Nationally revered, trusted and profitable prisoner reentry program—Texas Offender Reentry Initiative (T.O.R.I.)—celebrated the commencement of 98 program individuals on Friday, Dec. 16.
The luncheon, hosted by T.D. Jakes, featured Grammy ® award-winning artist Fantasia Barrino Taylor and Kendall Taylor onstage for an in-depth dialog. Kendall Taylor, who was as soon as a returning citizen and now a notable CEO, shared the stage together with his spouse to encourage and assist inform graduates of their highway forward. T.O.R.I. is ready to change into a information accomplice and assist different nationwide organizations replicate the Texas-based group’s success.
The in-depth dialog between Fantasia, Taylor and Jakes touched on felony justice reform, returning residents and the way packages like T.O.R.I. are serving to them throughout Texas and shortly throughout the US. During the last eight years T.O.R.I has helped the state of Texas, which incarcerates the most individuals within the U.S., shut eight prisons.
Taylor spoke about how he nonetheless grapples together with his traumatic previous: “There are nonetheless moments—residing the red-carpet life, sitting on the home on the hill, solely black individuals in the neighborhood—the place I may nonetheless be going to the mailbox feeling anxiousness. However I needed to let some issues go. I lastly simply realized I’m not at battle anymore.”
“We aren’t simply outlined by our successes, but in addition our struggles and our failures,” famous Jakes when talking to Taylor.
T.O.R.I., which is celebrating its 18th anniversary this 12 months, has change into a nationally revered and trusted information accomplice with a confirmed profitable mannequin of rehabilitative and recuperative justice that has immediately impacted the lives of some 300,000 males, ladies and their households. The White Home, the Division of Justice, Canada’s Home of Commons Standing Committee on Public Protected and Nationwide Safety, AT&T and Wal-Mart are a number of the authorities and company entities which have both consulted or collaborated with T.O.R.I. to glean main learnings from the Dallas-based initiative. T.O.R.I. is uniquely poised to align with key companions on the lookout for programming and curriculum that distinctively speaks to the ever-growing wants and inequality realities going through many households throughout the U.S. T.O.R.I has a 16% recidivism charge, a lot decrease than the nationwide common of over 65%.
T.O.R.I. offers returning residents stability by way of help in employment, schooling, housing, healthcare, religious steerage and household unification. The mission of T.O.R.I. is to information and empower ex-offenders to maximise their potential, rising their alternatives for profitable reintegration into society and to change into productive residents of their communities.
The U.S. has roughly two million individuals incarcerated. With solely 5 % of the world’s inhabitants, 16% of all incarcerated individuals on this planet are within the U.S. The necessity is important for T.O.R.I. to share its information and experience with comparable organizations to efficiently assist acclimate returning residents and cut back the nationwide recidivism charge.
About Texas Offenders Reentry Initiative
Launched in January 2005 to supply hope within the type of tangible options, the Texas Offenders Reentry Initiative’s (T.O.R.I.) aim is to supply stability and safety for returning residents. Via help in employment, schooling, housing, healthcare, religious steerage and household unification, T.O.R.I. addresses the person wants and helps former inmates acclimate again into society. So far, T.O.R.I. has served over 35,000 previously incarcerated adults throughout the state of Texas. T.D. Jakes is the visionary and chief architect behind T.O.R.I.
About The Potter’s Home
Situated in Dallas, The Potter’s Home is a 30,000-member nondenominational, multicultural church and humanitarian group led by Bishop T. D. Jakes, who was twice featured on the quilt of Time journal as “America’s Greatest Preacher” and as one of many nation’s “25 most influential evangelicals.” The Potter’s Home has 4 areas, The Potter’s Home of Dallas, The Potter’s Home of Fort Value, The Potter’s Home of North Dallas, and The Potter’s Home OneLA, and a Spanish language church, Casa de Fe. Extra info might be discovered at ThePottersHouse.org.
