By Olivia Weeks, The Daily Yonder, March 11, 2021
In recent decades, the number of women incarcerated in North Carolina has skyrocketed. In 2017, the state’s female prison population totaled 2,634, almost six times its 1978 number.
In the early aughts, programming for women reentering society lagged behind growing incarceration rates, said Benevolence Farm Executive Director Kristen Powers in a phone interview.
In 2008, social worker and Benevolence Farm founder Tanya Jisa put together a team to try to address the needs of women exiting the prison system in North Carolina. From this effort came forth the idea of a reentry program in Alamance County offering safe, stable housing and paid employment through farm work.
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