Program Helps Inmates Build Businesses, Improve Credit

A program at the Mecklenburg County Jail is helping inmates fix their credit scores and establish businesses before they are released. Peace for Poverty’s Next Great 50 program is helping give formerly incarcerated people hope and a fresh start while they are still serving time.

Xavier East has been inside the Mecklenburg County Detention Center for more than three years.

“When you locked up, you got to use that time,” East said. “You got to elevate yourself. You got to educate yourself.”

The 26-year-old has a plan to start over when he is released.

“Since I’ve been in, I just taught myself how to cut hair,” East said. “So naturally, I’m like, that’d be a smart idea to go out there and open up a barbershop.”

East is a graduate of Next Great 50 program. It helps people inside the Mecklenburg County Detention Center build businesses and improve credit scores before they are released. So far, graduates have established 56 businesses for careers in barbershops, trucking, retail and more.

“They’re going to create the website for you. They’re going to get you the LLC, your EIN number,” East said. “All you got to do is just really go sit in class and learn a couple new things.”

The eight week class brings together financial advisors, mental health professionals, business consultants and educators to help give residents in the detention center the tools to move forward after serving time. Mecklenburg County Sheriff Garry McFadden says it costs less than $7,000 to run.

“It reduces the recidivism. They have something to look forward to. They have a goal,” Sheriff McFadden said. “Imagine coming home and telling your your significant other, not only I have a job, but I am the CEO of that job.”

Data shows close to 50% of people who are locked up in North Carolina end up back in jail after release. Sheriff McFadden says in Mecklenburg County only 29% of people come back.

“We hope that somebody sees this and comes to us and says, let me put this in your detention center around the country,” Sheriff McFadden said. “It’s easy and, you know, we can do it virtually also.”

East says Next Great 50 has given him the tools he needs to succeed on the outside.

“It’s people who have actually taken business courses and have actually gone to school for business that haven’t learned the stuff that we learn in these classes,” East said. “I know I go home one day and I got to build a house when I go home. It makes it easier for the house to already the foundation already to be built.”

Next Great 50 for returning citizens is so popular that there is a waiting list for anyone inside Mecklenburg County Detention Center who wants to participate. The next cohort starts September 7th.