Broadcast date: 6/22/2017
In the past 30 years the State of California has added 21 new state prisons, and with this the prison population has expanded from 23,000 to 170,000. And while it is reported that taxpayers pay $11 billion per year to operate the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, comparatively little of California’s prison budget goes toward rehabilitation.
It was out of this need that the Poetic Justice Project was founded. An innovative reentry program that aims to reduce recidivism, the Poetic Justice Project advances social justice by engaging formerly incarcerated youth and adults in arts education, mentoring and the creation of original theatre examining crime, punishment and redemption. Audiences are entertained and educated about incarceration, rehabilitation and re-entry.
Join host Fred Munroe as he speaks with Deborah Tobola, artistic director and founder of Poetic Justice Project, the nonprofit theater company, as well as other members of the group as they discuss their vision of unlocking hearts and minds with this bold original theatre project and their program which provides arts instruction to at-risk youth, prisoners and people on parole and probation since 2009.
Central Coast Voices is sponsored by ACTION for Healthy Communities in collaboration with KCBX and made possible through underwriting by Joan Gellert-Sargen.