2024 News

11/21/2024

An update from the director

Greetings to you and your loved ones. We wish you grace and peace entering this holiday season. This season is a good opportunity to review the year so far and share a taste of what’s been happening through OVM volunteers, staff, and supporters. I hope you enjoy the stories in these pages.

I would characterize 2024 as a season of growth. Volunteer activity has increased, our staff has increased, and partnerships in the area community have increased. With this growth we would hope to also see increased impact. Based on stories we’ve collected it is clear that everyone in the community benefits from restorative justice activity.

Volunteers who participate time and again tell us with their continued engagement. Residents at HCF show us how meaningful it is through their words and more importantly in new choices they make, a positive change in actions. New community partners appreciate benefitting from the care received through OVM volunteers and staff.

With growth comes additional expenses. By far OVM’s greatest cost is paying staff. The donations, gifts, and grants we receive go directly into OVM programming by way of paying our trained and qualified staff to lead programs. Success stories in the community lead to more opportunities for us to participate, which leads to a need for more staff time. Then expenses increase. In terms of impact in the community this is a great problem! Yet it is still a challenge. This restorative justice-minded group of supporters has provided these healing opportunities for 50 years in the Harvey/McPherson/Reno tri-county region.

Needs for ongoing Restorative Justice:

$25,000 to end 2024 in the black
Share stories with new people

In an effort to pay our staff respectably for their hard work, dedication, and great care they give, we need to ask you, our community, to 1) step up and give – help us close the year positively this year by reaching our goal of $25,000 and 2) share our stories and need with a friend or family member who would be supportive of local restorative justice. If you introduce someone to our work and they have questions, please know we are here to respond patiently and share the good stories we have seen and heard.

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Thank you for being part of this community centered in hope and restorative justice.

Todd Lehman, Executive Director

Staff Update

Meet OVM’s newest staff member!
Julia Long became aware of the need to address rampant truancy in local school districts and wanted to be part of the solution. She began working with truancy cases through OVM this fall. She works primarily with cases in Harvey County schools.

Something that has surprised her so far is noticing that truancy is not often an individual’s conscious choice to not go to school, but rather is related to societal and systemic barriers. A challenge she has observed is continuing the group effort of everyone pulling together for the success of one student/family outside of and beyond the OVM intervention.

Julia lives in Newton with her family.

Truancy Program Stories

An area school administrator shared this testimonial: “[Our] school has been fortunate to work with OVM and the truancy intervention program they have developed.

Their efforts have allowed us to have supportive, solution driven conversations that seek to benefit students and their families."

Their staff have gone above and beyond to find both practical and creative solutions that improve student attendance at our school. When other strategies we have tried aren't successful, we are thankful that OVM provides additional resources to help our students, school, families, and broader community.”

The following comes from a staff person working with truant students, their families, and their schools (this school is in McPherson county).
"We had originally planned to close this [truancy] case at the end of January, per the student's agreement. However, as that date neared, the principal expressed concerns that, while the student was doing the work, he was doing it all at the last minute. She asked for OVM to stay on for another month to support him. I think that speaks to the strength of our relationship with the school… when I first contacted the two principals involved they initially didn't even respond to my emails because they didn't think we were going to be able to make headway, in part because of negative experiences with the family in the past and in part because they felt like truancy in general was so overwhelming that the system wasn't getting anything done. Three months later I checked in again and the principal was enthusiastic about the improvement in the student's performance. But, also importantly, the school's relationship with the family was much improved. The principal wrote,

I think I have also built enough of a relationship with the family that if there are concerns I can raise them without difficulty."

This work is so valuable! We helped two principals see that there are effective ways to address truancy. We helped this particular student get back on track. And we helped a school and a family rebuild their relationship."

Stories of Hope from M-2

from Prison Ministries Director Kenzie Brister

They were like family."

An incarcerated gentleman walked into the visitation room with only about thirty minutes left of the visit. When he arrived, it was clear that both he and his match were grateful that he made it. This young man was late because he had been told M-2 wasn’t happening that night and went out to the yard instead. When I checked in with them a little while later, he told me he had been practicing his conversation skills. Intrigued, I asked what he meant. He narrated how frustrated and angry he was to be missing his M-2 visit, and how he really wanted to “go off” on an officer “to make him feel what I was feeling.” Instead, he paused and made a different choice. He spoke respectfully to the officer, telling him how meaningful the visit was to him and how his volunteers had driven a long way to see him, and that they were like family. And could the officer please make a way for him to get to the visit?

This match is relatively new. The incarcerated man in his mid-thirties who’s been locked up for seven years and a couple who have been volunteering with M-2 for just about a year met for the first time in the spring and have only visited a few times; there have been hiccups with the inmate forgetting to come and volunteers unable to make it. And yet, in these few short months he sees his volunteers as family. He told me, emotion in his voice, about how his match hugged him the previous month and how much that meant.

At another M-2 visit, I checked in with a brand-new match. The inmate told me, pointing at his volunteer and smiling, “He's a cool dude.” And then he told me, looking around the room at all the conversations happening, that he didn’t know there were people who cared. He was stunned to know that there are people on the outside that care about incarcerated strangers. He’s excited to keep visiting with his new friend.

This is what M-2 does: we offer care to the isolated, to the lonely, to the forgotten, to those who (in the words of a past M-2 participant) are “hungry for the affection of a friend.” What might seem like small levels of connection and care to us on the outside can be of monumental value to someone locked up.

A prayer from an M-2 participant

An incarcerated man in Hutchinson wrote out this prayer and brought it to his M-2 visit to share with his match and with Kenzie.

Lord bless all volunteers who take time out of their day to come spend time with us prisoners. So many people have turned their backs on us and deemed us undesirables, but your light has beamed in the hearts of volunteers and they are saying ‘God loves you and you are valuable.’ Through programs such as M-2… I've come to your love and have a relationship with you. Thank you God for placing these amazing people in my life. God, please look after them and their families. Safeguard their minds, bodies and spirits. Give them everything they need and grant them safe passage as they journey on their way home. I pray all these things in your grace. Amen.”

Prison pen pal stories

In past years, OVM has organized several ‘card shower’ events to create handwritten notes of encouragement for incarcerated men, primarily on death row. As the landscape of prison mail has changed, it has become more challenging in recent years to send or hand deliver greeting cards to prisoners, due to increased (and varied) security measures at institutions.

Sometimes we are not sure it's worth the person-hours to navigate all of the red tape. But some messages do get through, and the recipients remind us why we do it. We received this reply to a Valentine we sent to a resident on Death Row this year:

"It felt good to be remembered by people. I know you are a very busy person, but you took time out of your busy schedule to cheer up and encourage people like me with positive motivation. It is very easy to forget [those] who are condemned by this society, but

You and the Ministry made it a point to encourage the last, least, and lowest who are forgotten by the society. Thank you very much. I truly appreciate your kindness."

Another brief story comes from a pen pal in a maximum security facility. What follows comes from his response to the first letter he received from his volunteer pen pal arranged through OVM:

“After a few weeks I told [my cell neighbor, who already had a pen pal through OVM] ‘They didn’t write me back. That’s why I don’t write these kind of places.’ He told me, ‘They will.’ Of course I waved it off. Then literally the moment I started to get discouraged in my faith and started sliding back to the whole ‘forget everything’ attitude, I woke up with your letter in my door. ...I’ve read it 4 times now."

While granting permission to share this he also added, "Thank you so much! Nobody in my support system is walking this walk with me so it means a lot that you would even write to me. ...I'm so thankful for the things your program & ministry is allowing God to do through you all. ...Encourage them that people really need positive people in their lives."

Volunteerism

For the year to date (October 31) OVM volunteers have contributed over 810 hours to community-based restorative justice practice! Based on the current hourly rate for a volunteer, that is a contribution valued at more than $24,000! What an amazing gift this RJ community is to the greater community! Here is a breakdown of those hours:

Financial Goals

The gift of restorative justice has very real financial cost. OVM is not a professional fundraising group nor do we want to be – we want to provide opportunities for our communities to grow in being healthier together, even when some part of the community causes harm to another part. The less we need to focus on fundraising the more we can focus on the activity of restorative justice.
We want to finish this year strong financially and get a good start for next year. Will you help us reach a year end goal of raising $25,000? If 250 people who read this give $100... we’ll make it!
We also happily accept larger gifts as well. :)

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