Each year 12,000 men and women with felony records are released back into Marion County:

  • Almost 2,900 from Indiana Department of Corrections (IDOC),
  • Just over 9,000 from Marion County Jail,
  • And a portion of the more than 500 released into our state from Federal penitentiaries.

Without a job, odds are, many will resort to crime once again, and return to incarceration.

A 2018 Recidivism Report released by IDOC says that 43.9 percent of those who came back to Marion County in 2015 returned to prison within three years of release date. Of those, 41.3 percent committed a new crime, and 58.7 percent were re-incarcerated as a result of a technical rule violation (failure to find and retain a job, to attend parole meetings or substance abuse treatment sessions, to fulfill community service requirements, etc.).

In stark contrast to those statistics, a national study said that the recidivism rates for those who are placed in jobs shortly after their release ranges from 3.3 to 8 percent.

Getting to work has positive effects both physically and mentally. A working re-entrant regains self-esteem, a sense of importance in his or her family, and can provide better nutrition to dependent children, which affects their health and can positively impact their ability to learn in school. Having a job and creating an income stream not only impacts the reentrant, their spouse, and children. Their new job also increases income spent in the community in which they live.

However, in spite of a need to work and a willingness to work, those with a felony conviction on their record too often find few employers willing to hire them.

To aid those returning home from long term incarceration in their job search, UNITE INDY has developed SecondChanceIndy.com, the first and only job site that connects those with a record to area employers willing to give them a second chance. These services are provided at no charge to either party.

Here, ex-offenders can search for various types of jobs available from UNITE INDY’s Second Chance Employer Partners by location or by looking through a simple list, and they can apply for any of the jobs listed right there, online. Because we know that this population has many other needs beyond work that can also have a profound impact on their ability to either remain free or to return to incarceration, the website also provides lists of hundreds of links to helpful Resources.

UNITE INDY, in collaboration with several business partners, has secured funding for an independent Second Chance Staffing Study being conducted by Butler University’s Lacy School of Business that we’re hopeful will corroborate anecdotal evidence we’ve collected which indicates that, in addition to being the right thing to do, hiring ex-offenders makes good—bottom line—business sense.

The study will enable us to convince many more employers to make jobs available on SecondChanceIndy.com should it confirm that people with records, when properly prepared to make the transition from incarceration to the workplace, are so grateful to have a second chance that they can be among the company’s most productive, dependable employees. In addition to a high level of productivity, we believe the study will show that this group will help to improve morale, lower the rate of absenteeism, and reduce turnover, which all contribute to the improved financial performance of the employer.

We started offering job preparation training, Jobs for Life, to a group of parolees who decided to settle within Marion or one of the surrounding counties. Not only does work help them (and their families) to defeat the curse of poverty, obtaining a good job is also the biggest deterrent to returning to incarceration.

Once visitation restrictions are lifted in Indiana correctional facilities, we’ll be taking the Jobs for Life course behind the walls of prisons and county jails, and enabling reentrants to access SecondChanceIndy.com immediately when they return to our community.