis Metro Area has a shortage of affordable housing for extremely low-income households, and people with prior convictions in the United States are ten times more likely to experience homelessness than other residents. Homelessness following release from prison is also found to increase your risk of rearrest. Fortunately, housing programs in places like Ohio and Wisconsin have already shown promise, creating a 40% decrease in rearrests and an 82% decrease in municipal violations, respectively. 

The Returning Neighbors Program operates both before and after justice system release, and the newly funded study will demonstrate the impact of providing housing support on recidivism, employment, and housing stability locally. This is expected to have positive outcomes not just for participants, but also for Memphis and Shelby County more broadly. Reducing recidivism is associated with more public safety, stronger families and communities, and more equitable outcomes, as incarceration disproportionately affects Black, Latinx, Indigenous, and low-income Americans. Coleman explains that one priority of the study is to ensure the program runs to its full potential. “I would say we are optimistic that it'll work, but part of the process is having a director of continuous improvement check in to see if there are kinks,” she says. “We don't want implementation hiccups to counter the likelihood of this working well.”

Completing the application was a challenge because the deadline required a short turnaround. Rachel Starks, a fellow policy advisor for Seeding Success who helped with the project, mentions that even navigating federal websites can be a technical barrier for organizations with less experience in applying for grants. “We’ve been asked to step in as part of not just building partnerships and leveraging some of the More for Memphis work, but also helping different agencies who may not have this previous experience to be better equipped to do this in the future as well,” she says. When awarded funds are used efficiently and effectively, projects such as Returning Neighbors can use past evidence of success to apply for even more funding and expand to benefit more residents. 

Seeding Success aims to bolster local initiatives that will improve the long-term quality of life for families in Memphis and Shelby County, and a large part of this work is ensuring that Memphis-based institutions and nonprofits have the capacity to pursue their visions. Our areas of focus include grant writing support, training in ethical data use, facilitation, and continuous improvement, and political advocacy work to bring additional funding to our county. Most crucially, preparing this application meant coordinating organizations with diverse skills and knowledge to design the evaluation process.

“I learned a lot about the housing space that I just did not know from previous experience at a very detailed level,” Coleman says. During the collaboration, she was “able to learn from certain stakeholders who are direct service providers.” She also credits teamwork in the Seeding Success office with the application’s triumph, mentioning that Starks, Matthew McCaffrey (Director of Public Policy and Analysis), Melody Freeman (Director of Engagement), and Taylor DeMagistris (Director of Continuous Improvement) were integral in contributing technical experience, county connections, and organizational knowledge to the effort.

All of our neighbors in Memphis and Shelby County deserve access to the resources and essential services they need to thrive. By ensuring we have the data and success stories to enhance the county’s reentry program, we can build support for expanding these efforts and help to heal our community.