A plea (ALERT) to all religious leaders – from the Safer Foundation

Calling our Faith-Based Partners to keep Crossroads Adult Transition Center open 

 

In Governor Quinn’s fiscal year 2013 budget address he proposed the closing of Crossroads Adult Transition Center. Closing Crossroads would put public safety at risk and is not a fiscally responsible decision, but that is exactly what the people we sent to Springfield want to do.

The Safer Foundation’s Crossroads Adult Transition Center, in operation since 1983 in Chicago’s North Lawndale neighborhood, has proven to change lives, change families, and change communities.    

Every year, Crossroads ATC helps about 750 men coming from prison get a second chance to reunite with their children and significant others, their churches, and communities and become employed, law-abiding, tax-paying members of society.

Services that Crossroads residents receive include:

Job Placement

Counseling

Job Preparedness Training

GED Classes

Life Skills

Substance Abuse and Mental Health Treatment

Parenting Skills and Family Unification

 Benefits of Crossroads to the west side community and greater Chicago area:

Community service through neighborhood clean-up and beautification project 

Working graduates make an economic impact of millions of dollars spent in the community

Residents impart the message that “crimes does not pay” to younger at-risk individuals

Safer Foundation needs your help to keep Crossroads open!

(1)   Please share this announcement with your faith-based groups, neighbors, friends, and family.

(2)   Please start a petition (attached) and get as many signatures opposing this closure as possible!  Please contact T. Lowery at 312-454-3379 for pickup of completed petitions no later than May 14.

(3)   Please call or write your state legislators TODAY.  Tell them: 

Closing Crossroads will jeopardize public safety in our communities by putting men returning home from prison on the streets without support services needed to stay on the right side of the law.

Closing Crossroads will be NOT save tax dollars.  We’ll actually spend MORE money on corrections because many men denied employment and other support services will return to prison.

Safer has a proven record of success with cost-effective alternatives to incarceration, which is what the state’s “budgeting for results” focus is all about.  People who take part in Safer’s programs are much less likely to return to prison than those who don’t.

Copy and paste this link into your web browser to find your legislator: http://www.ilga.gov/

For more information, please visit our website: www.saferfoundation.org  or call Tony Lowery at 312-454-3379.

Keep Crossroads Adult Transition Center open

Cuts to Reentry Programs Will Increase Prison Costs, Pose Public Safety Risk

For more information, please visit our website: www.saferfoundation.org or call Tony Lowery at 312-454-3379.