In just a few weeks, Westborough will host a lively Farmers’ Market each week on the front lawn of the Evangelical Congregational Church at the intersection of Route 30 and Church Street.

Click HERE to see the full article on The Westborough Patch.

(NECN: Kenneth Craig, Oakham, Mass.) – There’s a central Massachusetts online shopping site that is offering more than great gifts. It’s giving the people who make the gifts a fresh start.

Click HERE to see the full article and video on NECN.com

WORCESTER — The Health Foundation of Central Massachusetts has awarded a $138,413 planning grant to Dismas House of Massachusetts to address problems surrounding prisoner re-entry in Worcester.

The grant will enable Dismas House and its partners to research what has been successful elsewhere and make adaptations to create a new model for prisoner re-entry, according Jan Yost, president and CEO of the foundation.

“The initiative will begin with a review of evidence-based models that have been implemented elsewhere and will include an analysis of existing resources and gaps in current services. This information will be used to develop a model to pilot in 2012.

“If the pilot is successful, full implementation will follow over the next two to three years,” she said.

Dismas House’s partners in the project include Community Christian Church, Edward M. Kennedy Community Health Center, Henry Lee Willis Community Center, Jeremiah’s Inn, Massachusetts Department of Correction, Mosaic Worcester, Spectrum Healthcare, United Congregational Church of Christ, Workforce Central Career Center/City of Worcester, Worcester Community Housing Resources, Worcester County Sheriff’s Office and YMCA — Central Branch.

“It takes time and effort, Sadowski said, “but now people are coming to us.” When overlook Farm in Rutland had an extra 40 pounds of carrots and garlic, Lopez was happy to oblige. Last year the Abbey started getting tomatoes and greens from the Dismas house Farm in Oakham, a 35-acre farm where former prisoners get a fresh start by growing fresh vegetables.”

Click HERE to see the full article on edible Boston.

“Holy Cross’ long history with Dismas House, a model community program for former prison inmates, has reached another milestone. With this new chapter, the engaged learning and social justice opportunities that are a hallmark of Holy Cross have been enhanced.”

Click HERE to see the full article at the College of the Holy Cross.

“The Dismas House is rapidly gaining attention for its innovative methods of reintegrating former prisoners into society. By providing housing and support services, Dismas House staff are part of a healthy alternative to restructuring one’s life in the streets with few resources. The Dismas Family Farm, on 25 acres in Oakham, is among the organization’s highly successful programs. Ward Holloway is its Farm Steward.”

Click HERE to read the interview of our Farm Steward on the Worcester Magazine.

(NECN: Kenneth Craig, Oakham, Mass.) – Learning new skills, producing crops, raising animals. That’s what former prisoners and are doing at a working family farm in Oakham, Massachusetts.

Click HERE to view the video on NECN.com

WORCESTER – When a group of Russian judges, lawyers and legislators was asked what impressed them so far on their law and justice tour with the International Center of Worcester, they were quick in their response: New York City and Dismas House.

Click HERE to read the full article.

Dismas House of Massachusetts is being held up as a model prisoner re-entry program for
communities nationwide to imitate.

Dismas was recognized as a model by the Milton S. Eisenhower Foundation in Washington,
D.C. The foundation had LaFrance Associates research team in San Francisco study
Dismas and six other programs, according to Jennie Amison. Mrs. Amison is director of the
foundation’s Replications for Previously Incarcerated Persons program. She is also the
executive director of its Gemeinschaft Home in Harrisonburg, Va., a transitional therapeutic
community program for those persons being released from in-prison therapeutic community
programs in Virginia.

The Eisenhower Foundation deals with multiple solutions to community problems, including
re-entry of former prisoners into society, she said.

After LaFrance Associates did the research, Mrs. Amison visited each program, except for
one which was no longer there when she arrived, she said. The programs were all fantastic,
she said, but she felt a big connection with Dismas, because it is small like the Gemeinschaft.
“I was really impressed,” Mrs. Amison said of Dismas. She was impressed with Dismas’
structure, model, culture, data, resources, leadership and governance. “I felt like I had met
a clone of me,” she said.

Asked what it means to have Dismas get this recognition, Mrs. Amison replied, “That
means that y’all have notoriety.” On a more serious note, she said it opens doors for others
to learn from Dismas and for Dismas to get funding for its programs.
“I think it means a lot because we’ve had a lot of ups and downs through the years, and I
think this validates our program,” said Dismas House co-director Dave McMahon. “The
foundation says this is a model that should be replicated.” He said they try to keep Dismas
small to provide a family atmosphere.

While they could potentially receive funding, the most important thing is that they will be
able to help the foundation spread this model across the country, he said.
He also expressed hope that this would inspire holiday generosity – in the form of volunteers
to cook and serve meals at Dismas House “to help make these guys whole again
with the community.”

Dismas House operates three housing programs in Central Massachusetts, Mr. McMahon
said. The Almost Home program provides an intensive four-month housing and treatment
program for returning county inmates. Dismas House provides a range of services for former
prisoners. The Father Brooks House provides permanent housing for former prisoners
and their children.

On Nov. 13 the U.S. House of Representatives passed H.R. 1593, the Second Chance Act
of 2007, to reauthorize a grant program for re-entry of offenders into the community and to
improve re-entry planning and implementation, according to the Library of Congress Web
site www.thomas.loc.gov. On Nov. 14 the bill was referred to the Senate committee, received
in the Senate, read twice and referred to the Committee on the Judiciary, it says.
President George Bush is likely to sign it, Mrs. Amison said.
“We want to be ready; we want to let people know how to use the money wisely,” she said.
“We are looking at the best practices.” The foundation will seek government funding to
replicate nationwide Dismas and the other programs, she said, adding that she will provide
technical assistance and training.

In addition to Dismas and Gemeinschaft, the programs she visited were the Fortune Society
and Center for Employment Opportunities, both in New York City, Pioneer Human
Services in Seattle, and Safer Foundation in Chicago, she said.
The foundation chose these programs for the study because they have services under one
umbrella, which makes for former prisoners’ most successful re-entry into society, Mrs.
Aimson said. Those services are community networking, education, employment/
vocational training, evaluation, health services, housing, life skills, mentoring and substance
abuse/relapse prevention, she said.

Providing people with the services they need upon release from prison helps reduce recidivism,
she said. She said that in many places the services are scattered: “You need to
go here for housing, here for employment.” That is hard for people who have been incarcerated
for a long time, she said; they do better if all the services are in one place.
In addition, Dismas and the other programs studied start working with people while they
are still in prison, she said.

“We looked a skills starting inside prison and working outward,” she said.
“You’ve got teaching and training prior to them getting out.

WORCESTER — A local foundation yesterday pledged more than $1 million in immediate funding — and as much as $3 million over the next several years — toward the goal of not just stemming the tide of chronic adult homelessness, but eradicating it altogether in the city.

The ambitious initiative, announced by the Health Foundation of Central Massachusetts, is to begin immediately and will initially target 125 people, an estimated 20 percent of Worcester’s chronic homeless population.

“Chronically homeless people often have mental and physical illnesses exacerbated because they are living on the streets,” said Jan B. Yost, president of the Health Foundation. Her organization has delivered a $587,655 grant to a local project targeting homelessness called Home Again, and has committed to lending $500,000 to a housing loan fund to help get people who habitually live on the streets or in shelters into housing of their own.

Depending on the success of the first 12 to 18 months of Home Again, Ms. Yost said, the foundation anticipates providing another $3 million to keep the program operating for three to five years. Organizers hope that a good track record will prompt additional support from other sources.

The guidelines for Home Again were drawn from research and surveys undertaken last year through a $122,430 grant from the foundation. The agreed-upon approach draws heavily from successful programs for the homeless in other cities, which deliver mental health counseling, health care, substance abuse treatment, life skills training and other support services to the homeless, in addition to a roof over their heads.

The aim is for the formerly homeless participants in the project to become adept at managing their lives; find employment, if possible; improve their mental and physical health; and thus be able to support themselves. As they leave Home Again, new participants fill their slots in the program, the door revolving until all in need are served.

Home Again pulls together the resources of Community Healthlink, Central Massachusetts Housing Alliance, Dismas House, Henry Lee Willis Community Center, Jeremiah’s Inn, and South Middlesex Opportunity Council’s People in Peril Shelter in Worcester. Brook Doyle, vice president of homeless and detoxification services for Community Healthlink will serve as project director.

The Home Again project is well-suited to achieve the goals of the Massachusetts Commission to End Homelessness, according to Lt. Gov. Timothy P. Murray. “Targeting the chronically homeless and ensuring they have access to support services is a proven approach to reduce homelessness,” he said.

City Manager Michael V. O’Brien said the program also helps achieve the aims of the City Manager’s Task Force and its three-year plan to end homelessness in Worcester, which was issued last November.

For the project, Home Again uses the federal definition of chronic homelessness: “An unaccompanied adult who is 18 or older with a disabling condition and who has either been homeless continuously for a year or more, or has had at least four episodes of homelessness in the last three years.”

In addition to the 20 chronically homeless people receiving assistance at any one time, the program also will target 10 people who are homeless and considered on the verge of becoming chronically homeless.

Providing readily available services such as health care and other support is the most effective way to help people overcome homelessness, according to a man with considerable experience in the field.

Until last November, Ed, who was interviewed earlier this week at Community Healthlink’s Homeless Outreach and Advocacy Project, would have fallen into the chronically homeless category. Now 50, he has been homeless at various times since he was 22: the first time because he was thrown out of the apartment he shared with a girlfriend, and most recently for a 2-1/2-year stretch in which he lost his job as a grocery store clerk and figured the little money he had left was better spent on drugs and alcohol than on rent. In addition his addictions, he has been diagnosed with mental illness and suffers from hepatitis C.

He recalls that last fall he kept feeling “a pain in the back of my head like you wouldn’t believe.” It was similar to the headaches he would get from a booze or dope hangover, Ed says, but he knew he was in trouble because the shooting pain was coming even when he didn’t have the money to pay for a fix.

He started making the rounds of programs and agencies, but said he kept getting referred to another program or agency. He finally ended up at the HOAP program on Jaques Avenue.

With the exception of permanent housing, HOAP provides clients access to the kinds of support services that will be offered through Home Again. Sober ever since, the program made all the difference in the world to Ed.

“It’s like one-stop shopping,” he said. “They put me into detox. … I couldn’t fill out forms or applications because I couldn’t see, so they gave me a voucher and sent me to LensCrafters. … I’ve seen doctors and get counseling all the time.”

“I actually know what I’m doing now.”