By Erin Blasko
South Bend Tribune
SOUTH BEND — Each year, more than 600 people return to St. Joseph County from prison, according to information provided by the Department of Community Corrections.
Sadly, many have trouble finding work and land back behind bars, Cheryl Ashe, a former librarian and founder of Ex-Offenders Information and Referral Services, said.
In fact, ex-offenders who cannot find work are about 37 percent more likely to return to prison than those who can, regardless of education, according to the Indiana Department of Correction.
“For drug offenders, nonviolent offenders and sex offenders, the major factors influencing whether they go back (to prison) or not are employment, education and age,” Ashe said
With that in mind, Ashe and others, including Common Council member Valerie Schey, are looking to encourage businesses that seek tax abatement from the city to “ban the box.”
“Ban the box” refers to a nationwide effort to persuade employers to remove from job applications the box that asks whether an applicant has ever been convicted of a crime.
According to the National Employment Law Project, “The ‘box’ ... is a barrier to jobs because it has a chilling effect that discourages people from applying. It also artificially narrows the applicant pool of qualified workers when employers toss out applications with the ‘box’ checked, regardless of the applicant’s qualifications or relevancy of the conviction to the job.”
Research on the topic by Devah Pager, a professor of sociology and public policy at Harvard University, found that a criminal record reduces the likelihood of a job callback or offer by 50 percent.
“It is essentially trying to eliminate some of the barriers for ex-offenders to become gainfully employed,” Schey, the Common Council member, said of the initiative.
She added, “This isn’t going to be the silver bullet that turns South Bend around, but it could have a significant impact for 10, 15, 20 people who can now support their family.”
Along with Ashe and others, Schey, D-District 3, is working on a draft ordinance that would award points on the city’s tax abatement form to employers who agree to “ban the box” for the duration of any abatement period.
Schey plans to introduce the proposal later this year, she said, once budget season is over.
It’s a first step in the direction of more comprehensive legislation requiring all companies that do business with the city to “ban the box,” Schey said, and an inducement to other private sector companies to do the same.
“We’re hoping that after this passes, (other private sector employers) who are not getting abatements or anything like that will go, ‘Whoa, the ceiling didn’t cave in!’” Ashe said.
Ashe noted employers would not be required to hire ex-offenders under the law, nor would it prevent them from performing background checks on prospective employees.
But it would help level the playing field, she said.
“We have to remember, people who commit crimes have the same desires as the rest of us,” she said. “So we need to try to support them so it doesn’t cross their minds to go back to” a life of crime.
Sharon McBride, director of Community Corrections for St. Joseph County, supports the idea.
“I’m all for banning the box, because it’s been a detriment to our community, particularly in not giving (ex-offenders) an opportunity to find employment,” McBride said.
McBride noted the employment rate among individuals sentenced to Community Corrections hovers around 50 percent, mostly due to a reluctance on the part of many local companies to hire such people, no matter how minor the offense.
“Their (job prospects) are very minimal,” she said. “Some employers say they take low-level offenders, but they’re not even getting through the door if they have a felony on their record.”
And that only leads to more recidivism, McBride said.
“That’s one of the ripple effects of having that question on there,” she said. “People cannot find a job ... and they revert back to crime because they don’t have any resources, so they do anything by any means necessary to try to feed their families.”