Expanding Opportunities for the Formerly Incarcerated with Mission: Launch

Featuring Teresa Y. Hodge, President & CEO, Mission: Launch and Ebony Thomas, President, Bank of America Foundation

Teresa: [00:00:04] The American dream, the possibility of this experiment. It belongs to all of us, including those of us who have an arrest conviction record. This is not something that's a good thing to do for a small fragment of the population. 100 million Americans is not inconsequential. And so in order for our society to work, it works best when all of us have an opportunity to work hard, take care of ourselves, and have access. [00:00:33][29.2]

Tulaine: [00:00:41] You're listening to System Catalysts. Each week you will hear personal stories of change makers who are bringing more inclusive connective system level solutions to our most persistent challenges. I'm to Lane Montgomery. When I think about the purest definition of a system catalyst, someone who is directly involved in changing the system and catalyzing a movement, I immediately think of Theresa Hodge, and her personal experience makes her especially equipped for the work she is doing today. [00:01:31][49.8]

Teresa: [00:01:32] The topic of mass incarceration in our criminal legal system is a topic that shows me, quite frankly, it chose me when I was a business person, and the company that I started was investigated and I thought long and hard for literally my life, my freedom. And I lost. [00:01:52][19.3]

Tulaine: [00:01:54] Teresa spent seven years in prison, but she didn't let that time go to waste. She began planning with her daughter, Lauren Leonard, how she could be of service when she came out. After Teresa's release, they started Mission Lodge, an organization that helps people with criminal records get back on their feet financially. But Theresa soon realized that there was a great systemic barrier preventing people with a criminal record from getting a job or even borrowing money from a bank to start their own business. Background checks, no matter the circumstances that led people to prison or how much they had changed a criminal record meant they were immediately cut off from the opportunity to rebuild their lives. [00:02:35][41.0]

Teresa: [00:02:37] A criminal background check determines who gets access to opportunity. And if you have a criminal record, well, it is locked out because background reports are binary. Well, I can't do anything about my past, but I am not the person or that one single data point alone. [00:02:57][20.5]

Tulaine: [00:03:00] So Theresa turned her efforts into creating an alternative score, one that increases the opportunities for people with criminal records to access employment, banking services, education and housing. Her hope is to give people a second chance and change the cultural belief that paints those who have gone to prison as forever criminals. Today, we'll learn how Theresa is transforming our financial system along with our beliefs about who deserves access to opportunity. In this episode, I had the pleasure of interviewing my friend Theresa Hodge and Ebony Thomas, who will learn more about later. Theresa, It is so good to be here in conversation with you, my friend. So first, just tell us a little bit, Theresa, about your background and what made you personally so passionate about helping people who have criminal records in this country. [00:03:53][53.6]

Teresa: [00:03:54] Yeah, well, first of all, it's just good to be here with you, too. Always having a conversation. Oh, my story, my background. I tell you, I feel like I've been doing this for so long. When I think of my, you know, the work that I'm doing and to some degree, why I'm doing the work, I have to go back to like my childhood. And I think my entire life I've always been an empathetic person. I did not have the language or understanding of inclusion and belonging when I was younger, but I certainly was a person who kind of believed always in helping somebody who was the outlier or the outcast or someone who was being other. And I think I was just always curious as a child. And so when I think about the work that I'm doing today, in hindsight, it makes a lot of sense. [00:04:46][52.1]

Tulaine: [00:04:50] Today. Teresa brings that empathy to her work at Mission Lodge, where she advocates for the inclusion of people with criminal records. Her own experience is what led her to this work before going to prison. Theresa had co-founded a financial literacy company for the African-American Christian community. Her company was investigated, and in 2007, she was found guilty of mail fraud. Theresa was sentenced to over seven years for this white collar, nonviolent first time offense. [00:05:19][28.6]

Teresa: [00:05:20] And it was in that losing when I was facing an 87 month federal prison sentence, that I began to realize that in spite of everything that I knew and everything that I had done, that it was going to be incarceration that was going to have the greatest impact on my life. And so what I do today is my response to incarceration. It's my response to the journey. It's my response to what I witnessed. And today, it's work that I love. [00:05:53][33.1]

Tulaine: [00:05:54] While Theresa was in prison, her daughter Lauren, was pursuing her master's degree in business. [00:05:59][4.1]

Teresa: [00:06:00] While she went to grad school. She had a professor who told her that he thought she had an appetite for social entrepreneurship. And she said, Well, the topic that I'm learning about is mass incarceration. And so while I was in prison, Lauren started entering into business plan competitions. I was writing and assisting her from inside prison. I kind of laugh and joke about it now. I like in a sense, I had a captive audience. I had a lot of women who were in prison. And, you know, right then and there, it was like a over a thousand women there. So it was an opportunity to just ask everyone, you know, what do you need? What's missing? When you go home, what are you thinking? What are you feeling? It's going to be the right path for you. I also had an opportunity to see a lot of women who went to prison, who had really high dreams and aspirations come back. And I found the conversations with them the most intriguing, because what I wanted to know was what was the disconnect? Because I knew they wanted to make it, but it just didn't work. [00:07:09][69.3]

Tulaine: [00:07:12] These women were going out of prison, hoping to rebuild their lives, but found themselves back in prison due to the lack of opportunities. When Theresa came out of prison herself in 2017. She and Lauren founded Mission Launch. Tell us a little bit more about that. What is Mission Launch? [00:07:29][17.3]

Teresa: [00:07:30] So Vision Launch focuses on the reentry journey and reentry. You know, it's jargon, but what it really means is the time when a person is released from prison or jail. And it is that period of time when they're trying to rehabilitate themselves back to society, reconnect and just live a regular normal life according to how they want to live it. And so for me, mission launch is focused on helping individuals get back on their feet. And we have a very innovative approach to doing it. There are a lot of people who are doing amazing work. And so when I came home from prison, I did want to bring my whole self to the criminal justice as a service provider. And in doing so, it involved technology, because I have always been an early adopter of technology. It involved community. It involved thinking of innovation and how could you really improve something. And so we've, you know, took a little while to kind of figure out what was our right place in the ecosystem. And for us, it was being a convener. We hosted the first reentry focused hackathon in the country in 2014. We've hosted hackathons now across the country, and we just recently finished one. And so we've become a trusted convener to bring different stakeholders together and try to break the silos. But beyond that, you have to center the voice and the voices of those who are directly impacted by mass incarceration, because otherwise it's another form of othering. Let me fix you or let me fix solutions for someone else. And so we bring everyone in the room, but we never lose sight of the fact that if you don't hear from those who have been impacted by mass incarceration, your solutions will fall short. [00:09:21][110.7]

Tulaine: [00:09:24] Since 2012, mission launch has focused on helping formerly incarcerated people with access to jobs, self-employment, housing and higher education. Through this work, Teresa realized that one of the greatest barriers to employment is the background check. This led her to develop an alternative called R3 score. [00:09:43][18.1]

Teresa: [00:09:44] It's a contextualized criminal background report. We are a screening company, and so if you are an employer or a business of any type and before you extend an opportunity, you run a criminal background report just to get a little bit of extra information. Mm hmm. You come to a company like an hour, three score. [00:10:06][22.1]

Tulaine: [00:10:07] Got it. And so contextualized. That's a beautiful word. I love that word. Moving from binary, yes or no, Have you been incarcerated or arrested? Yes or no. To something contextualized. So give us a little bit of color and shape and flavor to what contextualized meaning means. What does the data include in R3 score? [00:10:27][20.4]

Teresa: [00:10:28] Yeah. So, you know, every now and then I still do some of the interviews we run, like I indicated, a C.R.A. compliant criminal background report. The difference is we do about a 5 to 10 minute interview because we want to get a little bit of information in the words of the person who's come in contact with the legal system, you know, what happen, where are you today and so forth, because we need to see where are you, Is there any new information, is there any new data? What can we learn about you? And so we allow them to fill in a questionnaire and then we have a conversation. The conversation is held by a person who's directly impacted. So we level the playing field a little bit. Mm hmm. I had a conversation recently with a woman who went to visit her mother over a Thanksgiving holiday, and she had two small children. She walked into a store, She bought groceries. And like many of us, she put a couple of items on the bottom shelf of the cart. She paid for everything and she was walking out. When she walked out, she was stopped and said, You didn't pay for two items on the bottom of your cart. And she was like, Oh my God, I didn't mean to do it. I have the money, let me pay for it. They wouldn't let her pay for. She ended up with a criminal record. Well, she was out of town. And so she went back home. It was the holidays. They told her, you know, we'll call you. She kept calling and trying to get this resolved. They said it was dropped, that it added up. No, it was not dropped when she went to apply for a job. It came up and she has been fighting and trying to get this resolved for several years. And no one where she was traveling to where she was visiting will help her fix it. She has limited resources to small kids and now she has a criminal record, even though she's never gone to prison and the final disposition never went to court. Nothing happened other than that one incident when she told me that story was very relatable because I, too have had to say, Oh, wait a minute, there's an extra item. So context of why you have a criminal record matters. Yeah, that was just a minor example. But context. 20 years ago, 30 years ago, you committed a crime. And since then, you've been home for 15 years and you're doing amazing things. That information also needs to come into play. And so that is part of the R3 experience for the individual who has the arrest or conviction record, giving them an opportunity to provide the context, a little bit of extra data and information. And if the decision maker, the business decides, they still don't want to engage after that, you know, there are some laws and stuff that they have to follow. But we believe that when businesses are given an opportunity to better understand the criminal history and not just the fact that it's yes or no, we say yes. And let us tell you a little bit more about this person using data. And when we do that, we're having some good success. [00:13:49][201.0]

Tulaine: [00:13:51] That's really interesting. So what challenges did you face as a woman, as someone who has been incarcerated as a business leader with this counter-culture idea? What challenges did you come across? [00:14:02][11.6]

Teresa: [00:14:04] Well, you just named them all right there. I do. And the fact that I came home from prison, you know, almost 50, you know, to that I think you would have it all layered in there that, you know, I am a black woman who came up with this idea and I tell this story often, and it's sickening to some degree. But I remember talking to an investor about our three score. He was like, Oh my God, this is brilliant. This is $1,000,000,000 company. And he was right. He said, But who came up with the idea? And so I was like, Oh, what I did, you know, my daughter and I, you know, that I got it. [00:14:47][43.2]

Tulaine: [00:14:47] And I kept. [00:14:47][0.2]

Teresa: [00:14:47] Talking and he asked me again, you know, and I, you know, always felt like, well, maybe he didn't understand what I said. So I went on and on. And by the third time, it hit me that. It's such a brilliant idea. And having the conversation with me, he did not believe I was brilliant enough to come up with a brilliant idea. And you know, when you say that, it means when it comes to creating billion dollar businesses. When it comes to creating brilliant ideas, somehow we believe that only a few people have the ability to do that. And usually they live on the West Coast. They usually go to Ivy League schools. They usually are white men. And we invest in them in ways that we do not invest in people who really understand. And what I know is brilliance exists across the globe, not distribute it to one group of people disproportionately more than others. We don't invest in people. We are not willing to take the same bet. On women. We're not willing to take the same bet on black people. We're not willing to take the same bet on people who have the lived experience of incarceration or homelessness, or you pick the topic. We're not willing to take the same bets. And what the evidence has proved is businesses ran by women succeed. And what I know is a lot of times black women, we joke about, you know, we know how to take and make something out of nothing. You know, we are resourceful. We're gritty in how we build and how we do. And as women, we build in community. We build in collaboration. Often we try to be fair. So it's been a challenge, quite frankly, doing this work. And I know if I were a white male with this idea, we would have received the level of funding and a clear path. [00:17:00][132.2]

Tulaine: [00:18:00] Despite the uphill battle to gain recognition, Artemis score continues to be a very attractive tool to employers and financial institutions. The score can unlock a whole population of potential employees and borrowers. Let me just lay out the numbers for you. I was truly surprised when Teresa did the same for me today. As many as one in three Americans have an arrest or conviction record. That is around 80 million people by the year 2030. Not long from now, that number is expected to rise above 100 million. That's one in two working age adults. [00:18:36][35.7]

Teresa: [00:18:38] So what does that mean for our business? It means that when you advertise, more than likely, 50% of the candidates are going to have an arrest or conviction record. You cannot say no to 50% of your applicant pool unless you're just, you know, an amazing business. And, you know, you just get that many applications. You can't say no to 50% of the consumers that are going to show up. You can't say no to 50% of the people who are going to rent want to rent from you, bank with you. And so expanding access to opportunity is something today that businesses are having to do because there's a constriction because of just the size of all of this. But then beyond that, let's like from a values based, you know, perspective, like we're talking about America and the American dream and, you know, the American dream, the possibility of this experience, this experiment. It belongs to all of us, including those of us who have an arrest, her conviction record. So this is not something that's a good thing to do for a small fragment of the population. 100 million Americans is not inconsequential. It's a significant number. That's right. And so in order for our society to work, it works best when all of us have an opportunity to work and take care of ourselves and have access. Right. [00:20:13][95.3]

Tulaine: [00:20:14] Right. And it's so powerful. I mean, those numbers are staggering. You know, half of the working age adult population and the not at all distant future will have an arrest or conviction record. And yet our systems, as they currently are designed, would mean that we would lose access to that much talent, that much you know, of our community. And I think you're right. Like this work you're doing with R3 and with Mission launch, it is actually one of those beautiful opportunities where doing what is right is also doing what is rational and required for economic prosperity. [00:20:51][37.0]

Teresa: [00:20:52] I'm actually more surprised that more corporations are not moving faster to figure out how to engage this population. The thing that I think was most staggering to me when I went to prison was just how normal I found people to be. You. I went to prison really afraid because of what I saw on television, and I had bought into the propaganda myself. Mm hmm. But when I got there, I was just shocked by how many soccer moms, quite frankly, were in prison. How many middle class women were in prison? And while I was sitting there, one of the things that I realized is for those who go to prison, who have more means and resources, they also can come home and tuck themselves right back into society. Hmm. And it's just the disruption to their lives. It doesn't destroy it. And then there are other people who have been under-resourced their entire lives. It just really hammers their lives. And so we focus so much on black and brown populations. I think that many of us have an image of who goes to prison. And usually it's a gangbanger. It's a you know, a man who, you know, came from a broken home. His school systems failed them, family failed and so forth. And I think when we lock that image in, we're okay with that person going to prison and we're okay with offering very few pathways for that person to return back. When you put people back into under-resourced communities and you provide no opportunity for individuals, I find that to be more of a danger and a public safety issue. So I think we just spent so much money incarcerating people versus creating pathways of opportunities. It is cheaper to invest in people, invest in communities to create pathways of opportunities for individuals than to destroy lives and families communities through incarceration and. [00:23:04][132.2]

Tulaine: [00:23:08] Teresa isn't the only one who recognizes we must begin creating opportunities for formerly incarcerated people. New Profit. The venture Philanthropy run partnered with singer songwriter John Legend's campaign Free America to support entrepreneurs impacted by the criminal justice system. We brought together nine formerly incarcerated social entrepreneurs, including Teresa, as part of what was then an accelerator program called Unlocked Futures. Another key partner in this accelerator was Bank of America, who provided financial and capacity support for this program. [00:23:39][31.0]

Ebony: [00:23:40] On marked futures. It's very personal to me because I've had two brothers who were formerly incarcerated. [00:23:46][5.5]

Tulaine: [00:23:47] That's Ebony Thomas, president of the Bank of America Foundation. [00:23:50][3.0]

Ebony: [00:23:52] Let's give these formerly incarcerated individuals an opportunity to break barriers and not return to prison because we're giving them the resources, the know how we help the family structure and unit support them as they've come out. And so we can reduce recidivism by supporting that system. So this notion of their system, an individual, and we can do both of these things through coalition. [00:24:19][27.0]

Tulaine: [00:24:22] Recidivism happens when formerly incarcerated people come into conflict with the criminal justice system. After being released, people who are successfully reintegrated into society after prison are less likely to further engage in crime. But with the barriers to employment, housing and financial support, a successful reentry often requires support from different sources. Unlocked Futures was an opportunity to bring some of these organizations together. [00:24:46][23.6]

Ebony: [00:24:48] One organization might not be equipped to do it all, but oh, this one is sitting adjacent to it. Let's bring this into the fold. Oh, and that was adjacent to that. And so now you have this beautiful coalition of 3 to 4 organizations that are supporting the same community, the same individual, but now it's into N instead of one piece of it. So I think it's it's beautiful work and I'm excited to to be a part of it. [00:25:16][28.5]

Tulaine: [00:25:17] That's wonderful. So you mentioned unlike futures. And so, you know, we started working with Bank of America on unlocked futures back in 2017, and it was at a time where that was not in the sort of mainstream philanthropic narrative. Right. That community, those needs, the idea that you would give unrestricted money to people who have been incarcerated to build their organizations and implement their ideas. It was still very much counter-culture. What led Bank of America to invest in unlocked futures when it was still just an idea? [00:25:51][34.7]

Ebony: [00:25:53] You know, I think it's two pieces of that. I mean, it's certainly the idea, but it's also the leadership. And I think we invest deeply in vision and that of you and others who can bring this work to life and not only make it come alive for people, but really do it in a way that's sustainable. [00:26:18][25.4]

Teresa: [00:26:19] Mm hmm. [00:26:19][0.1]

Ebony: [00:26:20] So, again, that goes back to our why I mean, the why is really around economic impact and economic inclusion at its core. And these individuals who have served their time should be able to come back as productive citizens and contribute and feel as though they can create a life for themselves and their families. And again, that goes back to the communities in which we have supported and we invest deeply in. And so that's where that proximity comes to bear, in that we can make decisions about what's needed in the community and how do we reintroduce those individual, how do we support those individuals who have been are informally incarcerated back into a community and are contributing to a gap in the community like that is really powerful, is that it's almost like you've extracted them out of the community for a period of time and then they come back to filling the gap in which no one failed in the time in which they are. Why? I mean, how powerful of a story is that? That really is the tagline for Unlocked Futures is fill in the gap for those futures. And I just think that's just so beautiful for us to be a part. [00:27:43][82.9]

Teresa: [00:27:43] Of that work. [00:27:43][0.2]

Tulaine: [00:27:45] It's really powerful. Like when people talk about systems change and justice and equality in access, right? And we talk about those things a lot in the Systems Catalyst podcast community. They don't always lead by looking at the private sector. They don't necessarily say, okay, private sector is where I can amplify social justice and equality and anti-racism work because of some history, perception and distance really across sectors. And so I would love to hear from you. Eboni, what do you see as the highest and best role of the private sector when it comes to systems change? [00:28:21][36.0]

Ebony: [00:28:22] You know, I don't think I'm a unicorn in saying that. I think that the private sector really are the leaders. I think we have the speed, the agility, the creativity to do it alongside government and nonprofits. But but I do think that we're a leader in that space. And I often think about Brian or Timothy, who I just I have so much admiration, respect for it. And not every person employee can say that about the leader of their organization, but I certainly do, and that his leadership style is one of leading from the front, and it's not leading in a way that's meant to cast a shadow on others or to lead in a way that puts people in shame because they're not doing it. But it's leading in a way to say, Come with me, come collaborate, let's do this work together. I mean, when we even we think about the commitment that we made, the 1.25 commitment, $1,000,000,000 commitment, by no means am I not suggesting that a million $1,000,000,000 is not a lot of money. It is certainly a lot of capital. Yeah, but it's not enough capital to solve the deep rooted issues. Right. And systemic change that is needed. Mm hmm. And so it's really a catalyst for others to be a part of the work. It's a jumpstart is to say, let me put my investment here, and then I want this investment to come from somewhere else. And if we do this investment together, we collaborate together. We can actually make that meaningful progress that we want to make. And so that's what I think the private sector is really good at. Leading from the front is taking capital, taking investment, putting it in places where the change can really happen and then bring others along in that collaborative spirit. And I think we could do more of that. [00:30:15][113.5]

Tulaine: [00:30:17] While the private sector has a big role to play in fixing our systems, Ebony believes that systems change starts with small, everyday actions. [00:30:24][7.3]

Ebony: [00:30:25] I tell people it's never too late to start doing work. You probably already are doing the work work. You just don't recognize it or you may not have categorized it in this way of being a system change. But I think if you truly want to be known as a system change, use your voice. Use your platform. Most people I know have a social media platform. Use it in a smart way. Yeah, use your resources in a smart way. Find the things that matter to you and invest in those things. You know? Make sure that your neighbor across the street has access to a car that can get him or her to the doctor. Like that system change. We often think of these massive undertakings, these big boulders. Yes, it's a pebble. And make sure that you pick up that pebble off the ground and you are that small piece in a larger pond that can really make things happen and change. [00:31:18][52.3]

Tulaine: [00:31:22] And now our Rapid Fire segment. Teresa, what's one word to describe your journey as a systems catalyst? [00:31:31][9.3]

Teresa: [00:31:33] Long suffering. I wish it was joyful a word, but it has been long suffering. I bring joy to the work, but it has been a joyfully painful process. Hmm. [00:31:46][13.4]

Tulaine: [00:31:47] Well, there's so much in that. There's so much. What has been one of the most gratifying moments along this journey for you? [00:31:53][5.8]

Teresa: [00:31:54] Securing a loan for someone by way of our three score who could not keep and maintain a job. A person who constantly found himself getting hired and fired. Hired and fired. Who went out and started a business. And then when it was time to grow his business, he needed a different tool. He needed the contextualized criminal background report, and he was able to secure a $50,000 loan to help him grow his business. And it was a catalytic, you know, investment at the time. [00:32:23][29.5]

Tulaine: [00:32:24] Mm hmm. And then the final kind of rapid fire question, what is it about mission launch and R3 score that keeps you up at night? What is your greatest sort of concern or wondering for the organizations you've launched? [00:32:37][13.0]

Teresa: [00:32:38] Yeah, it's really the market adoption. It's finding a way to talk about this topic and and our solution in a way that businesses, individuals with the rest or conviction workers themselves. Want to say yes to something? [00:32:54][16.3]

Tulaine: [00:32:55] Mm hmm. So I'd love that. Now, for our listeners who either aspire to or are already dipping their toes in the water of being a systems catalyst, what advice or encouragement would you give them, Teresa? [00:33:08][13.1]

Teresa: [00:33:10] Start with what you know and don't feel the need to go along. Don't even feel the need to be in lead position unless there's something that's really burning on you and you don't see it being done the way you feel like you could bring it into existence. But look for partnerships and collaborations that align with your values to go faster. I love that. I think African proverb is if you want to go fast, go alone. But if you want to go far, you have to go together. And so I think community and collaboration is so important. [00:33:42][31.9]

Tulaine: [00:33:51] If you want to learn more about mission launch and our three score, head on over to mission launch, dawg. You can also visit our Web site System catalyst dot com. We we'll find resources related to this week's episode. That's it for today's show. Please don't forget to subscribe to system catalysts so you don't miss out on our new episodes. Also, do us a huge favor by reading our podcast and leaving us a review. Thank you so much for joining us and we'll catch you all in the next episode. Before we go, we'd like to thank our producers at Human Group Media. We'd also like to thank our incredible network of partners who are supporting our mission. Echoing Green DPRK Foundation Population Services International, Virgin Unite. Charlize Theron, Africa Outreach Project. Boldly Go Philanthropy, Synagogues, The Philanthropy Workshop, Nexus and New Profit. If you are interested in becoming a system catalyst and would like to learn more about our partners, please visit System Catalyst AECOM. [00:33:51][0.0]