Author: Jerry Higgins, Communications Officer
The monthly meeting of the N.C. Joint Reentry Council took place Nov. 21 at the NCDAC Office of Staff Development and Training in Apex. Offender rehabilitation and reentry stakeholders received updates from NCDAC Chief Deputy Secretary of Rehabilitative and Correctional Services Maggie Brewer and Deputy Secretary of Rehabilitation and Reentry George Pettigrew, as well as presentations from two reentry stakeholders.
Deputy Secretary Pettigrew spoke about the first update report on the Reentry Strategic Plan that will be turned over to Gov. Roy Cooper in early December as part of the Reentry 2030 initiative. According to Deputy Secretary Pettigrew and the governor’s policy advisor, Ziev Dalsheim-Kahane, nearly 34% of the strategies set forth in Reentry 2030 are either in progress or have been completed. And they both stressed the momentum set forth so far will continue into the next administration.
The audience also heard about offender transitional housing from Anita Lynch, the director of Road 2 Recovery in Nashville, NC (https://www.road2recoveryllc.com) and an explanation of Federal Bonding and the Work Opportunity Tax Credit program, both of which benefit businesses that hire “at-risk” individuals such as former offenders, from Donna Farrar and Annie T. Gomez of the NC Department of Commerce Division of Workforce Solutions.
The next meeting is scheduled for Jan. 23, 2025 in Raleigh.