CROP Grows in California

By SETH SANDRONSKY

Creating Restorative Opportunities and Programs (CROP) opened a campus for formerly imprisoned people in Oakland, Calif. April 3. Ted Gray and Jason Bryant co-founded CROP, launched to help those previously incarcerated to be productive members of society.

“The Ready 4 Life program is CROP’s expression of a reimagined reentry program,” according to Bryant. “When our proximate leaders envisioned this program, we knew the development and implementation of a holistic program would be a huge mountain to climb. We anticipated there would be challenges and winding paths … so in that regard, what has transpired is exactly what we expected. Beyond this, we’ve remained anchored in our commitment to put our Fellow’s needs first and ensure that all programmatic components are aimed at supporting people’s success in the community.”

There are 20 Fellows, females and males, participating in a 12-month career development program at a new live-in career campus in Oakland. Participants will receive leadership training, financial coaching and money management skills, job training, full-time tech-focused jobs that offer living wages, and pathways to permanent housing.

“Holistic services aren’t just important – they’re paramount,” said Terah Lawyer, CROP executive director, in a statement. “It makes communities safer. It makes families closer. This is the pathway into more success for the community beyond the person who is a formerly incarcerated person.

“You talk about the ripple effect of crime. This is the ripple effect of amends. This is how we repair our communities. This is how the voices of those who have been impacted by their own poor choices and incarceration can turn around and give back to their communities that are still struggling with crime.”

The program is receiving $28.5 million in workforce and housing grants from the state of California, which Assemblymember Wendy Carrillo (D-Los Angeles) helped CROP secure. Of the $28.5 million, $27 million funds the Ready 4 Life program, including programming and housing costs, and another $1.5 million supports improvements and renovations at the career campus.

“I am honored to work with CROP on the launch of the Ready 4 Life program, a landmark project that will positively change the lives of justice-impacted individuals,” Carrillo said in a statement. “The state of California has done a lot of work to end regressive policies that have for decades disproportionately impacted low income communities and people of color. Through the state budget, the Legislature created a justice and values driven budget that puts healing and people first. 

“CROP’s state budget allocation will provide us with real-time data for effective oversight as we work on tackling re-entry issues like housing insecurity, skills and confidence building, workforce development and ultimately reduce recidivism. Investments like this are the necessary actions needed to undo the harms created by over policing in communities and statewide policies that have fueled mass incarceration and the growth of the prison industrial complex in California. Today is a new day in justice reform.”

From a fiscal viewpoint, CROP’s funding from the $210 billion 2021-22 General Fund saves money for state taxpayers. Consider this: Incarcerating one adult in California costs $120,000 per year, according to Bryant, CROP’s program director. By contrast, CROP’s price tag is half that six-figure amount per person, according to him. The math of the state spending contrast speaks volumes.

The genesis of CROP is the California state prison system. It houses adults separately along the color line. Bryant and Gray, one black and the other white, spent seven years in Susanville’s High Desert State Prison. Annually, the Calif. Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation releases about 30,000 incarcerated people.

Seth Sandronsky lives and works in Sacramento. He is a journalist and member of the Pacific Media Workers Guild. Email sethsandronsky@gmail.com.

From The Progressive Populist, May 1, 2023

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