What seemed an impossible dream has become reality for Karen Eckerman.
She is now the sober-living coordinator at Freebirds Solution Center. But at one time, she was a resident trying to rebuild her life, having lived through years of drug abuse and earning a criminal record.
“I went from being a nobody – no life, living house-to-house on the streets – to now I’ve dedicated my life to helping people change their lives for the better,” Eckerman said recently.
Joshua Sullivan has a similar story.
At age 22, he has been in jail four or five times in the past four years. The last time he got arrested, his parents told him they were done with him.
“They got fed up with it,” he said of his drug and alcohol abuse. He started drinking at a young age, then started using drugs in high school. He has been at Freebirds for 10 months, holds a full-time job working night shift, and helps out around Freebirds, working on projects such as refinishing a hardwood floor for the new retail store in the building.
“Seven of the 10 months I’ve been here are by my own choice,” Sullivan said. “I am free to leave whenever I choose. I just have no desire to leave.”
Eckerman has been with Freebirds for several years. She had already been in jail eight or nine times when she ended up there again in 2006.
“It knew the last time I went it was over. I went to court and had nowhere to go,” she said, “and Jack stood up in court and said, ‘If nobody wants her, I will take her.’ I came here as a resident, and six months later I was on staff.”
Jack Tanner is one of the founders of Freebirds Solution Center in 2004. He had his own multiple run-ins with the law before ending up with a non-suspendable prison sentence. While he was in the county jail, he detoxed and participated in a clean-living program with fellow inmates.
“We saw a lot of people who got fired up about getting out and making changes, but when they got out, they were back in the same environment that got them sent to jail,” Tanner said recently, sitting in the Freebirds meeting room. “We started this as a safe place to go after jail.”
While Jack was in prison, some of his friends in recovery made plans and formed a support group called Freebirds. They built a room at the Club Soda sober-living house for Tanner to live in after prison, and they got busy with fundraising and publicity. They eventually were able to move the program into a house in a nearby neighborhood.
Tanner said that he was working at a fundraiser yard sale when a supporter offered to purchase the former Greenwood School as a better headquarters for Freebirds. Tanner and four other men moved into the building, and the program took off.
“We drank three-day-old coffee,” Tanner said of the shoestring budget the men lived on. “There were five of us. We lived in the dry goods closet, and had a TV, and coffee and a microwave.”
Donations came their way, with city and county officials helping out. When the old juvenile center was closed, Freebirds received a stove and grill and exhaust fan for their kitchen, as well as electrical wiring.
“I was in construction my whole life, as were the other men who were here at the time, and it came in handy,” Tanner said. “We just kept remodeling the place, and it just kept happening.”
A lot of people have asked Tanner how he and the others made Freebirds happen, and he is quick to point out that it has been a spiritual process, with God helping all the way.
Those in the program use the 12 steps to recovery, and there is a lot of support of each other among the residents. But success also comes from the way Tanner teaches the residents to see themselves after they have completed the program and been released by the court system.
“Our way of thinking is not the way of thinking in most recovery communities,” he said. “They say, once and addict, always an addict. But we believe in positive thinking.
“I was an addict,” he said, emphasizing was as the past. “I was undependable. I lied to people. I hurt people. I had all the characteristics of an addict. Today, I don’t match up with that. Why keep on calling myself an addict if I’m not?”
In fact, the court system in Vigo County relies on Tanner to provide a safe and sober environment for people desiring recovery. Tanner is known to provide honest and regular reports to the courts. If a resident relapses, he will tell the courts, and that usually means the resident returns to incarceration.
“I don’t try to get them locked up because I hate them or I’m mad at them,” Tanner said of his tough attitude and expectations. “I do it because I love them more than they do themselves.”
It can be depressing when people relapse, he said, but it is also joyful to see people come to life.
“That gives you hope. It keeps you going.”
Tanner said he understands why people turn to the only thing they know – illegal drugs - to block out their personal pain and to make themselves feel better.
“The people we get here are not usually your ordinary people who have just got in trouble,” he said. “They are people who are failing at everything. We get the lost causes. Over 60 percent of the people leave successfully. But I don’t take credit for the people who make it, because I’d have to take credit for the people who don’t.”
The business of running Freebirds can also be stressful. Tanner said he watches the funding flow through the program, and he is thankful that few years ago, he saw that some federal and state funding that Freebirds relied on was going to dry up.
That prompted some brainstorming, and Tanner realized that if the residents received help in finding jobs, they could afford to pay rent.
“We have a shift of focus to helping people find jobs and get employed,” he said. “We have a person who volunteers to help folks get their GED for free. Last year, we were going under financially. But now, we’re above water and we’re doing more things to be self-supporting.”
The new retail store will also be a way to earn money. Residents can buy sodas and other drinks, Freebirds attire and health supplements. Becoming physically healthy is important for recovery, and is the reason that a gym for residents is set up in the basement.
Statistically speaking, Tanner and the Freebirds staff keep track of their impact in the community.
During the past 10 years, Freebirds has served about 2,000 people with addictions. To assess the impact of Freebirds on Vigo County, a follow-up study was conducted on the 99 county residents who were discharged in 2007. The study looked for any local arrests or probation violations that occurred after the residents enrolled at Freebirds. The review period ended Dec. 31, 2010.
Using data from the courthouse, the study found that 26 Freebirds graduates incurred new arrests or probation violations during the next three years, which is a 26 percent recidivism rate. The national recividism rate is 66 percent, with 54 percent returning to prison.
Of the local 99 people, 74 percent did not get any new criminal charges during those post-Freebirds years through 2010.
And of those 99 people, their records prior to their time at Freebirds showed that 88 percent had at least one prior offense and 64 percent were repeat offenders.