- Hi, everyone.

Steve Adubato.

We kick off the program with an important conversation with an important not-for-profit leader.

Barrett Young is the CEO of the Trenton Rescue Mission.

Barrett, good to see you.

- Good to see you, Steve.

- Website's up.

Tell everyone what the organization is and the people you serve.

- Sure, the Rescue Mission of Trenton is an organization that's been in the Trenton community for over 100 years.

We serve the homeless population.

We also serve those in need of addictions treatment, and we also have just under 50 units of housing that we own and operate.

- Your history of the organization is interesting.

Your mom, the previous CEO.

You grew up in this organization?

- I did, I've worked at the Rescue Mission for a little over 20 years.

I'm 42 years old, and I literally like to say to people that I was literally born and raised at the Rescue Mission.

My mother was the executive director for almost 40 years.

- My dad started a not-for-profit in Newark back in 1970.

My sister runs that not-for-profit.

Sometimes not-for-profit service runs in our blood.

Let me ask you this.

Describe, Barrett, the need as you see it for the services that you provide, particularly for people who are homeless.

- You know, Steve, the need for services, unfortunately, has never waned.

And as we moved through and out of the pandemic, the need for services has just grown in our community.

People are just scraping by, and it's very, very hard for them to get by right now.

And so the need for services and the need for what we do has never been greater.

- Now, I wanna talk about public attitudes toward people who wind up homeless, combined with government policy as it relates to people who wind up homeless.

First of all, to what degree do you believe most people, we're not a monolithic people, we're a diverse population, however, people have strong views.

- Right.

- Do you believe the degree of empathy and compassion for those who are homeless has waned over the years?

- I think that there's unfortunately been been a stigma that's begun to get attached to those that are homeless.

I think a lot of folks don't understand the struggle that these folks go through.

You know, I like to say to a lot of people that in the history of education, not one kid has ever filled out in their first grade application of, what do they wanna be when they grow up?

Not one person has ever filled out that I wanna be homeless, I wanna be an addict, or I wanna be a criminal.

And I think we have started to lose that understanding that no one chooses this life.

Unfortunate circumstances lead people to these dire straits, but no one chooses this life.

- So let's talk about the United States Supreme Court.

United States Supreme Court rules that, basically based on a community, I believe, out in Oregon.

Is it Oregon?

- Yes.

Yep, yep.

- They brought a case that went all the way to the United States Supreme Court, and if I'm wrong, you'll correct me, Barrett, that ultimately had the court declaring, deciding, defining homelessness as a criminal act, that homelessness has been criminalized.

- Correct, correct.

- A, how the heck do you think that even happened?

B, what are the implications of it?

- A, how it happened, I think we could have a whole 'nother day's conversation on how that happened.

I think, you know, the Supreme Court's decision is mind blowing to me, to criminalize.

- Why?

Why mind blowing?

- Just to criminalize someone for being homeless is just, is as, it's just, it's absolutely mind blowing to me that you're in a situation where you have nowhere else to turn and now it can be criminalized and you can be fined.

You can be punished up to being in jail.

Where's the humanity?

Where's the service?

Where's the help in any of that?

We, the day that the case was being held at the Supreme Court, we held a panel discussion here at the Rescue Mission with homeless folks and talked about how the criminal justice system can and will affect you if you're homeless if this case came to pass.

And one of the gentlemen on the panel said it the best I've ever heard it said.

He said, "I've been housed for five years, but I've been clean, sober, and in recovery for my mental health for the last four years."

And then he says, "Without my housing, I could have done none of it."

And so if you start to then add on all these layers of criminality, fines, jail time, it just is unbelievable.

The question is, I guess in my mind, comes to, "What's next?"

If you can now be criminalized for being homeless, what's next in this country?

What's the next thing that can be criminalized?

- Just remember, a community, a group of community leaders, folks in the community brought this case.

So it wasn't like the Supreme Court looked for this case.

This case was brought to the Supreme Court by a community.

I've gotta believe that's not the only community that would have done something like this.

And it's not the law of that community now.

It's the law of the land.

- Correct, it was Grants Pass out in Oregon is who brought it.

And now it's made it the law, you know, and it just is, it's unbelievable to me and to my fellow constituents who work in this field to think that what we're doing, the people now we're trying to help can now be criminalized for being homeless.

It's- - Barrett, what...

I'm sorry for interrupting.

What is the New Direction Program, and what impact have you had with it in Trenton?

- Sure.

- By the way, to be clear, Trenton is our, we're a New Jersey based operation.

New Jersey programming, primarily.

Our state capital.

- Correct.

- The New Direction Program in the community of Trenton.

Describe it.

- So our New Direction Program is a program that I founded along with Chef Jeff Henderson, who's a chef from Las Vegas who did federal prison time.

He and I founded this program three years ago.

What it is, is a program that is designed to take individuals who are in our Behavioral Health program who have addiction, mental health, and criminality and we try to impress upon them during this six-week program that the way of their past isn't gonna define where their future's gonna go.

And we have subject matter experts come in from all over the country to teach them and show them how to be resilient, how to build a plan for yourself, how being a criminal doesn't define you into your future.

And we've had some tremendous success with the program thus far.

82% of our individuals who have gone through the program, they take an optimism test at the beginning of the program, and at the end of the program, 82% of them have a higher optimism score about their future after they finish the program.

66% of our graduates have obtained employment and kept employment, which is in comparison to about 30 to 35% of our program participants in our Behavioral Health Unit.

- Important work being done in our state capital in Trenton.

Barrett Young and his colleagues at the Trenton Rescue Mission.

Their website has been up so you can find out more.

Barrett, thank you so much for joining us.

You are making... We've been doing a series for 20-plus years called "Making a Difference."

You and your colleagues making a difference every day.

Thank you, Barrett.

- Thank you, Steve.

- You got it.

Stay with us, we'll be right back.

- [Narrator] Think Tank with Steve Adubato is a production of the Caucus Educational Corporation.

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