Prison Babies

This past Saturday, it took only a few hours for Benevolent donors to step up and help Brianna keep her baby. It's not often that a small amount of money can help a mom and baby stay together, but this was a special circumstance. Brianna needed $210 to pay off a traffic fine so she could keep her baby and raise him from the moment he’s born. The baby’s due next month, and Brianna’s in prison. There’s a special program that will allow her to stay with and keep her baby, but not if she has any outstanding fines.

There was something about the simplicity and raw humanity of Brianna’s need. She’s a mom who wants to nurture her infant when he’s born. We can envision what it will look and feel like when Brianna holds her son. We can also imagine what it would feel like if he were taken from her. We’ve been parents; we’ve been parented; we’ve held newborns close and we’ve suffered hurts. We can feel the urgency of this even if we can’t imagine what it’s like to be in prison and to face the reality of a child being taken away from us.

Over 64% of the women in prison in this country have been convicted of nonviolent crimes, mostly property or drug offenses, and over 2,000 women in prison will give birth this year. Most of us know that babies are born to women serving time in prison and that the vast majority of women who give birth while incarcerated in the U.S. don't get to stay with their babies for even a week after they're born. We don’t often get the opportunity to change that for a mom and her baby. This week, we did.

I knew it. I knew that women in prison in the U.S. have their babies taken from them when they’re born. But I’ve got to tell you, I've never signed a petition, called my legislator or lobbied to urge policymakers to change prison policies and programs to allow women to remain with their babies, if they choose to, after birth.

When Brianna's need came to us, though, I felt an immediate surge of adrenaline. I knew we had to help this young woman get into the program that would allow her and her son to remain together, and I knew that donors would feel as I did. I was right. Seven donors from five different states took only seven hours to completely fund Brianna’s need.

If the donors felt anything like I did, it didn't matter to me how many times Brianna might have been arrested (only once, as it turns out), what the traffic tickets she had left unpaid were for, how many children she had (this will be her first) or whether she had made poor choices rather than paying her fines. All I could think about was the hours and days after my own children’s births, about the sweetness of their new skin, about the way they smelled, cried, and felt in my arms, about all the protectiveness and responsibility I felt for the fragile life in my arms.

In the U.S., we seem to cherish parenting for ourselves, but not always for others. Paid parental leave is not a protected right; all parents are expected to work starting as soon as six weeks after birth; and babies are taken from prisoners at birth. This makes us very different from many other countries and cultures.

In Germany, for example, mothers serving jail sentences can have their children remain with them until age four or six and some are allowed work-release privileges to go and parent their children. That's right; moms leave prison in the morning like anyone else headed off to a work-release job and their work is getting their children ready for school, taking care of their children's needs, and doing everything associated with being moms to their kids. At the end of the workday, they head back to prison like any other work-release prisoner. In Germany, being a parent is considered a vocation; a child’s need to have his or her mom present is valued; and systems are put into place to make the situation work.  

We helped Brianna and her baby to stay together.  What could we do to help the other 2,000+ moms who will give birth in prison this year to have the same option? I checked into it, because it seems to me that when a need we encounter on the Benevolent site strikes us as powerfully as this one struck me, we should find out how to get involved and become a part of the solution for people beyond the one we’re helping through the Benevolent site.

Here’s what I found...

• The Women’s Prison Association appears to be one of the strongest organizations engaging in research and advocacy work around the issues of women in prison. Their program work seems to be only in New York state, but their policy and advocacy work extends nation-wide. Interestingly, the president of the Board of Directors for this organization, Piper Kerman is the author of the book and new Netflix series about women in prison - Orange is the New Black.

• The National Institute of Corrections maintains a list of programs for women in prison state by state. You could use this website to find out how to get involved as an advocate or volunteer in your area.

So these are places for us to start. I hope that Brianna’s story touched you the way it touched me. I hit “send” on the payment to Chicago Legal Advocacy for Incarcerated Mothers earlier today so that Brianna’s fine can be paid and she can qualify for the program that will keep her together with her son when he’s born. I’m so glad we were there to help.

- megan kashner

  founder & ceo

  Benevolent

  www.benevolent.net

Happy 2nd B'Day to the Benevolent Idea

The earliest visual depiction
of the Benevolent concept

Can you believe it’s been two years since I woke up with the idea for Benevolent? Yep. It was February 13^th, 2011. Hard to believe that a half-formed idea that was born on a random Sunday morning in a sleepy-headed state has blossomed into today’s Benevolent.

When I look back on my early thoughts and sketches (I really can’t draw, so I used comic software to create storyboards), I am amazed at what it’s taken to get here, what the road ahead looks like, and how many people have been and continue to be a part of Benevolent’s infancy and youth.

So today, I’d like to take a moment and pause to say “thank you.”

• Thank you to those who believed in this idea in its earliest days and encouraged me to pursue it.
• Thank you to my amazing team of staff, volunteers, pro bono do-ers and advisors, Benevolent’s board, advisory board, kitchen cabinets, and friends.
• Thank you to those visionary and trusting nonprofit partners who took a chance on this new idea when we had no track record and nothing to prove we could deliver.
• Thank you to those who have stepped up to support Benevolent’s birth and development.
• Thank you to those who came forward, eager to help someone else in this new way; and a special thanks to those who took an additional step and sent a note of encouragement to the people you were choosing to help.
• Thank you to the bravest of the brave, the determined people who shared their stories, their challenges, and their dreams with us and invited us in to be a part of their progress.

You may have noticed that we can’t seem to keep needs posted to the site these days. People out there in the world can’t believe that we’re actually in a situation where the desire of people to give is out-stripping the pace at which we can get needs up onto the site. We post them; people keep coming back to check the site and contribute; and the needs are filled. It’s a great problem to have because it shows clearly that this is a way that people are excited to give and engage. You all are pioneers in this new-fangled way of lifting our neighbors toward their goals.

Now we on the Benevolent team get to do the work necessary to get more and more needs up on the site; engage more nonprofit partners to let their clients know the help is available; and expand the model to more cities.

So what are we actually doing back here behind the Benevolent curtain? We’re working on expanding to three new cities in an intensive way over the coming months. When we expand, we’ll be focusing on forging partnerships with excellent nonprofits, learning as we go, and improving what we do so that it’s easier and easier for everyone to engage – nonprofits, people who are facing challenges, and people who want to give.

For now, then, know that we’re here in the Chicago area, working on hiring excellent people, raising essential money, and making critical improvements so that we can achieve our dream of becoming national and providing a resource to allow people to connect, give and get help in ways that they couldn’t before.

Thanks for believing in us and thanks to all those who have been a part of making the first two years of the Benevolent concept so groundbreaking and thrilling.

- megan kashner, founder & ceo

  Benevolent

  www.benevolent.net

Let the Giving Begin!

It’s early Thanksgiving morning, so perhaps my blog post should be titled “Let the Eating Begin!” or “Let the Shopping Begin!”

I hope you get to eat with your family, hug those you love, and shop for your friends and for yourself this week. Then, on Tuesday, when you’ve lived through the turkey, through Black Friday, Small Business Saturday and Cyber Monday, you’ll be ready.

You’ll have made it through the melee and you’ll have earned the calm fulfillment of Giving Tuesday. Benevolent is a Founding Member of the GivingTuesday movement and we’re hoping that Tuesday will, in fact, be your most rewarding, most self-rewarding day. After all, shopping is stressful - we worry about how much we’re spending and whom we’ve forgotten on our list; we worry about getting the best deals and about the buying decisions we’ve made.

Giving to help someone else, by contrast, is stress-free. We can do it without worrying that we’re paying too much, without worrying if the person we’re buying for will like or appreciate the sentiment behind our gift.

This Thanksgiving day, I’m thinking about Bart. He and his wife and kids could have such an excellent holiday season if we come together to help them over these few months while Bart’s training to become a welder. They need help with winter clothes for their three kids, including school uniforms and snow boots.

Here’s how Bart describes himself:

“I think of myself mostly as a great dad, loving husband, provider, humble, positive, and self-motivated. I live with my wife of 11 years and three beautiful kids - two sons and a daughter. I am going to school at JARC to become a welder. I've worked at jobs including parking attendant, machine operator, sales rep, security officer, and a material handler. Something interesting about me is I enjoy reading books, playing video games, playing sports, and traveling. I have a positive attitude and am a good father.”

Today is the opening bell of the giving season. Today I invite you to join me: take a breath and reward yourself by stepping away from holiday stress and helping someone out when it really matters.

When you take stock of all you’re thankful for today, remember to be grateful that you have the opportunity to give. I know I am.

- megan kashner, founder & ceo

  Benevolent

  www.benevolent.net 

Undermining Economic Segregation

A study of African- American and Caucasian households in the U.S. found that residential segregation between these two groups has decreased over the past decades. At the same time, according to a study released this summer by the Pew Research Center, segregation by income level is on the rise in the U.S.

The Rise of Residential Segregation by Income

by Richard Fry and Paul Taylor

So while we seem to be breaking through racial barriers, we’re becoming more and more economically isolated, and this has significant implications for those who are striving to rise out of low-income circumstances.

If we continued this trend towards economic isolation, we would expect to see some increasingly significant social challenges:

1)    Because neighbors help neighbors, we could see a decrease in capacity to access help in over-burdened areas.

2)    Because diversity begets empathy, we might well see an increased divide between those with and without resources, particularly among young people who grow up in increasingly economically homogenous communities.

3)    Families who experience a drastic shift in income (up or down) could experience heightened isolation and alienation from their communities.

4)    Low-income youth may increasingly lack access to and familiarity with the educational and professional norms, opportunities and possibilities prevalent in upper-income communities.

5)    Sentiments of xenophobia and class hatred might find a more fertile breeding ground on both sides of the fence.

Dire, eh? Yes, but that’s not the whole story. It’s true that we’re living more segregatedly than in previous decades, but we’re also living more connected. Some of the biggest changes to residential segregation along income lines have come in the Southwestern U.S. which posted an over 60% increase in income segregation between 1980 and 2010. Houston posted the biggest change.

In Houston, though, just this week, a woman from Chicago picketed and protested on behalf of striking Houston Janitors. She said:

"I know the fear that so many have to live with, the fear that you could lose your job for speaking up. Janitors in Houston can't risk arrest without risking their jobs too. I can, so I will."

Across the internet -- across states -- the Chicago woman connected with her community, reached out, stepped up and supported people she felt could use her help. This doesn’t change residential economic segregation, of course, but it does speak to the fact that community is no longer constrained by where we live.

Using technology and human connection, we’re creating a different kind of neighborhood, beyond geographic limits. We can build community and empathy, and extend help to neighbors across boundaries that were once impassable. Benevolent is one tool for this, driving from Chicago to Houston to support those you can relate to is another.

If we took each challenge I listed above one by one, and considered them through the lens of our new-fangled communities and networks using media, technology, and human connection, the outlook might look at least a little bit brighter.

- megan kashner, founder & ceo

  Benevolent

  www.benevolent.net 

Only 2% Make It - We Can Help

Amayah is a teen mom
headed off to college this fall

She came to the US five years ago, when she was about 12. She made her way through a new country, culture, school system, and more. Now she's headed off to Southern Illinois University in the fall, full of promise and expectations.

The American Dream: believing in yourself; overcoming expectations and obstacles; succeeding through hard work. Amayah is all that, and more.

Amayah is also a teen mom. She's nothing like the flashy and combative young moms we see on reality TV. She’s the real deal - the young woman who had a child at 16, kept on going to school, is graduating and is heading to college without missing a beat. She's got her future in clear focus, and she's got her baby's future in mind as well - a balancing act that many parents decades older than Amayah have not mastered.

Right now, though -- this is when it gets hard. Amayah has challenges to face as she heads off to college that the other young students won't be burdened by. She'll need to find housing suitable to a small family, child care, and time to cook for, read to, play with, and care for her child. She'll have to plan her course schedule and her study groups around her child's timetable and then there will be other things that crop up - a babysitter bailing, her child getting a fever, or the stroller refusing to open.

Amayah is asking the Benevolent community for help with one singular challenge: for help paying her housing deposit and getting her apartment set up for herself and her child. I hope we'll meet this challenge and step up for Amayah. More importantly, I hope we'll be able to jump back in future years if another big challenge pops up. Maybe create a community of support just for Amayah. 

On average, about half of all teen moms finish high school. Another 15% will get their GED by the time they're 22. Only two percent - 2% - of teen moms complete college by the time they're 30. Those are ridiculously long odds. 

Let's step up, step in and become a part of Amayah's story, and let's hang out there for a while to keep an eye on her success and be there when she needs us.

Who's in?

- megan kashner, founder & CEO

Fierce Love...Unplanned?

A few weeks before she passed away, my Great Aunt Mil contributed to one of our Benevolent recipients. She chose to help someone who has seven children living at home with her. Aunt Mil was glad to give and glad to help, but as she did so, she said (in her 95-year-old pithy way): “Seven kids. I don’t see how she’ll ever get ahead.”

When we hear or read about the allegorical welfare mom (or welfare queen, depending on your source), she often has a great number of children – a brood, if you will. She is, of course, hyperbole, as are her numerous children. This Mother’s Day weekend, however, I found myself thinking about this allegorical figure in a different light.

On Mother’s Day I got to sleep in, celebrate with my kids and all that. Later that day I sat down to write for today’s blog and my mind kept going back to a piece of research I read recently and some trends we’re seeing among the recipients on the Benevolent site.

We launched the Benevolent site only this past December, but as early as March, I started to see a thread of connection I hadn’t anticipated. It seemed to me that of the women who posted their needs to the Benevolent site, those who described having fled and survived domestic violence had more children than those who did not report a history of domestic violence.  

Of course as we seek to help the mother who has escaped and overcome domestic violence to thrive, we do not and should not ask whether the number of children she has a connection to victimization. This started me wondering, though - was this a real trend, and if so, why?  I started looking for research to help me understand what I thought I might be seeing.

I found some articles and papers that described the ways in which abusers undermine a woman’s control over her fertility choices. These included interference with contraception (making holes in condoms, discarding a woman’s contraceptive pills or devices), sexual assault, and more. (Black, 2011) But this article posed no quantitative analysis to indicate how prevalent this was.

Another article summed up the scholarly research on the connections between unintended pregnancy and domestic violence. This one told me more. I discovered that in one U.S. study, “almost 70% of women reporting physical violence had unwanted and/or mistimed pregnancies,” and women with unwanted pregnancies were 4.1 times more likely to have been physically abused “than women with intended pregnancies before adjusting for other variables.” (Gazmararian et al., 1995)

Again, not clear causality, but certainly an arresting correlation. The author of this article explained: “The association between intimate partner violence and unintended pregnancy implies an intergenerational cycle in which unintended childbearing in abusive households can lead to repeated cycles of violence and unintended pregnancy.” (Pallitto et al, 2005)

What is clear is that the more children a mother has, the harder it will be for her to protect them, provide for them, and promote their education, simply by virtue of numbers.

Aunt Mil had a point. If there is any causality – whether widespread or even sporadic – between intimate violence and unintended pregnancy, then I want to take this moment – this Mother’s Day moment – to express my immense respect for those women who fiercely love, protect, support, and nurture children whose existence they had not planned or intended.

As a mother who held complete control over when and how I would choose to try to conceive, I concede all maternal kudos today and award them all to those mothers who protected their children, brought them to safety, fought to rebuild and thrive, and fight on today as they raise children they pray will never repeat the violence of their mutual past.

-  megan kashner, founder & ceo

   Benevolent - www.benevolent.net 

When the Bough Breaks

For many years, our nation’s public libraries have been providing more than books. After-school homework help, computer access for students and job searchers, preschool and adult literacy programming, shelter for those in need, and more have been provided in libraries and by their professional staff for decades.

In the current state of municipal budget shortfalls, many cities and towns have decided to cut library branches and decrease library hours to cut costs. Like the removal of any public service, the loss of library access has an impact on many people. It is a tear in the social safety net.

We know that school kids, job seekers, shelter-seekers, and learners of all ages were impacted when the City of Chicago implemented $3M in budget cuts in January of this year, cutting 172 low-wage library jobs and closing 75 branch libraries on Mondays. The community lost access to critical services and 172 people lost their jobs as clerks and pages in the Chicago library system.

Rufus was one of those who lost a job in the Chicago Public Libraries this winter. Now he’s asking for help with the funds necessary to purchase the right-sized car seat for his infant son and to buy his son books and toys, as he would have been able to do had he not lost his job.

I am not arguing here for or against curtailing library hours or jobs. Cuts had to be made in the city’s budget. If those funds had instead been pulled out of our public transit system or out of violence-prevention programs, we would see similar tears in the fabric of support and resources for those living close to the economic edge.

I wonder whether schoolteachers are now finding that their students cannot be expected to complete homework on Monday evenings because they can’t access after-school homework help or get onto a computer to complete their assignments. I wonder whether public transit stations, malls, fast food restaurants, and the like are feeling the strain of the volume of people who might otherwise have been reading, taking shelter in or attending programs at public libraries and who are now at loose ends on Mondays.

We can see in Rufus’ situation that the low-wage positions of clerk and page in a library system were not sufficient to provide these earners with any sort of a financial cushion. Less than three months into unemployment, Rufus tells us of near-homelessness and an inability to purchase basic supplies for his son.

This is where you see clearly the multi-generational effect of the fragility of our safety net. When Rufus lost his job, his son’s potential future earnings dropped along with his father’s. While we hope that Rufus and his son prove to be the exception to this rule, research and history tell us that children whose parents are low-income earners are exponentially more likely to be fixed in the same socio-economic status as their parents.

Rufus was on his way to a career path and stability in earnings. We hope he’ll get right back on track, but in today’s job market, that is going to be a challenge. In fact, we know from research cited in the Chicago Tribune last week that within Rufus’ age group, his chances of being rehired within 18 months of losing his job are approximately 77% (down from 89% before the recession) and that he’s likely to be hired at a wage 11% lower than the wage of the job he lost. This has implications for Rufus and for his son’s safety and development.

When we step up and help Rufus’s son during his dad’s jobless patch, or when we help Brenda get a computer so that she can complete her training in Radiology and her son can apply to colleges, we’re alleviating the human impact of cuts and shortfalls and addressing two generations’ needs. We’re fixing the holes when the social safety net has stretched to the breaking point. We’re doing it because we can see and hear Rufus and Brenda and we can be there to tighten the weave under them at a critical moment.

- megan kashner, founder & ceo

It’s a Big Deal - Time to Shout it from the Rooftops

This past week marked the introduction of Benevolent’s new website at benevolent.net. Our new system, new look, and a batch of new member needs made their debut on Thursday, December 1st.

As an early adopter of the Benevolent model, you can make it a really big deal. We’re loading more new needs into the site this week, and the holidays are approaching. It’s time to shout it from the rooftops and spread the word. At the bottom of this blog are all the links you’ll need.

In the five days since we launched the Benevolent site at benevolent.net, I’ve been envisioning what will have changed in some lives when we’ve met the needs of these first Benevolent members. Here are a few highlights I’m looking forward to seeing…

When Tori’s need for a computer is met, her kids will be able to come home after school, sports practices, and after-school activities to have dinner, do their homework, and be together as a family rather than waiting in line at the library to use a computer for homework, unsupervised and without their mom’s help.

When Luis gets the money to have an eye exam and get glasses, he’ll be a better and safer taxi driver and will be able to read and study for his GED. Luis wants to improve his English, learn computer skills and get a better job – perhaps a job during the day rather than at night.

When Jose’s need for winter clothes and gear for his kids is met, he’ll be able to bundle his kids into winter clothes that fit, buckle and zip in all the right ways. Jose is raising his kids on his own since his wife left them several years ago. Making sure his kids have the clothes and gear they need is only one of his many concerns and responsibilities as he works for a food distribution company and struggles to make ends meet.

The people who’ve listed their needs on the Benevolent site are putting themselves out there. The nonprofit professionals who have stepped forward to help their clients get the help they’re seeking have also put themselves on the line. Our Benevolent donors have started putting themselves out there as well, stepping up to meet people’s needs.

Now we’re ready to ask you to get the word out. Please:

• Email your friends, family, and coworkers – tell them to check out www.benevolent.net
• Post a link to your facebook page –www.benevolent.net
• Share our facebook page www.facebook.com/benevolent.net
• Tweet about us - @benevolentnet

Spread the word in your own way.

- Megan Kashner, Founder & CEO