March 31, 2025 • 29 mins
Jack Hausen Executive Director and Trent Redwine, Director of Operations at Shepard’s Fold talks about their organization’s mission to reintegrate recent releasees from incarceration to being productive members of our Alabama communities.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Following their release from incarceration and what prevents a criminal
from reoffending or the recidivism rate. There's an organization that's
trying to do that. Hello, I'm John Bounce and this
is Viewpoint Alabama on the Alabama Radio Network, and this
week I'm talking with two gentlemen from Shepherd's Fold because
this is such an important ministry because there are so
many people who are convicted of a crime and they
(00:24):
do their time and they're released into society with everyone else,
and now where do they go from here? Because you
can't just throw a person away, and so it's so
important that we're able to get these people reintroduced and
also help them become valuable members of our society once again.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
So joining me now is the.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
Executive director, Jack Howsen. And Jack, if you could talk
about the original design. How did Shepherd's Fold come about?
Speaker 3 (00:51):
Well, Shepherd's Fold has been around for over thirty years,
so it's not like we just started yesterday. So we've
been doing this for quite some time. And one of
the most important points that I want to make sure
is is that we're not a halfway house. There's a
big difference there. We are a actual six months Transitional
Ministry for formerly incarcerated men and or homeless. So these
folks come to us from prison and they stayed with
us for six months during that six month period, and
(01:13):
we will work with them and help them to gain
the tools that they need to re enter society. And
this is just a brief opportunity to share it with
the fact that of our graduates from our program, less
than two point seven percent of them go back to prison.
That's a big word recidivism. You may have heard before,
but that's pretty significant if you think about me. It's
ninety seven percent of our folks are not going back
(01:36):
into their cities and whatever and doing crime. That's getting
them back into prison, which costs you, the taxpayer obviously
a lot of money too for that to happen as well.
So that's what we do, and we were founded in
when nineteen eighty seven, I believe is correct, and Mary
kay Beard as actually the person she and her husband
Mary Kay Beard, at one time was one of the
top top ten most wanted people for the bank robbers
(02:01):
that the FBI was looking for.
Speaker 4 (02:02):
So she herself is a former oh yes, yeah, So
they finally caught up with her and I think it
was Minnesota, and she came back with them and actually
was here in Jefferson County Jail for a short period
of time, and then she was visited from members of
the community and.
Speaker 3 (02:20):
Finally wound up at Tutwiler. But she became a person
of faith and within the only short period of time
she was released from Tutwiler and then her husband, who
had also been incarcerated, started Shepherd's Fold with the very
goal as you mentioned from the very beginning, it's helped
people who are coming out. You just can't come back
and expect people just to walk it back into society
(02:40):
unless they have a strong support victim to do so.
I brought this is the book that she wrote. It's
actually her bibliography called Rogue Angel, and it's a wonderful story.
She worked with Chuck Coulson, if you remember Chuck Coulson,
worked with him and his agency. She also started a
ministry called Angel Tree, which is well known by most people.
(03:01):
Maybe you see it during your church during Christmas where
things are put together to help people, and this was
put together and helping people who are in prison to
be able to give something to their children. So she
pretty remarkable lay, to say the least. So that's kind
of how we got started one building on the west
end of Birmingham, and today we're fortunate enough to have
(03:22):
a series of programs, the biggest one which is really
near Lawston State Community College's one hundred bid facility that
currently offers those residents that come to us all that
they need to be able to come back and to
be able to become productive citizens. So that's what we do.
And I'm the executive director and I'm blessed to have
(03:43):
Trent with me today too to share with you a
little more about what he does and how that actually
applies to them when they come to our program.
Speaker 5 (03:50):
Right.
Speaker 1 (03:51):
So Jackson next to is Trent RedWine, and Trent you
handle more of the day to day operations kind of
thing in terms of what you're doing at shepherds Fold,
because I guess walk me through, if you would, the
journey of one of these men who come out of prison.
I should say men and women, right, you serve both
men and women, just men, just men. Okay, So these
you threw me off because Mary Mary is a woman.
(04:12):
So but I guess a lot of and I'm not
I'm not being discriminatory, but a lot of people who
come out of jail are men. Uh and what what
what happens like? Okay, their sentences over and you know
that you see it all the time in the movies.
The gate opens and that they are staying there with
their belongings in a bag and then what exactly?
Speaker 5 (04:32):
Well, first, thank you for having us, and uh, we did.
I want to make it clear we did used to
serve women. Okay, we did have a women's program and
a men's program. After kind of doing the analytics and
looking at what we were doing, we were not helping
the females out the way we should have been helping
them out. We were holding them back more. And the
reason being is there's different responsibilities when women get out
(04:56):
a lot of times they have children they're responsible for,
and we just didn't have our insurance stuff set up
to be able to accommodate that and do it, and
so it would put them in a bad position. And
there are programs for that, and there are programs for
women that do a really good job that are set
up to handle that. So we dropped our female program
and we concentrate mostly on our men's program and what
(05:16):
it is when a man gets out of an incarceration,
most of the time they have to go back to
the county or the city where they committed the crime.
That's where they get released back too. We're in Birmingham,
and so they're given a bus ticket to go back
to where they were sentenced at, which sometimes is in
the opposite direction of So first thing we have to
work through them to be able to get them to us.
(05:38):
To the bus station. Here we pick them up and
most of the time all they have on them is
a bag of hygiene and the clothes that were given
to them when they changed out of their prison uniform
into their Saville clothes. And so we get them like
that and that's all they have. We bring them into
our facility, we start an intake on them. There's no
(05:59):
call to get into Shepherd's fould that we do not
charge an intake fee. Kind of one of our reasoning
in that and looking at it, is how can you
charge somebody an intake fee when they have no money?
Speaker 1 (06:11):
Sure, because they've been behind bars for some time in
the untold amount of time, and you don't really get
in the movies. Again, I'm basing all this on movies Okay,
you know, you make a little something when you're working
the license plate factory. But does that always pan out
in Alabama? Or they don't think they get paid anything,
do they?
Speaker 5 (06:27):
If they're at a work release facility where they're released
into society to work at different programs that do hire
X felons, the facility itself gets forty percent of their
check off the top any fines or fees or restitution
that they were charged when they went to court. That
place also takes that out of their check, and then
they get what's.
Speaker 2 (06:47):
Left over, which probably isn't very much.
Speaker 5 (06:49):
Which doesn't add up to much.
Speaker 1 (06:51):
And that's why your program is able to take them
in for no cost to them. But while it's no
cost to them, it costs you, guys, a substantial amount
to operate this program, doesn't it?
Speaker 5 (07:00):
It most certainly does. And now I say it doesn't
cost anything to come into our program. There's no intake fee.
It does cost one hundred and fifty dollars a week
to be there. Okay, But when they get to us,
they're broke, they have no IDs, they have no job,
they have no way of obtaining that. Well, what we
do is we work with them to help get their IDs.
After the intake process, we find out where they're at,
(07:20):
where they stand, and we begin helping them get their
birth certificate, their drivers are non drivers, photo ID, and
their Social Security card. Those are the three IDs you
have to have to get a decent job, a job
paying you enough to survive out here. People cannot live
on a minimum wage job, and that is apsol. We
don't really allow that to happen at our facility. There's
(07:44):
plenty of second chance employers in Jefferson County that will
hire people. We have it set up to where we
get there, help and get their IDs, and then we
get them in touch with employers that will employ them.
Once they do that, they go through the same hiring
process that anybody else does. Got to set up an interview.
(08:04):
That's all part of the learning process of how you
survive out here in this world today.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
So, Trent, do you have sleeping quarters there or where
do they sleep at night?
Speaker 5 (08:12):
We do. We have a facility used to be a
nursing home. For those of you that know Birmingham, it
used to be the Ruby Hills Nursing Home and it
was the Mountain View Nursing Home for a while. But
it had been closed down. They had moved into another building,
and the place was actually transitioned, if you will, into
another program that was there that no longer exists, and
(08:33):
they had closed down and left, and Shepherd's Full was
able to obtain this building. Jack said, it's a hundred
bed facility, and he's totally right if we had bunk beds. Now,
the way I have it set up right now, we
have no bunk beds in the entire place. Everything is
a single level bed. So I have seventy eight beds available.
I have forty men living there right now.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
And that's actually a pretty important thing for the dignity
of these men who are coming out of an incarceration facility,
because usually in jail, there's a lot of bunk beds.
Speaker 5 (09:02):
Right pretty much everything's on bunk beds, and so in
prison this.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
Way, it's a little bit more like home. It's not home,
but it's more of a home because you have single
beds in rooms, and it's more like the way they
will be living because there's a lot especially if you've
been behind bars, you have a I've been around people
like like who have been behind bars, certainly right after
they've gotten out your your psychog psychologically, you're so different
the way you eat. You know, you have to hold
(09:27):
your food close to you, eat fast, that sort of thing.
You're always looking behind you. And to get to a
situation where you're not like that, you know, it takes
a minute.
Speaker 5 (09:35):
That's You're absolutely right. There's a lot of things that
are unknown with people who come out of incarceration. One
of the first things that they lose being behind the
fence is a sense of responsibility. When they get out,
that hits them right in the face. I mean, you
had mentioned how the eating part where they where they
did keep that up and have to do it fast
(09:56):
and get out. That's one of the biggest parts of
our ministry. We have a life since the kitchen at
that Jefferson County comes in and inspects just like they
do any other restaurant anywhere, and we serve a hot breakfast,
a hot supper, and sack lunch for lunch. Because everybody
gets a job. I mean, it's like ninety some percent
of the people that are with us, they all have jobs,
and every single one of them are making over thirteen
(10:18):
to fifteen to twenty dollars an hour. I mean, these
are not minimum waste jobs. These guys are getting. They're
getting jobs that they can sustain them out here in life.
Speaker 1 (10:26):
And so do they do Some of them actually work
for you, Like some of the people who are working
in your facility. Are they some of the graduates of
your program.
Speaker 5 (10:33):
Or yes they are. Some of them come through and
most of them are are older and not really able
to get into working the working class out there because
of the rough life that they have lived. Now they've
settled down, they're good, but they're over sixty five years old.
They start getting their Social Security checks. So they live
there and they work for us. Like my cook, he's
(10:55):
been with me for six years now. But I mean
this guy used to cook in Las Vegas at the casino.
I mean he could. The meals he's cooking you pay for.
I main't nobody there losing weight, I guarantee you. But
he does a good job. And then I've got a
yard maintenance guy that came through and he takes care
of the yard and keep all that done because we
do have a rather pretty large facility facility there and
(11:20):
the grounds are pretty good sized, so in keeping that
up because we are in a community over by laws
and State Birmingham location. We do have to keep that
up so that we stand up good for the community.
Speaker 1 (11:33):
Shepperd's fold a faith based organization or is it very
much you know, secular in nature.
Speaker 5 (11:39):
We are a faith based organization. Let me explain what
that means. That means we are going to act in
a way that we believe in that our faith is.
But that is not something that we're going to force
on someone else. They are going to be exposed to that.
They are going to be exposed to the Christian faith.
Jack always tells a lot of people that ask who
do you allow in just Christians? No, we don't. I
(12:01):
have Muslims, I have Hindus, I have all those people
come in. They're going to be treated with the same
respect that I would anyone else. And Jack said, we
even have Southern Baptists in there, So I mean we
allow anybody. But it's it's they're going to be exposed
to that. There's church groups that come in and they
will feed them and they'll have a devotion. We do
have a church service every Sunday evening. Hunter Street Baptist
(12:24):
Church comes in and does that, and.
Speaker 2 (12:27):
I imagine it's not it's not required, but it's encouraged.
Speaker 5 (12:30):
Encouraged, yes, absolutely, and that's that's something. But also, and
this is one thing that we get questioned about, we
do not transport people on Sunday to churches. And I'll
explain that the reason we don't do that, even though
we have all the transportation, is because if I transport
you to a church of your choice, which I encourage
(12:50):
people to get involved, I also have to transport the Buddhists,
the Muslims and personal faith that that's where we stand
up up. So Sundays is kind of a no transport,
no nothing day that that's our day of rest, and
that's when my drivers get off. That's when my other
people get a down day. So you're sort of there
(13:13):
you go. I need to make sure that they still
have monitoring. So there's We have a guy that we
have the house right across the facility from across the street,
and he is my nighttime facility manager. So when I
go home in the evening, when Jack and I leave,
(13:33):
we have a guy, Harvey Owens, which has been with
me pretty much since I started with with Shepherd's Fold
in twenty sixteen, and he stays there with him in
the evenings when I'm gone, so there's somebody there with
him twenty four hours a day to take care of
whatever needs or whatever situations come up. There's a lot
of unknowns when you're dealing with these people, with this
(13:56):
type of people coming out because they have lived a
hard life and not really treated themselves well. And so
there's there's physical issues that come up, medical issues that
we have to be ready at a moment's notice to
be able to get that took care of, get them
more they need so that they can be nursed back
and make sure to get their health back up and write.
(14:16):
We do drug testing, just random drug testing all the time,
and that that's for them and for us.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
Trust, but verify.
Speaker 5 (14:26):
It's it to somebody that's lived a life where they've
always been kicked out, always been kicked aside, knock you know, leave,
you can't be here. People like that. It feels really
good to be caught doing the right thing.
Speaker 2 (14:38):
It's very true.
Speaker 1 (14:38):
So in other words, you can can you know they
go in there and say, hey, I'm clean, but I
want you to know, I don't want you to have
any doubt.
Speaker 2 (14:45):
You can prove. I'll prove that I'm.
Speaker 5 (14:46):
Clean, absolutely they just it's a really good feeling to
be caught doing the right thing. Just full disclosure. I
did eight years in prison myself, So I was in
prison from two thousand and five to twenty thirteen. When
I got out, I worked for another ministry. I'm kind
of doing the same thing, but they were the ones
that crashed and went away. So I worked out in
(15:10):
the downtown Birmingham. Actually worked for Inline Electric for about
a year year and a half and then Jack had
and Shepherd's Foal was able to obtain the building that
I had actually got out and come to, and he
knew that I had done this before, and then he
came to me asking if I would come back to
do it again. Every day's a challenge. Every individual is
(15:31):
different and every situation is different, so you've got to
be very open to everything going on to meet them
where they are, figure out where that is, and then
try to bring them back up. Gaining their trust is
the first step. I Once you gain someone's trust and
they're willing to talk to you and tell you even
the things that they don't want anybody else to know.
(15:52):
When you can gain their trust and begin to talk
to them openly, you learn that pain, so I can
speak to their heart and speak to that pain and
let's work on that.
Speaker 1 (16:01):
Trent, do you have any sort of counseling available in
terms of, like you said, if they're dealing with underlying
issues from I guess at this point they've dried If
they had a substance abuse problem, they probably mostly dried
out from that, but something drove them to the substance
abuse problem. And there could be underlying issues, psychological issues,
or just things in their past that drove them to
the end up to that place. And you, like you said,
(16:22):
you don't want the recidivism, So how do you how
do you minister to these these men to make sure
that they're going to always move forward, they're not going
to slide back.
Speaker 5 (16:32):
That's part of the process. We did have an agreement
with West Alabama Universities in which they have a psychology class,
a psychologist course that they do social okay, and they
have to have intern hours. Now. They used to come
and do that in our facility and we had a
great build up of that to where it gave them
an outlet just to release and then they could make
(16:55):
us aware or give them different places they can go
to get the help. Since that time, because of some
changes in administration, that's kind of gone away. But luckily
there are other organizations that are really good at handling
that here in Birmingham. Some of those other organizations have
their own psychologists and psychiatrists and people that these guys
(17:19):
can talk to, so if that character is exposed that
they do need that help, because unfortunately, a lot of
our incarcerated people do have slight mental issues that can
be dealt with with simple medication or meditation or talking
to people let it out. They can deal with that
(17:39):
and live a perfectly good social life out here. But
if they're not taught how then they're still reacting from
the pain or the hurt of whatever went on in
their past. And so we're in connection with several of
the organizations that we work with that have those people
on their staff to do that, and we have numbers,
direct numbers each and ever one of them. If we
have somebody that needs that, we can on tact them
(18:00):
and they're immediately set up a time either that day
or the next day to come get that done. The
crisis center that's.
Speaker 3 (18:07):
On UH that's excellent Beacon High, Beacon Street, Beacon Parkway,
I think can Parkway.
Speaker 5 (18:13):
I think it is awesome organization. They do a fantastic job.
They're not a facility that takes somebody in and keeps
them for for months or years. They go in there
and they have the medical uh expertise, they have the
psychological expertise to find out exactly what's causing some of
these people's problem when they just can't reason it out,
(18:35):
and they're able to talk them down and make sure
that there's not any any chemical imbalances, whether it be
drugs or whether it be just something with their body,
and to figure out what needs to be done to
straighten it out, and then they come to that conclusion,
they get to it and then the people Okay, they've
got to go back to wherever you're living at because
we don't have a house. They didn't, but we do
(18:57):
so even without patient situations where people have mental issues
that they have to deal with on a weekly or
monthly basis. Someone who does have a drug issue but
they're functional enough that they don't need in house they
can do outpatient. We work with them and take care
of that, get them to where they need to be
so that they can get that help.
Speaker 3 (19:18):
We've talked a lot about God, I'm sorry, go ahead, yeah,
I just wanted to touch on real quick about this
recidivism issue. Is that recently ail dot com published in
their report that the recidive is of rate for the
state of Alabama is twenty nine to thirty percent, meaning
a thirty percent of the people who've been released go
back to prison with anywhere from what one to three
years of three to five years, which is a very
(19:40):
huge number. In fact, it's the second largest in the
entire country. And so that is a problem at the
state of Alabama faces, and that's why we work as
close as we can with a prole board with those
folks that are involved with that to let them know
that if they paroll them to shepherds fold, the opportunity
for them to succeed it goes up significantly. And just
(20:03):
to put in perspective too, is that we don't get
any funds from the state or from the federal government.
Any funds that we receive come from the fees we
do get from our guys. By the way, it only
costs about eighteen dollars a day to stay on our program,
and we pay food expensively for running about two thousand
dollars a week, about three thousand dollars a month just
for power. You got to throw water in and all
(20:24):
the other efforts. So it takes a lot to run
the program. But we've been blessed because of the fact
that we've been able to sustain that. And we have
an upcoming event that will upcoming us in October when
we have our annual banquet October seventeenth, and Danny Carr,
who's a district attorney for Birmingham, he is the one
who has set up a second Chance program that allows
(20:45):
employers that will be at the Battlet Auditorium on April fifteenth,
as a matter of fact, if anybody's hearing this, and
you can go there and you can have all those
companies there that hire people who have been paroled or
cons or whatever and give them a chance to seek employment.
And so he'll be our guest speaker actually at that event.
But that's a very important part. I think he's probably
the only district attorney that I know of that does
(21:07):
something like that. The other component that we work with
is Ingram State Technical College was the Elmore Correctional Program
near Montgomery. It's the only one of its kind in
the entire country, and they actually work in most of
the prison systems we have here in Alabama with skill
sets teaching them electricity, electronics, what is it skidding, CDOs
(21:29):
and all those things that they have something when they
leave that they can use to become you know, get
get work. So those are those are the things that
we do and so.
Speaker 5 (21:39):
You know, our our whole.
Speaker 3 (21:42):
We received most of our funds from the freewall love
offerings of people, donors and corporations. That's that's kind of
how that works. And we do get some grants that
help as well, but that's how we fund the program
that allowed to sustain itself.
Speaker 5 (21:56):
I want to expand on the one hundred and fifty
dollars a week. We do charge one hundred and fifty
dollars a week for a person being our program. But
until they're earning that one hundred and fifty dollars a week,
they can't pay that one hundred and fifty dollars a week.
It does accumulate, and I do that. Part of the
reason is because some of what needs to be taught
is budgeting for people to figure out how to budget,
(22:17):
just like we all have to do with stuff goes on.
So that's part of the of the on the job training,
if you will, that they learn that as they go
through the program. But I'm not going to We're not
going to put someone out because they can't give us
that one hundred and fifty dollars that week. What we're
going to do is we're going to work with them
to help make sure they're earning that so that they
(22:38):
can pay it.
Speaker 2 (22:40):
So in the progressing around for you said thirty years, right, Jack,
over thirty dollar?
Speaker 1 (22:44):
Oh yeah, so how many people have passed through the program?
How graduates do you think estimate you had in thirty years?
Speaker 3 (22:51):
I think we looked at that the other day. I
think over three thousand, I think if I remember correctly, I.
Speaker 5 (22:56):
Think the amount that we had we went back to
two thy seventeen, so that's all that was, and we
had we had between three and four thousand. Come back
with the number that comes so so yeah, so.
Speaker 3 (23:09):
Based on the analytics, you know, I mentioned the recidivism
rate for our graduates, Well, not everybody graduates from the
program because of behavior or something else that they can't
complete the program. But even if you look just at
those folks, the recidivis of race eight percent. So even
folks who have come to the program but did not graduate,
they still have a very very low recidive race. So
they got something out of the program while they were there.
(23:31):
I think that's pretty cool. So what we're what we
do now also is that you know we visit with
the local churches, is to share our story with the
churches and others that are interested in what we do,
just like you are, and a lot of folks. But
what can we do well, you know, it's not just money.
You know, we asked for people to come in as mentors.
We have mandatory meetings three times a week that they
can come in and love on these guys and share
(23:53):
a meal with them and just spend some time with them.
So there's a lot of ways you have to go
overseas to do mission work in this city. You can
come to it here in burmingm and do something like
that as Shepherd's.
Speaker 1 (24:02):
Full And I think that is so important because there
are a lot of churches who do like you said,
they send people overseas and that's a great ministry. But
there are so many people in our community and I
think too often we throw people away you know we
won't redeem them. We go, well, you've broken the law,
and forever you are an other, you are going to
be over here. You're shunned and we can't bring you back.
(24:22):
And that's actually the whole message of Jesus is the
idea of being redeemed from what you've done wrong. And
we've all sinned, and sometimes you've gotten caught by a
police officer, other times you haven't. But either way, people there,
you know, there are good people behind bars. Most of
them are good people, and at some point they come
out and we want them to be able to do
something to contribute, because if they don't, they'll end up
(24:45):
back behind bars. But on their way they might cast
some damage and we don't want that, and we.
Speaker 5 (24:48):
Don't want that. That's what we want to keep from happening,
and to show them that there is a way to
survive out here in this world without doing it wrong
or taking other people's items or covening things that just
don't belong to them. One thing I want to point
out with the program also is that the way that
you get it's a six month program, okay, but you
(25:09):
don't advance from one level to the next, just because
of how long you've been there. So even though you've
been with us for six months, if you don't accomplish
the requirements that are set in place for them to meet,
they don't get a completion at six months. Their program
continues until they meet those goals. That's like you and me,
everybody coming up out here in the world. In order
(25:30):
for you to get to one level to the next,
you got to find out what are the procedures, what
are the processes to get to that next level? How
do I get that? You learn them, you achieve them,
and then you move up. And so it's goal oriented,
not based on time. One of the things that they
get to do. You have these people incarcerated and a
lot of them, especially in Alabama prisons, they're in a
(25:53):
room that's filled with two to three hundred people on
bunk beds three feet apart. They learn to be in
a crowd that many people and be alone, and so
teaching them to unlearn that how to be social creatures again,
which our society is a very social element. That's what
bringing as many people in as we can to spend
(26:14):
time with them, coming in to eat supper with them,
coming in and just put on an event to do something.
The more interaction we can get to happen like that,
the more social they become and they know how to
deal with society once they do leave us.
Speaker 1 (26:29):
We're almost at a time, but I want to make
sure we have some time to mention if people are
hearing this message and they want to participate in any
way with your program. For starters, how can people give
to your ministry?
Speaker 3 (26:41):
Well, first of all, then go online. We have a
web page www dot shepherds fold org and on that
web page has all the donate pages, all the missions,
everything we do, and they can go through that. They
can also just come by and visit. I tell people
I could sit here and tell you how great this
program is, but if you'll just come out and visit,
(27:01):
well we'll give you a tour. We'll let you meet
some of the folks, and you'll see why this program
exists to do what it does. So that's a very
that's a very important component. They can always always call us,
you know, two O five seven eight zero six two
one one. One of the benefits that I have is
that my executive assistant also happens to be Trans's wife,
so I can keep them there as long as I
(27:22):
need to keep them there during the day, so it
kind of works out for that perspective. But those are
probably the two. But we're also on Facebook, I mean,
so you can also gain information. We put pictures on there,
and we put down testimonies and things of that nature.
But those are the best way to get in touch
with us, and we'd love for people to do so.
I'd love to be able to come out and share
the seper story. I was in pharmaceutical sales for thirty
(27:45):
five years, and I think I could sell, you know,
ice cream to an Eskimo. But the point is is
I just I don't twist elbows. I just tell the
shepherd's full story. It's biblical and believe that, you know,
the Lord's going to take care of ourt ease. And
we're just gad to have an opportunity like this to
share it, Amen.
Speaker 1 (28:00):
And for and you know, we have listeners all over
the state, some of which are listening from behind bars.
If you are about to come out of jail or
you know somebody, how can we get some of those
people connected with you?
Speaker 5 (28:12):
Guys, Each and every facility has a chaplain or they
have counselors. Case managers if you will, that they can
be in touch with and every single one of them
have our application. If they don't have it on hand,
all they have to do is send us a letter
or let have one of their family members contact us
at the seven eighth sixty two one one number and
(28:34):
we can get an application sent out. There's also an
application spot on our website at the Shepherdsfold dot org
where you can do it online and once it's done
online and scent page. Jack's executive assistant in my wife,
she gets it immediately. She also does the intake coordination,
(28:56):
so she's in contact with every single one of the
facilities in the state, all the chaplains, they have our
applications or can get our applications at each facility, and
all they got to do is fill it out. And
a lot of the case managers or the chaplains or
internal pos you got an internal PO at each facility,
they can get it to us, fax it to us,
(29:19):
email it to us however, and that starts the process.
Speaker 1 (29:22):
Trent RedWine he's the director of operations, and Jack Howsen
he is the executive director of shepherds Fold. Guys, thank
you so much for joining me this week on Viewpoint Alabama.
Speaker 3 (29:32):
Thank you for the invitation of Liss.
Speaker 2 (29:34):
I'm John Mount and this is the Alabama Radio Network.
Speaker 5 (29:36):
You've been listening to Viewpoint Alabama, a public affairs program
from the Alabama Radio Network.
Speaker 1 (29:41):
The opinions expressed on Viewpoint Alabama are not necessarily those
of the staff, management, or advertisers of this station.
Following their release from incarceration and what prevents a criminal
from reoffending or the recidivism rate. There's an organization that's
trying to do that. Hello, I'm John Bounce and this
is Viewpoint Alabama on the Alabama Radio Network, and this
week I'm talking with two gentlemen from Shepherd's Fold because
this is such an important ministry because there are so
many people who are convicted of a crime and they
(00:24):
do their time and they're released into society with everyone else,
and now where do they go from here? Because you
can't just throw a person away, and so it's so
important that we're able to get these people reintroduced and
also help them become valuable members of our society once again.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
So joining me now is the.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
Executive director, Jack Howsen. And Jack, if you could talk
about the original design. How did Shepherd's Fold come about?
Speaker 3 (00:51):
Well, Shepherd's Fold has been around for over thirty years,
so it's not like we just started yesterday. So we've
been doing this for quite some time. And one of
the most important points that I want to make sure
is is that we're not a halfway house. There's a
big difference there. We are a actual six months Transitional
Ministry for formerly incarcerated men and or homeless. So these
folks come to us from prison and they stayed with
us for six months during that six month period, and
(01:13):
we will work with them and help them to gain
the tools that they need to re enter society. And
this is just a brief opportunity to share it with
the fact that of our graduates from our program, less
than two point seven percent of them go back to prison.
That's a big word recidivism. You may have heard before,
but that's pretty significant if you think about me. It's
ninety seven percent of our folks are not going back
(01:36):
into their cities and whatever and doing crime. That's getting
them back into prison, which costs you, the taxpayer obviously
a lot of money too for that to happen as well.
So that's what we do, and we were founded in
when nineteen eighty seven, I believe is correct, and Mary
kay Beard as actually the person she and her husband
Mary Kay Beard, at one time was one of the
top top ten most wanted people for the bank robbers
(02:01):
that the FBI was looking for.
Speaker 4 (02:02):
So she herself is a former oh yes, yeah, So
they finally caught up with her and I think it
was Minnesota, and she came back with them and actually
was here in Jefferson County Jail for a short period
of time, and then she was visited from members of
the community and.
Speaker 3 (02:20):
Finally wound up at Tutwiler. But she became a person
of faith and within the only short period of time
she was released from Tutwiler and then her husband, who
had also been incarcerated, started Shepherd's Fold with the very
goal as you mentioned from the very beginning, it's helped
people who are coming out. You just can't come back
and expect people just to walk it back into society
(02:40):
unless they have a strong support victim to do so.
I brought this is the book that she wrote. It's
actually her bibliography called Rogue Angel, and it's a wonderful story.
She worked with Chuck Coulson, if you remember Chuck Coulson,
worked with him and his agency. She also started a
ministry called Angel Tree, which is well known by most people.
(03:01):
Maybe you see it during your church during Christmas where
things are put together to help people, and this was
put together and helping people who are in prison to
be able to give something to their children. So she
pretty remarkable lay, to say the least. So that's kind
of how we got started one building on the west
end of Birmingham, and today we're fortunate enough to have
(03:22):
a series of programs, the biggest one which is really
near Lawston State Community College's one hundred bid facility that
currently offers those residents that come to us all that
they need to be able to come back and to
be able to become productive citizens. So that's what we do.
And I'm the executive director and I'm blessed to have
(03:43):
Trent with me today too to share with you a
little more about what he does and how that actually
applies to them when they come to our program.
Speaker 5 (03:50):
Right.
Speaker 1 (03:51):
So Jackson next to is Trent RedWine, and Trent you
handle more of the day to day operations kind of
thing in terms of what you're doing at shepherds Fold,
because I guess walk me through, if you would, the
journey of one of these men who come out of prison.
I should say men and women, right, you serve both
men and women, just men, just men. Okay, So these
you threw me off because Mary Mary is a woman.
(04:12):
So but I guess a lot of and I'm not
I'm not being discriminatory, but a lot of people who
come out of jail are men. Uh and what what
what happens like? Okay, their sentences over and you know
that you see it all the time in the movies.
The gate opens and that they are staying there with
their belongings in a bag and then what exactly?
Speaker 5 (04:32):
Well, first, thank you for having us, and uh, we did.
I want to make it clear we did used to
serve women. Okay, we did have a women's program and
a men's program. After kind of doing the analytics and
looking at what we were doing, we were not helping
the females out the way we should have been helping
them out. We were holding them back more. And the
reason being is there's different responsibilities when women get out
(04:56):
a lot of times they have children they're responsible for,
and we just didn't have our insurance stuff set up
to be able to accommodate that and do it, and
so it would put them in a bad position. And
there are programs for that, and there are programs for
women that do a really good job that are set
up to handle that. So we dropped our female program
and we concentrate mostly on our men's program and what
(05:16):
it is when a man gets out of an incarceration,
most of the time they have to go back to
the county or the city where they committed the crime.
That's where they get released back too. We're in Birmingham,
and so they're given a bus ticket to go back
to where they were sentenced at, which sometimes is in
the opposite direction of So first thing we have to
work through them to be able to get them to us.
(05:38):
To the bus station. Here we pick them up and
most of the time all they have on them is
a bag of hygiene and the clothes that were given
to them when they changed out of their prison uniform
into their Saville clothes. And so we get them like
that and that's all they have. We bring them into
our facility, we start an intake on them. There's no
(05:59):
call to get into Shepherd's fould that we do not
charge an intake fee. Kind of one of our reasoning
in that and looking at it, is how can you
charge somebody an intake fee when they have no money?
Speaker 1 (06:11):
Sure, because they've been behind bars for some time in
the untold amount of time, and you don't really get
in the movies. Again, I'm basing all this on movies Okay,
you know, you make a little something when you're working
the license plate factory. But does that always pan out
in Alabama? Or they don't think they get paid anything,
do they?
Speaker 5 (06:27):
If they're at a work release facility where they're released
into society to work at different programs that do hire
X felons, the facility itself gets forty percent of their
check off the top any fines or fees or restitution
that they were charged when they went to court. That
place also takes that out of their check, and then
they get what's.
Speaker 2 (06:47):
Left over, which probably isn't very much.
Speaker 5 (06:49):
Which doesn't add up to much.
Speaker 1 (06:51):
And that's why your program is able to take them
in for no cost to them. But while it's no
cost to them, it costs you, guys, a substantial amount
to operate this program, doesn't it?
Speaker 5 (07:00):
It most certainly does. And now I say it doesn't
cost anything to come into our program. There's no intake fee.
It does cost one hundred and fifty dollars a week
to be there. Okay, But when they get to us,
they're broke, they have no IDs, they have no job,
they have no way of obtaining that. Well, what we
do is we work with them to help get their IDs.
After the intake process, we find out where they're at,
(07:20):
where they stand, and we begin helping them get their
birth certificate, their drivers are non drivers, photo ID, and
their Social Security card. Those are the three IDs you
have to have to get a decent job, a job
paying you enough to survive out here. People cannot live
on a minimum wage job, and that is apsol. We
don't really allow that to happen at our facility. There's
(07:44):
plenty of second chance employers in Jefferson County that will
hire people. We have it set up to where we
get there, help and get their IDs, and then we
get them in touch with employers that will employ them.
Once they do that, they go through the same hiring
process that anybody else does. Got to set up an interview.
(08:04):
That's all part of the learning process of how you
survive out here in this world today.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
So, Trent, do you have sleeping quarters there or where
do they sleep at night?
Speaker 5 (08:12):
We do. We have a facility used to be a
nursing home. For those of you that know Birmingham, it
used to be the Ruby Hills Nursing Home and it
was the Mountain View Nursing Home for a while. But
it had been closed down. They had moved into another building,
and the place was actually transitioned, if you will, into
another program that was there that no longer exists, and
(08:33):
they had closed down and left, and Shepherd's Full was
able to obtain this building. Jack said, it's a hundred
bed facility, and he's totally right if we had bunk beds. Now,
the way I have it set up right now, we
have no bunk beds in the entire place. Everything is
a single level bed. So I have seventy eight beds available.
I have forty men living there right now.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
And that's actually a pretty important thing for the dignity
of these men who are coming out of an incarceration facility,
because usually in jail, there's a lot of bunk beds.
Speaker 5 (09:02):
Right pretty much everything's on bunk beds, and so in
prison this.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
Way, it's a little bit more like home. It's not home,
but it's more of a home because you have single
beds in rooms, and it's more like the way they
will be living because there's a lot especially if you've
been behind bars, you have a I've been around people
like like who have been behind bars, certainly right after
they've gotten out your your psychog psychologically, you're so different
the way you eat. You know, you have to hold
(09:27):
your food close to you, eat fast, that sort of thing.
You're always looking behind you. And to get to a
situation where you're not like that, you know, it takes
a minute.
Speaker 5 (09:35):
That's You're absolutely right. There's a lot of things that
are unknown with people who come out of incarceration. One
of the first things that they lose being behind the
fence is a sense of responsibility. When they get out,
that hits them right in the face. I mean, you
had mentioned how the eating part where they where they
did keep that up and have to do it fast
(09:56):
and get out. That's one of the biggest parts of
our ministry. We have a life since the kitchen at
that Jefferson County comes in and inspects just like they
do any other restaurant anywhere, and we serve a hot breakfast,
a hot supper, and sack lunch for lunch. Because everybody
gets a job. I mean, it's like ninety some percent
of the people that are with us, they all have jobs,
and every single one of them are making over thirteen
(10:18):
to fifteen to twenty dollars an hour. I mean, these
are not minimum waste jobs. These guys are getting. They're
getting jobs that they can sustain them out here in life.
Speaker 1 (10:26):
And so do they do Some of them actually work
for you, Like some of the people who are working
in your facility. Are they some of the graduates of
your program.
Speaker 5 (10:33):
Or yes they are. Some of them come through and
most of them are are older and not really able
to get into working the working class out there because
of the rough life that they have lived. Now they've
settled down, they're good, but they're over sixty five years old.
They start getting their Social Security checks. So they live
there and they work for us. Like my cook, he's
(10:55):
been with me for six years now. But I mean
this guy used to cook in Las Vegas at the casino.
I mean he could. The meals he's cooking you pay for.
I main't nobody there losing weight, I guarantee you. But
he does a good job. And then I've got a
yard maintenance guy that came through and he takes care
of the yard and keep all that done because we
do have a rather pretty large facility facility there and
(11:20):
the grounds are pretty good sized, so in keeping that
up because we are in a community over by laws
and State Birmingham location. We do have to keep that
up so that we stand up good for the community.
Speaker 1 (11:33):
Shepperd's fold a faith based organization or is it very
much you know, secular in nature.
Speaker 5 (11:39):
We are a faith based organization. Let me explain what
that means. That means we are going to act in
a way that we believe in that our faith is.
But that is not something that we're going to force
on someone else. They are going to be exposed to that.
They are going to be exposed to the Christian faith.
Jack always tells a lot of people that ask who
do you allow in just Christians? No, we don't. I
(12:01):
have Muslims, I have Hindus, I have all those people
come in. They're going to be treated with the same
respect that I would anyone else. And Jack said, we
even have Southern Baptists in there, So I mean we
allow anybody. But it's it's they're going to be exposed
to that. There's church groups that come in and they
will feed them and they'll have a devotion. We do
have a church service every Sunday evening. Hunter Street Baptist
(12:24):
Church comes in and does that, and.
Speaker 2 (12:27):
I imagine it's not it's not required, but it's encouraged.
Speaker 5 (12:30):
Encouraged, yes, absolutely, and that's that's something. But also, and
this is one thing that we get questioned about, we
do not transport people on Sunday to churches. And I'll
explain that the reason we don't do that, even though
we have all the transportation, is because if I transport
you to a church of your choice, which I encourage
(12:50):
people to get involved, I also have to transport the Buddhists,
the Muslims and personal faith that that's where we stand
up up. So Sundays is kind of a no transport,
no nothing day that that's our day of rest, and
that's when my drivers get off. That's when my other
people get a down day. So you're sort of there
(13:13):
you go. I need to make sure that they still
have monitoring. So there's We have a guy that we
have the house right across the facility from across the street,
and he is my nighttime facility manager. So when I
go home in the evening, when Jack and I leave,
(13:33):
we have a guy, Harvey Owens, which has been with
me pretty much since I started with with Shepherd's Fold
in twenty sixteen, and he stays there with him in
the evenings when I'm gone, so there's somebody there with
him twenty four hours a day to take care of
whatever needs or whatever situations come up. There's a lot
of unknowns when you're dealing with these people, with this
(13:56):
type of people coming out because they have lived a
hard life and not really treated themselves well. And so
there's there's physical issues that come up, medical issues that
we have to be ready at a moment's notice to
be able to get that took care of, get them
more they need so that they can be nursed back
and make sure to get their health back up and write.
(14:16):
We do drug testing, just random drug testing all the time,
and that that's for them and for us.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
Trust, but verify.
Speaker 5 (14:26):
It's it to somebody that's lived a life where they've
always been kicked out, always been kicked aside, knock you know, leave,
you can't be here. People like that. It feels really
good to be caught doing the right thing.
Speaker 2 (14:38):
It's very true.
Speaker 1 (14:38):
So in other words, you can can you know they
go in there and say, hey, I'm clean, but I
want you to know, I don't want you to have
any doubt.
Speaker 2 (14:45):
You can prove. I'll prove that I'm.
Speaker 5 (14:46):
Clean, absolutely they just it's a really good feeling to
be caught doing the right thing. Just full disclosure. I
did eight years in prison myself, So I was in
prison from two thousand and five to twenty thirteen. When
I got out, I worked for another ministry. I'm kind
of doing the same thing, but they were the ones
that crashed and went away. So I worked out in
(15:10):
the downtown Birmingham. Actually worked for Inline Electric for about
a year year and a half and then Jack had
and Shepherd's Foal was able to obtain the building that
I had actually got out and come to, and he
knew that I had done this before, and then he
came to me asking if I would come back to
do it again. Every day's a challenge. Every individual is
(15:31):
different and every situation is different, so you've got to
be very open to everything going on to meet them
where they are, figure out where that is, and then
try to bring them back up. Gaining their trust is
the first step. I Once you gain someone's trust and
they're willing to talk to you and tell you even
the things that they don't want anybody else to know.
(15:52):
When you can gain their trust and begin to talk
to them openly, you learn that pain, so I can
speak to their heart and speak to that pain and
let's work on that.
Speaker 1 (16:01):
Trent, do you have any sort of counseling available in
terms of, like you said, if they're dealing with underlying
issues from I guess at this point they've dried If
they had a substance abuse problem, they probably mostly dried
out from that, but something drove them to the substance
abuse problem. And there could be underlying issues, psychological issues,
or just things in their past that drove them to
the end up to that place. And you, like you said,
(16:22):
you don't want the recidivism, So how do you how
do you minister to these these men to make sure
that they're going to always move forward, they're not going
to slide back.
Speaker 5 (16:32):
That's part of the process. We did have an agreement
with West Alabama Universities in which they have a psychology class,
a psychologist course that they do social okay, and they
have to have intern hours. Now. They used to come
and do that in our facility and we had a
great build up of that to where it gave them
an outlet just to release and then they could make
(16:55):
us aware or give them different places they can go
to get the help. Since that time, because of some
changes in administration, that's kind of gone away. But luckily
there are other organizations that are really good at handling
that here in Birmingham. Some of those other organizations have
their own psychologists and psychiatrists and people that these guys
(17:19):
can talk to, so if that character is exposed that
they do need that help, because unfortunately, a lot of
our incarcerated people do have slight mental issues that can
be dealt with with simple medication or meditation or talking
to people let it out. They can deal with that
(17:39):
and live a perfectly good social life out here. But
if they're not taught how then they're still reacting from
the pain or the hurt of whatever went on in
their past. And so we're in connection with several of
the organizations that we work with that have those people
on their staff to do that, and we have numbers,
direct numbers each and ever one of them. If we
have somebody that needs that, we can on tact them
(18:00):
and they're immediately set up a time either that day
or the next day to come get that done. The
crisis center that's.
Speaker 3 (18:07):
On UH that's excellent Beacon High, Beacon Street, Beacon Parkway,
I think can Parkway.
Speaker 5 (18:13):
I think it is awesome organization. They do a fantastic job.
They're not a facility that takes somebody in and keeps
them for for months or years. They go in there
and they have the medical uh expertise, they have the
psychological expertise to find out exactly what's causing some of
these people's problem when they just can't reason it out,
(18:35):
and they're able to talk them down and make sure
that there's not any any chemical imbalances, whether it be
drugs or whether it be just something with their body,
and to figure out what needs to be done to
straighten it out, and then they come to that conclusion,
they get to it and then the people Okay, they've
got to go back to wherever you're living at because
we don't have a house. They didn't, but we do
(18:57):
so even without patient situations where people have mental issues
that they have to deal with on a weekly or
monthly basis. Someone who does have a drug issue but
they're functional enough that they don't need in house they
can do outpatient. We work with them and take care
of that, get them to where they need to be
so that they can get that help.
Speaker 3 (19:18):
We've talked a lot about God, I'm sorry, go ahead, yeah,
I just wanted to touch on real quick about this
recidivism issue. Is that recently ail dot com published in
their report that the recidive is of rate for the
state of Alabama is twenty nine to thirty percent, meaning
a thirty percent of the people who've been released go
back to prison with anywhere from what one to three
years of three to five years, which is a very
(19:40):
huge number. In fact, it's the second largest in the
entire country. And so that is a problem at the
state of Alabama faces, and that's why we work as
close as we can with a prole board with those
folks that are involved with that to let them know
that if they paroll them to shepherds fold, the opportunity
for them to succeed it goes up significantly. And just
(20:03):
to put in perspective too, is that we don't get
any funds from the state or from the federal government.
Any funds that we receive come from the fees we
do get from our guys. By the way, it only
costs about eighteen dollars a day to stay on our program,
and we pay food expensively for running about two thousand
dollars a week, about three thousand dollars a month just
for power. You got to throw water in and all
(20:24):
the other efforts. So it takes a lot to run
the program. But we've been blessed because of the fact
that we've been able to sustain that. And we have
an upcoming event that will upcoming us in October when
we have our annual banquet October seventeenth, and Danny Carr,
who's a district attorney for Birmingham, he is the one
who has set up a second Chance program that allows
(20:45):
employers that will be at the Battlet Auditorium on April fifteenth,
as a matter of fact, if anybody's hearing this, and
you can go there and you can have all those
companies there that hire people who have been paroled or
cons or whatever and give them a chance to seek employment.
And so he'll be our guest speaker actually at that event.
But that's a very important part. I think he's probably
the only district attorney that I know of that does
(21:07):
something like that. The other component that we work with
is Ingram State Technical College was the Elmore Correctional Program
near Montgomery. It's the only one of its kind in
the entire country, and they actually work in most of
the prison systems we have here in Alabama with skill
sets teaching them electricity, electronics, what is it skidding, CDOs
(21:29):
and all those things that they have something when they
leave that they can use to become you know, get
get work. So those are those are the things that
we do and so.
Speaker 5 (21:39):
You know, our our whole.
Speaker 3 (21:42):
We received most of our funds from the freewall love
offerings of people, donors and corporations. That's that's kind of
how that works. And we do get some grants that
help as well, but that's how we fund the program
that allowed to sustain itself.
Speaker 5 (21:56):
I want to expand on the one hundred and fifty
dollars a week. We do charge one hundred and fifty
dollars a week for a person being our program. But
until they're earning that one hundred and fifty dollars a week,
they can't pay that one hundred and fifty dollars a week.
It does accumulate, and I do that. Part of the
reason is because some of what needs to be taught
is budgeting for people to figure out how to budget,
(22:17):
just like we all have to do with stuff goes on.
So that's part of the of the on the job training,
if you will, that they learn that as they go
through the program. But I'm not going to We're not
going to put someone out because they can't give us
that one hundred and fifty dollars that week. What we're
going to do is we're going to work with them
to help make sure they're earning that so that they
(22:38):
can pay it.
Speaker 2 (22:40):
So in the progressing around for you said thirty years, right, Jack,
over thirty dollar?
Speaker 1 (22:44):
Oh yeah, so how many people have passed through the program?
How graduates do you think estimate you had in thirty years?
Speaker 3 (22:51):
I think we looked at that the other day. I
think over three thousand, I think if I remember correctly, I.
Speaker 5 (22:56):
Think the amount that we had we went back to
two thy seventeen, so that's all that was, and we
had we had between three and four thousand. Come back
with the number that comes so so yeah, so.
Speaker 3 (23:09):
Based on the analytics, you know, I mentioned the recidivism
rate for our graduates, Well, not everybody graduates from the
program because of behavior or something else that they can't
complete the program. But even if you look just at
those folks, the recidivis of race eight percent. So even
folks who have come to the program but did not graduate,
they still have a very very low recidive race. So
they got something out of the program while they were there.
(23:31):
I think that's pretty cool. So what we're what we
do now also is that you know we visit with
the local churches, is to share our story with the
churches and others that are interested in what we do,
just like you are, and a lot of folks. But
what can we do well, you know, it's not just money.
You know, we asked for people to come in as mentors.
We have mandatory meetings three times a week that they
can come in and love on these guys and share
(23:53):
a meal with them and just spend some time with them.
So there's a lot of ways you have to go
overseas to do mission work in this city. You can
come to it here in burmingm and do something like
that as Shepherd's.
Speaker 1 (24:02):
Full And I think that is so important because there
are a lot of churches who do like you said,
they send people overseas and that's a great ministry. But
there are so many people in our community and I
think too often we throw people away you know we
won't redeem them. We go, well, you've broken the law,
and forever you are an other, you are going to
be over here. You're shunned and we can't bring you back.
(24:22):
And that's actually the whole message of Jesus is the
idea of being redeemed from what you've done wrong. And
we've all sinned, and sometimes you've gotten caught by a
police officer, other times you haven't. But either way, people there,
you know, there are good people behind bars. Most of
them are good people, and at some point they come
out and we want them to be able to do
something to contribute, because if they don't, they'll end up
(24:45):
back behind bars. But on their way they might cast
some damage and we don't want that, and we.
Speaker 5 (24:48):
Don't want that. That's what we want to keep from happening,
and to show them that there is a way to
survive out here in this world without doing it wrong
or taking other people's items or covening things that just
don't belong to them. One thing I want to point
out with the program also is that the way that
you get it's a six month program, okay, but you
(25:09):
don't advance from one level to the next, just because
of how long you've been there. So even though you've
been with us for six months, if you don't accomplish
the requirements that are set in place for them to meet,
they don't get a completion at six months. Their program
continues until they meet those goals. That's like you and me,
everybody coming up out here in the world. In order
(25:30):
for you to get to one level to the next,
you got to find out what are the procedures, what
are the processes to get to that next level? How
do I get that? You learn them, you achieve them,
and then you move up. And so it's goal oriented,
not based on time. One of the things that they
get to do. You have these people incarcerated and a
lot of them, especially in Alabama prisons, they're in a
(25:53):
room that's filled with two to three hundred people on
bunk beds three feet apart. They learn to be in
a crowd that many people and be alone, and so
teaching them to unlearn that how to be social creatures again,
which our society is a very social element. That's what
bringing as many people in as we can to spend
(26:14):
time with them, coming in to eat supper with them,
coming in and just put on an event to do something.
The more interaction we can get to happen like that,
the more social they become and they know how to
deal with society once they do leave us.
Speaker 1 (26:29):
We're almost at a time, but I want to make
sure we have some time to mention if people are
hearing this message and they want to participate in any
way with your program. For starters, how can people give
to your ministry?
Speaker 3 (26:41):
Well, first of all, then go online. We have a
web page www dot shepherds fold org and on that
web page has all the donate pages, all the missions,
everything we do, and they can go through that. They
can also just come by and visit. I tell people
I could sit here and tell you how great this
program is, but if you'll just come out and visit,
(27:01):
well we'll give you a tour. We'll let you meet
some of the folks, and you'll see why this program
exists to do what it does. So that's a very
that's a very important component. They can always always call us,
you know, two O five seven eight zero six two
one one. One of the benefits that I have is
that my executive assistant also happens to be Trans's wife,
so I can keep them there as long as I
(27:22):
need to keep them there during the day, so it
kind of works out for that perspective. But those are
probably the two. But we're also on Facebook, I mean,
so you can also gain information. We put pictures on there,
and we put down testimonies and things of that nature.
But those are the best way to get in touch
with us, and we'd love for people to do so.
I'd love to be able to come out and share
the seper story. I was in pharmaceutical sales for thirty
(27:45):
five years, and I think I could sell, you know,
ice cream to an Eskimo. But the point is is
I just I don't twist elbows. I just tell the
shepherd's full story. It's biblical and believe that, you know,
the Lord's going to take care of ourt ease. And
we're just gad to have an opportunity like this to
share it, Amen.
Speaker 1 (28:00):
And for and you know, we have listeners all over
the state, some of which are listening from behind bars.
If you are about to come out of jail or
you know somebody, how can we get some of those
people connected with you?
Speaker 5 (28:12):
Guys, Each and every facility has a chaplain or they
have counselors. Case managers if you will, that they can
be in touch with and every single one of them
have our application. If they don't have it on hand,
all they have to do is send us a letter
or let have one of their family members contact us
at the seven eighth sixty two one one number and
(28:34):
we can get an application sent out. There's also an
application spot on our website at the Shepherdsfold dot org
where you can do it online and once it's done
online and scent page. Jack's executive assistant in my wife,
she gets it immediately. She also does the intake coordination,
(28:56):
so she's in contact with every single one of the
facilities in the state, all the chaplains, they have our
applications or can get our applications at each facility, and
all they got to do is fill it out. And
a lot of the case managers or the chaplains or
internal pos you got an internal PO at each facility,
they can get it to us, fax it to us,
(29:19):
email it to us however, and that starts the process.
Speaker 1 (29:22):
Trent RedWine he's the director of operations, and Jack Howsen
he is the executive director of shepherds Fold. Guys, thank
you so much for joining me this week on Viewpoint Alabama.
Speaker 3 (29:32):
Thank you for the invitation of Liss.
Speaker 2 (29:34):
I'm John Mount and this is the Alabama Radio Network.
Speaker 5 (29:36):
You've been listening to Viewpoint Alabama, a public affairs program
from the Alabama Radio Network.
Speaker 1 (29:41):
The opinions expressed on Viewpoint Alabama are not necessarily those
of the staff, management, or advertisers of this station.
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