Criminal Justice
& Second-Chance
Employment
The United States has the world’s largest prison population yet some of the highest rates of crime and violence. The current system has profound repercussions, disproportionately impacting certain communities and creating cycles of incarceration that undermine families, communities, and economies.
At Greenbridge, we focus on two priorities: helping individuals avoid incarceration in the first place and supporting second chances for those who have paid their debt to society. From addressing the school-to-prison pipeline to promoting alternatives to incarceration, we believe reform must happen at every level.
We are particularly committed to reducing recidivism by addressing barriers to employment and encouraging policies that enable businesses to hire from this overlooked talent pool. By championing innovative, scalable approaches to reform, we aim to create opportunities for individuals and strengthen communities, paving the way for a more equitable society.
Above banner photo courtesy of FreeWorld
Grantees
Meet the incredible organizations that we are supporting. Each is creating a meaningful impact in its own way. We hope you will spend time learning more about the ones that speak to you.
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FreeWorld’s mission is to end generational poverty and recidivism. They help formerly incarcerated people get high-wage jobs so they can thrive on their own terms. With a newfound sense of stability, prison remains a memory for FreeWorld graduates. Jason Green is a founding board member.
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Jason’s close friend Matt Mochary started coaching formerly incarcerated men on how to find jobs. He discovered trucking was an ideal vocation that was in high demand and easy to learn. The results were astounding. They decided to start a non-profit to scale this initiative and recruited an amazing leader, Jason Wang, formerly incarcerated himself, to scale this organization. We’re proud to say that, as of summer 2024, they have over 1,500+ graduates. We hope to expand to thousands in the next few years under Jason’s leadership.
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FWD.us is a bipartisan political organization that believes America’s families, communities, and economy thrive when more individuals are able to achieve their full potential. For too long, our harmful immigration and criminal justice systems have locked too many people out from the American dream. Their goal is to influence policymakers and those around them to make the policy changes that create opportunity and unlock America’s potential.
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At Greenbridge, we are thrilled to support FWD.us and its transformative work in criminal justice reform, led by the impressive Zoe Towns. Zoe’s thoughtful and bold leadership has sparked critical conversations around often-overlooked areas of the system, including how individuals are appointed to parole boards and the profound impact these decisions have on the lives of those who come before them. Parole boards play a pivotal yet underexamined role in shaping outcomes, and we are excited to partner with Zoe and FWD.us over the coming year to explore meaningful reforms that prioritize equity and systemic change.
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Recidiviz is a team of technologists committed to getting decision-makers – from policymakers and corrections leaders to individual probation and parole officers – the data they need to drive better criminal justice outcomes.
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We are so impressed with the approach that Clementine Jacoby and the team at Recidiviz are taking to help folks return to the community. Instead of lobbying to change the system, they’ve identified a clear need with in the complex prison system in the US that they can fix right now: integrated data systems to help officials make timely, informed decisions. Within the next five years, they seek to directly remove 100,000 people from the criminal justice system safely and we are proud to help them achieve this ambitious goal.
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Code for America works shoulder to shoulder with community organizations and government to build digital tools and services, change policies, and improve programs. Through their Clear My Record program, they work with courts, criminal history repositories, executive branch agencies in state governments, policymakers, and advocacy groups to design and implement new record clearance policies. Their goal is to make automatic record clearance—where the state initiates and completes the clearance of all eligible criminal records—the standard across the country.
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We are excited to support Code for America's Clear My Record program, which works with states to efficiently and automatically clear eligible criminal records. By partnering directly with governments, Clear My Record integrates the knowledge and capacity needed to make record clearance a scalable, ongoing solution. This critical work opens pathways to employment and opportunity for individuals while building systems that ensure new records can be cleared seamlessly over time.
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Freedom Reads is a first-of-its-kind organization bringing libraries to people in prison so that they can transform hopelessness into possibility. They bring beautifully handcrafted 500-book libraries into prison, and by doing so, bring hope and possibility to serving their sentences. To date they have built more than 200 Freedom Libraries in 33 prisons and juvenile detention facilities, serving more than 25,000 library patrons.
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Freedom Reads sits at the unique intersection of several areas of interest to the Greenbridge team: our deep commitment to criminal justice innovation, supporting organizations whose leaders have proximate experience, and English literature (Ann is pursuing her Ph.D. on this topic). We are very impressed with their founder & CEO, Reginald Dwayne Betts, and the organization’s commitment to equity of access to their resources: they seek not to provide just one library per prison but per housing unit within the prison.
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They prepare incarcerated individuals in Rhode Island for the workforce, equipping a traditionally underserved population with the skills, self-confidence, and support they need to successfully transition to long-term employment and productive life in the community.
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While they are a small program based only in Rhode Island, they have designed a unique program that provides skills and support to individuals while they are in prison and, through the input of participants, has recently launched a re-entry program to support program participants in using their newfound skills as they re-establish their relationships and network in the community.
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OpenDoors is the first and the largest organization in Rhode Island dedicated to helping people who have been in prison. They offer re-entry planning services to incarcerated individuals in prison and people with criminal records.
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Part of what drew us to OpenDoors is their commitment to building an organization that represents those they seek to serve: over three-quarters of staff, including the management team, have experience with overcoming incarceration or addiction, and the agency continues to develop the leadership skills of those who know from personal experience how important this issue is. While they will work with anyone seeking support, they are leaning into the unique needs of women as they return to the community, which was of particular interest.
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Paws for Life combines two areas that we are passionate about - helping save animals and giving people second chances to make a positive difference. They have a number of innovative programs to transform the lives of both animals and formerly incarcerated people. One measurable result of their impact, over 43 Paws For Life participants have had their sentences commuted due to good behavior, most of whom were serving life-sentences.
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In January 2023, Jason and Kim were visiting Lancaster Prison and had the chance to see the Paws for Life Prison Program in action. The housing facility that hosts the program was buzzing with purpose and activity. The men were motivated and active – collaborating on the training programs for various dogs that were working through a six-week behavior training program. We left knowing that we had witnessed a very special program – both for the rescue dogs and the men training them.
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Additional Impact Partners
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