Pinellas Ex Offender Re Entry Coalition Inc

OUR STORY

The State of Florida Department of Corrections releases over 32,000 offenders from incarceration annually, approximately 2,000 of who return to Pinellas County. Approximately 15% of offenders released from the Pinellas County Jail are rearrested the following year.

The Pinellas Ex Offender Re Entry Coalition (PERC) has over twenty years of experience helping offenders become and remain ex-offenders, reuniting clients with family through advocacy, education, programming and comprehensive service delivery and referral. Services include, but are not limited to substance abuse treatment, mental health treatment, education, training, housing, transportation, family reunification, and employment.  Successful reentry of offenders who become and remain ex-offenders is excellent public policy that helps make Pinellas County a safer and more productive community.

The oldest reentry organization in the state of Florida, PERC emerged as a group in 1988 to promote the provision of services to ex-offenders and their families by networking within the public and private sectors and providing ex-offenders the opportunity to successfully reenter into the community. 

Today, PERC provides direct services to approximately 1,000 clients annually, and serves as a key reentry resource in the state of Florida.  Over the past ten years, PERC has been extraordinarily effective in providing direct services to approximately 10,000 former inmates, helping them through the transition from incarceration to stability. PERC’s programming offers ex-offenders opportunities to become stable, productive, law-abiding citizens who avoid returning to a life of crime and make positive contributions to the County's safety and growth.

 

A LEAD STORY

"Tiny Houses Are the Big Idea"

The Pinellas Ex-Offender Re-entry Coalition recently won a $50,000 Big Idea Grant, awarded by the Community Foundation of Tampa Bay, for its Second Chance Tiny House Manufacturing Company, which will train people coming out of jails and prisons for construction jobs.

Looking to build tiny homes in South St. Petersburg, Michael Jalazo, PERC’s CEO/Executive Director, says the organization was “grateful and humble” to receive the award. He expects to have the first tiny house up by June.

“We’d like to see the tiny house movement take off,” stated Mr. Jalazo. He hopes to keep the ex-offenders out of jail and prison, while providing homes for the homeless.

“They’ve got partnerships with a host of people and a revenue stream to pay for the continuing cost of operation, but they need startup costs,” says Wilma Norton, the Foundation’s VP of Marketing and Communications. PERC plans to build and sell tiny houses to private citizens and local government.

There were 31 applications for the award that promotes self sufficiency.

 

A SUCCESS STORY: Rico Green

"Continuing Success"

PERC was launched in 1990, and Rico Green got himself enrolled with the program in 2003 after serving a yearlong jail sentence.

Green grew up in south St. Pete and from 1997 to 2002 he was arrested at least once a year, he explained. While attending Gibbs High, he said he was a good student but craved “a sense of acceptance” from others, and ultimately turned down a different path and started selling drugs.
“I didn’t have to,” he pointed out. “I grew up in a two-parent household, spoiled kid, got what I wanted. It was a conscious choice I made to create an image for myself.”

Green now considers himself “blessed” for only receiving a one-year jail sentence for the charges against him in Pinellas and Hillsborough Counties. He took that time to get involved with a program called Project New Attitudes, which changed his life. Green took part in the program for 27 weeks, and working with mentors he started on a journey of self-rediscovery.

Green worked hard in the program. After completing the program, Green was hired by PERC, and has served in the agency for about 14 years, conducting case management services for adults in the Career Pathways program, facilitating support groups and, most recently, offering counseling services to at-risk youth.

“He has an extensive history but he’s always worked hard and he tries to do the right thing,” said PERC CEO/Executive Director Michael Jalazo. “He wants to do more in the community to give back. He’s been a great asset for us.” Jalazo further stated Green is the perfect example of how you can turn your life around.

“I went through it,” he said. “So I find it rewarding to assist other ex-offenders that are going through the same thing that I went through and show them that ‘hey, there is a light at the end of the tunnel’ and show them that there is hope.”