In February, we celebrated our first five years of building a new model of success. Jermaine Davis, NetWork participant spoke at the breakfast and shared his insights on the role The NetWork is playing in his life. Listen to his speech.
Special thanks to Wells Fargo for sponsoring our 2013 Annual Breakfast!
The NetWork for Better Futures and National Association of Counties Announce Partnership to Advance Smart Justice Reforms
The NetWork for Better Futures and National Association of Counties (NACo) have launched a strategic partnership for
Chris Rodgers, NACo President and Steve Thomas, NetWork CEO
advancing smart justice reforms that will promote better outcomes for ex-offenders, enhance public safety and use public dollars more efficiently.
Over the next year, The NetWork and NACo will convene an advisory committee to help identify and assess communities across the country that may be interested in adapting The NetWork's innovative model. Read more.
The NetWork Launches Improvements to Create Jobs and Keep Men Working
Between 2008 and 2012, The NetWork's business activities created part-time employment for 370 participants and their work helped generate nearly $2 million in business income. We are proud of these results but have learned that conventional pathways to self-sufficiency simply are not available to most high-risk men. Many of our participants are not able to move from our work crews to stable employment that pays decent wages. Without consistent support for mental health conditions, substance abuse relapses, cognitive skills training, aggressive assistance from a job coach, and improved literacy, many fail in the mainstream economy, workforce development and education programs. Consequently, we are committed to becoming more effective at preparing our participants to succeed in the worlds of work and education. Read more.
National Association of Counties (NACo) 2013 Smart Justice Symposium
Steve Thomas, NetWork CEO, presented at the National Association of Counties (NACo) 2013 Smart Justice Symposium. "The NetWork for Better Futures was launched in 2007 by a team of Minnesota's civic leaders to provide essential supports and short-term, part-time employment for high-risk men. Over 600 men were served in our first 5 years. We are the only entity in Minnesota explicitly creating jobs and offering critical supports for this target population. The results are promising: employment is increasing; child support payments are high; and return to prison rates are low. But the great recession, the reality of barriers to employment for our participants, and the state of public finance, has led us to conclude we must reengineer our operating model to produce much better and sustainable results related to employment" explained Thomas.
We are proud of these results but have learned that conventional pathways to self-sufficiency simply are not available to most high-risk men. Many of our participants are not able to move from our work crews to stable employment that pays decent wages. Without consistent support for mental health conditions, substance abuse relapses, cognitive skills training, aggressive assistance from a job coach, and improved literacy, many fail in the mainstream economy, workforce development and education programs. Consequently, we are committed to becoming more effective at preparing our participants to succeed in the worlds of work and education.