These felons needed jobs; these businesses needed workers. United Way brought them together

The troubles started for Ivy Morelock when she was a junior in high school. She suffered trauma, which she doesn't like to talk about. 

She started drinking and using meth. She racked up OWI and possession charges. She went to prison in 2001 for conspiracy to manufacture meth.

The moment the judge's gavel fell and she knew she was going to be locked up was "total destruction for me," Morelock said.

When she got out of prison, she stayed sober for eight years.

Then a friend offered her a job at a bar. She relapsed and began using and selling drugs. She ended up back in prison.

"I thought I had made it because I did so well for so many years, but one bad choice and I was right back where I started," Morelock said.

Morelock has been out of prison for about 18 months now. She's 46 years old. Transportation was a problem because her license was revoked for six months as part of her punishment.

It took her a long time for her to find housing because many property owners refuse to rent to felons.

She's still looking for full-time work because scores of employers don't want felons on their payroll.

Brian Spring tried meth for the first time when he was in his 20s. Within a week, he was using regularly and selling the drug.

He was arrested in 1998 and earned a 10-year sentence.

Spring got a reconsideration of his sentence, which was reduced to three years, and he was out of prison in 120 days. The only job he could find was at an oil-change chain that paid $7.50 an hour.

After taxes, he took home about $300 every two weeks.

One night after work, a co-worker offered him some meth. He took it.

Soon, he was selling again.

On the night Spring's girlfriend, now his wife, found out she was going to have a baby, Spring went to make a drug deal for about $1,000. He thought the money could help pay for prenatal care and other baby expenses.

Spring was inside the house when he heard what sounded like an explosion.

"I thought, 'Please, just let these guys be getting robbed,'" he said.

The sound was a police battering ram smashing the front door of the home. Spring's probation was revoked.

He called his girlfriend the next morning to tell her he was going back to prison. His daughter was born while he was behind bars.

When Spring got out of prison, he couldn't live with his wife and child because their apartment complex didn't allow felons.

He was forced to live with his parents. And just like Morelock, finding work was also a challenge.

The easy thing to do at this point is to judge Morelock and Spring based on their crimes and prison time. If you can't do the time, don't do the crime, the old cliché goes.

Yet Spring and Morelock served their time. Now they want to be productive members of society.

A pair of United Way programs aim to assist people such as Morelock and Spring. Central Iowa Works helps match employers with workers who have needed skills.

But in some areas, such as forklift operators or commercial driving, program officials found it difficult to find candidates for employers.

The program found an untapped resource in the state's prison population, said Pat Steele, program director.

"There was a large body of potential workers who were returning to society but didn't have the skills to support themselves," he said.

While Morelock served time at the women's prison in Mitchellville, Central Iowa Works arranged for trainers to come to the prison to teach work skills.

Morelock learned how to drive a forklift and was trained in transportation, distribution and logistics which taught skills such as order filing, material handling, shipping and receiving, assembly work and dock work.

She's worked odd jobs, from shoveling snow to temp jobs at UPS and delivering pizzas. But she needs a career — a job that not only can pay her bills but help her retire one day.

She may have met the right person in Mike Weckman, an official at the Laborers' International Union of North America, Local 177.

Weckman has already had success working with men and women discharged from prison who want to work hard for a living.

One of the biggest successes is Brian Spring. While Spring served time at the Fort Madison prison, he worked on one of the labor farms. He picked up skills that helped him land a job at a waste removal company at $12.50 an hour.

Eventually, Spring got in contact with Weckman, who told him come to the union hall and they would help him earn his commercial driver's license and keep him in steady, well-paying work.

Spring eventually became a field representative for the union.

"We work with a lot of people who've had similar experiences to Brian," Weckman said. "He can relate to them directly and tell them how the union can help them get the training and the jobs they need to get their lives on the right track."

I met Morelock and Spring at the union headquarters on East Euclid Avenue. When Ivy mentioned her troubles finding work, Weckman said, "Come see me. We'll find you a job."

The next day, Morelock visited with Smith and she got a job interview through the union at Rew Materials, a company that distributes construction materials. Morelock didn’t get the job because of some lifting requirements, but the she’s optimistic work with the union and the training she received through Central Iowa Works will help her succeed.

One barrier for employment is that her driver’s license was revoked for six months due to her drug conviction. She has a license now and commercial driving training, but the revocation shows up on her  driving record during background check;  many employers won’t hire someone with a revocation on their record.

It’s one of many ways our laws and society continue to punish people after they have served their time and puts people at risk for poverty or to return to criminal behavior.

“Some jobs — like the medical field or certain federal contracts — just won’t allow people with a record,” Weckman said. 

To a degree, that makes sense. One wouldn’t want a former drug addict or a dealer handling medicine or certain criminal convictions on a secure government project.

Still, everyone deserves a second chance and the more barriers we put in front of felons trying to return to a productive life, the more likely we are to see wasted lives.

”We you find that one person whose willing to give you a second chance, that’s everything,” Springs said.

My late Grandma Rogers often said that we lived in a "throw-away world." Her complaint usually stemmed from the amount of waste she and my late grandfather saw at the building sites they cleaned.

I worry Grandma's lament applies to people, too. Our society claims to believe in forgiveness and redemption, but more often we embrace judgment and punishment.

The prevailing culture attitude seems to be that if you've ever been in jail or to prison, you must be ostracized forever and treated as less than human.

The more barriers society and the law place between felons who've served their sentences and finding homes and jobs, the more likely the state will have to warehouse these people in our overcrowded prisons.

"When you're in prison, you're costing the state about $38,000 a year," said Seth Johnson, who works with OpportUNITY, a United Way program designed to prevent poverty. "What are the chances they would be able to make that kind of money when they get out of prison? It's not very good."

Of course, Johnson isn't suggesting handing out $40,000-a-year jobs to felons released from prison. He is saying felons need training and opportunities so they change their lives and stay out of the system.

"It's about basic human dignity," he said.

In other words, stop throwing people away.

Daniel P. Finney, Register Metro Voice columnist, is a Drake University alumnus who grew up in Winterset and east Des Moines. Reach him at dafinney@dmreg.com. More from Finney: DesMoinesRegister.com/Finney.