Welcome to Good Neighbors Live Here, a series that celebrates the people who make our region stronger, kinder and more connected.

I'm your host, Amy Baker, and each week will highlight individuals whose leadership, service, creativity, and perseverance are making a lasting impact throughout the Lehigh Valley.

This week, we'll meet two neighbors whose lives and work are rooted in one shared truth.

That lived experience can become a powerful force for change.

We'll begin with Hassan Baths, a speaker, strategist and advocate whose work is shaped by both professional expertise and lived experience.

Across his career, he's focused on addressing inequities and helping people turn personal challenges into pathways for growth and change.

Thank you.

How's it going, man?

What do you do, sir?

I grow leaders.

That's what I do.

But I'm going to welcome here.

Oh.

Very nice.

Yeah.

I always had this social consciousness, although I took an indirect route.

I went through juvenile facilities, went to prison, got caught up in the streets.

I always had this idea of things could be better.

Yeah.

So I do.

I do what they call radical.

My work is really sending around belonging and connectivity and welcome.

So I did like.

Well, how do we welcome folks to the Valley or come to this place.

And I'm just hyping them up.

My name is Jason Betts and I am a father, a son, a brother, a grandfather and a neighbor.

See, my lovely wife.

Somebody have somewhere.

Well, my question for is on the hat.

I can ask you.

I don't know, what do you feel?

I prefer the hat, but she's going to tell me no hat.

So I was going to blame you and say you.

And it's great.

To have them do it whenever you go.

Thank you.

I see you.

Hat on.

No hat.

I think that's.

A good.

All right.

To kick off the conference tonight, we have someone who specializes in unity and strength.

It's a guest who has done years of research and serving the city of Allentown through his passion for equity and stabilizing communities.

He is a force.

He is a strength.

He is a friend to many.

Doctor Hassan bats.

Welcome to the Lehigh Valley.

Radical welcome is about being in places where people want you there.

I'm a community epidemiologist.

I work with the strengths of the community to solve the challenges and diseases that exist.

There's a messiah.

Greeting.

That says.

Bona, that says.

I see you, I see you.

I want you to look to your left and look to your right and say, I see you.

The responses I am here.

A lot of my work is centered around violence prevention and prison reentry.

We help prison survivors understand they're not alone.

They're not alone in their experiences and their story, and they're not alone in their reentry, that they have a support system that will walk this journey with them, that understands the challenges that they're going to experience.

Because the challenge is are real.

We want to welcome you back to the incredible message of training going for back everyone.

One tell me what we've covered already.

What is the kind of message?

What's incredible message is do we use our live experience?

I was on probation.

I was on say we had an individual that was scared to go to his probation officer.

We had to show them that they could trust us.

The challenges that I work to solve are centered around issues that impact health and life outcomes.

Can I do that?

Because I've utilized all the services across the community, and I've come through a lot of the challenges.

I believe that I bring a unique lens to that.

So some.

Other sectors that we need to be working to get this work done of zero use violence to ensure that zero youth in our community of murder, gun violence, as people in charge of their money, they never people from the area that is affected.

So I can stand.

A lot of money is needed there.

We always say that policies, practices and programs will always reflect the values of the people that design policies.

The issues that I work towards around community engagement, making sure that everyone within our community has the opportunity and the access to contribute to making the world a better place.

If you are in this room because you are respected in your community, because you care about your community, and because you hold the most intimate solutions to the issues that are plaguing our communities.

And the goal is to make sure that the people that are closest to the pain are the ones that are developing the solutions.

So today.

It's a difficult road.

There's a lot of doors closed in people's faces, and I personally experienced it.

I mean, I probably applied for 200 jobs, man.

Literally.

We want Allentown to your city with mistakes are forgiven and allowed to be made.

There was a huge stigma here that we saw removed, and we removed it by putting our faces at the forefront.

The Lehigh Valley is our headquarters.

We bring people here, we do the work here.

It's hyper local, but also with a global focus.

Everybody makes sure.

It's.

Got some fliers, literature in our hand.

We want to share our information, understand also, people don't like a large group of people walking up to the spread out 2 to 3.

We have teams in Charlotte.

We have teams in Seattle.

We have teams in New Haven, Connecticut.

So our Allentown team gets to know they're part of a larger structure that's working towards.

The same issues.

And not only do we help the prison survivors, we help society.

We help the community welcome them back, welcome us back by understanding that we need inspirational stories.

You need to see people who have done it.

My experience with the systems that existed in my community were difficult.

I often tell the story.

I was left back in kindergarten.

What does a child have to do to be left back in kindergarten?

That's that's major, you know, left back in seventh grade, three years in the ninth grade, pushed out of 11th grade into prison.

So me and the educational system always had this, this tension in this conflict, you know, there was no lack of capacity with me, but I was in systems that did not nurture it.

I was educated by people that just didn't believe in me.

I mean, we had teachers telling us things like we would die in a pool of our blood or, you know, we're going to go to prison, not going to make it.

That is the educational system that we work to reform.

You can't expect a child that's growing up in a violent home, in a violent community with substance use, untreated mental health issues to perform at the same level that children that are growing up in stable environments perform.

I grew up in a school where people are getting stabbed, cut, shot.

We had police in the school metal I'm talking about in the 80s, you know, so they act like metal detectors are new.

14 years old.

The first time I was incarcerated and then later on, you know, 15, I was incarcerated as a juvenile and adult facility.

And I remember one time just sitting back and thinking, the best thing the New York City public school system did for me was and prepared me for prison.

No one ever exposed me to poetry, art, ballet, any of the other options that exist in the world, right?

Because our community did not have access to those resources.

So we found the streets and everybody wants to be good at something.

So I found mastery in gangs, violence, drugs, all, all of the things.

From a batsman.

I wouldn't be here had it not been for my bass.

Everybody deserves a mama bass in their life.

That's that cheerleader, right?

That's that cheerleader, that coach, that support system that believes in you before you learn to believe in yourself like loves you, when you feel unlovable, when you feel unseen.

Not only did she believe me, she would tell me why.

She would tell me specifically what it was about my entire life, what it was about me, the leadership skills that I don't even know if it's true, but it was a self-fulfilling prophecy, right?

One of the most important things she would always tell me is she would say, if you put half the energy into doing the right thing that you put into doing the wrong thing, you could change the world.

I think I was born into this work.

My mother was a black panther.

I was what you call a panther cub.

So she always told us about our people.

She always hold up our social justice.

She talked about our responsibility.

And I remember when I came home from prison last time, I was going to go to, like, Charlotte, San Diego, Houston, all these places, you know, and take over the world and do this work, had all these opportunities.

And she said to me, you need to to stay in Allentown.

She said, that's the city that you contributed to destroying, and you should not move forward to contribute to rebuilding that city.

And that's why I centered my work here in Allentown, Pennsylvania.

Come on, let's get some noise in the building.

We're about to start.

I know some of y'all have been here for a moment waiting for us.

It's beautiful to see all of these wonderful faces coming together.

Mass incarceration is the human rights issue of our time.

And we say that because the magnitude of people that are impacted by this issue.

Raise your hand if you or someone you love has been impacted by mass incarceration.

Almost everyone's hand in Rome went up right when I'm in rooms all across this country and I say, raise your hand if you've been impacted by massive conservation, almost everyone raises a hand.

Regardless of the room.

We could be in a boardroom of a fortune 500 company, and their son is wrestling with opioid use disorder and incarceration, right?

So what we do is we look to remove the shame.

We want to digest this.

We want to do with a panel.

So we want to bring a couple folks down.

The cost of mass incarceration.

It's expensive.

It's extremely expensive in many ways.

And that's what we want us to open up with.

What did it cost you.

Being in juvenile detention centers?

I think it cost me my childhood.

I was in an in and out of juvenile detention since I was 12 years old.

I graduated in juvenile detention centers.

I missed out on prom.

I never experienced that high school year.

Definitely my relationships with my family and friends and time.

Time is consistent.

Prison is a predictable outcome of the neglect that exists within specific communities.

So we want to go upstream, right?

We don't want to just keep pulling people out the water that are drowning.

We want to find out how they falling into that water.

And one of the reasons that we want to continue to have this conversation is because of the 2.4 million people that are incarcerated in this country at any given time, any given day, well over 97, 98% are coming home.

So how did the system prepare you to come home?

Is the next question.

They don't.

They free you and they say you have 30 days to find an address, and they give you these 30 days to find the address.

But you've been locked up maybe for a year to 20.

And during that time, everybody you known is either incarcerated, dead on drugs, or just flat out broke.

So did they prepare me?

No, they prepared me for a setup.

And you need someone that understands even the emotional turmoil and stress and trauma that you've experienced, right?

Even just reconnecting with your family, you are essentially abandoning them because of your decisions and the pain and the shaming and blaming that you do to yourself and how counterproductive that is, right?

So we provide that level of emotional support.

And I guess my question to you is, how are you caring for your own mental health?

Are you open to it?

Are you seeking it?

When I when I came home in 2017 from the state, from state detention.

Right.

They didn't have any mental health support and I was asking for it.

And I was told, well, you either got to find it yourself or figure it out, right?

They say 5 to 10 or 10 to 20 or 20 to 40, but you get a life sentence because every time you get pulled over, it comes up.

Every time you apply for a job.

Just imagine, every time you went for a job, they asked you about the worst decisions that you ever made.

Every time you went to get an appointment, they asked you about the worst decisions that you've ever made.

Last time I was incarcerated, I couldn't even get a volunteer opportunity.

It wouldn't even let me in the door.

Within nonprofits and places like that.

Like I wanted to give back to this community.

So not only would no one hire me, no one would even allow me to provide support or guidance or share my story.

The amount of time that you've been incarcerated, that's the amount of time you need to get acclimated.

So if you've done two years, it takes two years.

If you've done 15 years, it takes 15 years to give to society.

I remember I was going to keynote the conference.

They were excited.

I was excited and putting all these marketing materials together.

And someone in one of those smoke filled boardrooms said, this guy was in prison.

I wasn't hiding, and I thought they knew.

And they called and said, no, he can't do it.

They're concerned because you were incarcerated.

I said, those crimes are 15 plus years ago.

I'll accept your decision, but I need you to answer this question for me.

When is enough time, when has enough time passed, and what do I have to do?

I've continued my education, I volunteer, I'm a philanthropist in this community.

I show up every day for people in this community.

I have more references than probably we can count from top level people.

When is a time that that record is behind me and I can have another chance with your organization?

And it couldn't answer it.

So if at my level, I continue to experience these barriers, I know that Johnny from seventh Street hits those struggles and doesn't know how to navigate those systems the way that doesn't have the support system that I have, doesn't have the education that I have.

So we've got to change the system.

That's part of the motivation.

I know what it feels like to be rejected, kicked out, suspended, expelled, asked to leave, divorce, locked up and placed in solitary confinement, I was left.

I'm Doctor Bass because I met a couple of doctors and I said, hell, they could do it.

I can do it.

And since I became Doctor Bats half my circle, I have gotten their doctorate because they look at me and they say, if he can do it, I can do it.

When I opened.

My first business, I learned that I didn't have to ask somebody, can I get a job?

They offered me jobs.

I never thought of my life.

I won't make so much money being a business owner and people believe in me.

We have a saying that we are each other's medicine.

We are the solution to the challenges that exist in our community, in our lives.

We all need to be bonded to something.

And if you're not bonded to people, if we're not bonded to one another.

That's when you'll be bonded in marijuana and coke and meth and all of the things people are going to be bonded to something.

They're ready to throw people in prison the drop of a dime, but they don't realize that wiser allocation of resources would give them what they want, more safety, and basically give what the community truly needs.

And one of the mothers that I was working with said that the most radical thing you could do is come to know your neighbors.

Those skills and attributes that they use to do negative things can be transferred into positives.

I do this work.

I do radical work every day.

But when she said that in that workshop and she talked about ending violence and poverty and hunger, she said, we have all these big, bold dreams.

And she asked me my neighbor's name and I didn't know it.

And I had lived there probably 3 or 4 years.

There's no other way out of this.

Situation.

That we.

Happen to find ourselves in, other than through love and care and concern.

And that's what brought you here today.

That love, that caring, that concern.

So now I know my neighbors and I encourage people that the most radical thing you can do is come to know your neighbors.

So step outside your house and introduce yourself to the neighbors and learn their names.

Now let's meet Don Godchaux, a long time nonprofit leader whose path shifted from media into direct community service, driven by a deep commitment to helping others.

She spent her career working alongside individuals and families as they navigate some of life's most difficult moments.

Hi.

I'm well, how are you?

Good.

Don.

Gotcha.

Nice to meet you.

I want to welcome you to a sixth Street shelter day, which is one of the best days of the year.

Welcome.

Our CEO of Community Action Lehigh Valley.

Don.

Gotcha.

I'm Don Godchaux.

I'm the CEO of Community Action Lehigh Valley.

We are in anti-poverty nonprofit that seeks to help people get out of poverty in many different ways.

The Sixth.

Street Shelter has been a staple in this community since 1984.

That's over 40 years.

40 years of making sure families find safe, stable and affordable housing after whatever circumstances caused them to be unhoused.

Affordable housing is an extreme challenge for most people.

There's 15 people looking at every one apartment.

What these situations get people into is that if I can't pay my rent, I'm going to take away from my food money in order to pay the rent.

And so a lot more people are going to pantries and to food banks in order to supplement the money that they need to pay higher utilities, higher rents in order to sustain their families.

I'm seeing more and more of this all the time.

We give them the tools they need to succeed.

Not a handout, but a handout.

Don is one of a kind.

There is one of one.

She's absolutely kind and she loves what she does.

She's passionate about what she does.

She defends those that cannot defend themselves.

John strive to give back more than she has been given.

Everything that we do in our organization right now is something that I've personally experienced.

I grew up in a really rough neighborhood in Buffalo, New York that was very much gang ridden.

We were raised by a single father because my mom passed away when I was five, and my dad then passed away when I was 11 or 12.

So I was in a lot of different foster homes.

It was a unique experience in growing up, but everything that I've been through has made me stronger and made me into the human being that I am today, which I don't think is so bad.

My college career took me into the media industry.

I was a reporter for a newspaper in Buffalo, New York.

That's kind of how I started.

I went to school for journalism and moved to new Jersey, got a job at ABC in New York.

So as a producer for ABC news, you start out stacking your show with all of the highlights of the day, whether it's death, destruction, whatever it is.

But then you try to go to commercial with something lighter.

This is where I sit in this control room.

Things start going wrong.

You can sometimes hear people screaming.

Sometimes you can hear Don screaming.

Not often.

Not usually.

It taught me that while there are a lot of really difficult things that happen in this world, there are good things that are happening in this world too.

So I think that career helped me to appreciate more of what I do today.

All right.

Thanks.

I decided to take a break from television.

I was going through a really rough period of time.

I started volunteering at a homeless shelter.

I wanted to give back because I knew that I had been through a similar circumstance.

I decided I really liked helping people that good.

Part of what I was doing was more fulfilling than the bad news that I got to report on every day when I was in the television industry.

So one.

Of the other things that I want to look into is to ask, planning to look for grants particular to our parking lot and our roof and the bar coding.

Unless there are funding sources that you guys already know of.

That we can apply those things to.

I know that both of them were accepted to the next round, which is a plus, but that doesn't mean anything.

I will look into it.

I will give a call.

I know I got an email about whose office that was coming from, and that we made it to the next round.

So I'll kind of push that and call some legislators and see if we can get that through.

This role is difficult being a fundraiser, especially in this time when federal funding and state funding kind of shrink a little bit and get readjusted.

It's important to be agile and coach your team, and she does a great job coaching and finding solutions.

Instead of blaming the problem on the person, she works together with the team to ensure that we get the job done.

We need to increase our donor participation because we don't know what direction the government is going to go from day to day, month to month.

We have to figure out how to do this with the heart of the community, hoping that people care enough about their neighbors to assist in all of the different things that we do.

When you don't know what funding sources will be clawed back, you have to figure out how to still get the work done.

Earlier this year, when we went through the government shutdown and the state impasse, millions of our dollars were in jeopardy.

Snap was cut off for a period of time.

Food Bank saw a 40% increase in people needing food, so we had to figure it out.

Thank goodness we had a lot of our community step up and decide they wanted to help the situation.

We can't do it without them.

Seeing some of the families who have come out of the sixth Street Shelter, which is the largest homeless family shelter in the region.

There are people who have been in that situation who have gone on to medical school.

It is not a crime to experience homelessness.

People are homeless for many different reasons.

Families who have lived here have gone on to do amazing things.

When you see the success that you have been able to help people achieve.

Some own their own homes, some own their own businesses.

Many have gone on to successful careers.

It's helpful when you encourage people and tell them they can do it, and you give them the tools that they need to navigate through whatever challenges they're facing at the time.

I was blessed to be able to help people who were trying to figure things out.

Things they didn't plan, but now they were experiencing.

Some of the lessons that John has taught me as to never give up faith and never give up hope.

I'm proud to be a part of community action and proud to work alongside of her.

It's in those stories when you see people doing really wonderful things with their lives and being that example for their kids, so that they will go on to do the same thing, that is success to me.

And for over 40 years, Community Action and the Sixth Street Shelter has been helping unhoused families create a plan to stabilize and to get back on their feet.

I see those stories as being the cornerstone of all that we do because people getting out of poverty, they're doing wonderful things and they're good examples for being good neighbors in the community.

The stories of Hassan and Don remind us that impact is measured not only by the titles or institutions, but by the lives we choose to show up for when experience, empathy, and action come together.

Communities grow stronger and people are given the chance to rebuild, restart and move forward.

Thank you for joining us on Good Neighbors Live Here.

We'll see you next time as we continue sharing the stories of the people making the Lehigh Valley a better place.

One neighbor at a time.