“We’re dying to live,” says Dartrell, to nods and affirmations. “We’re dying to live.”
Dartrell is a member of READI Chicago’s Participant Advisory Council (PAC), a weekly convening of men from across Chicago who are current or former READI participants. Typically, the PAC uses its weekly meetings to discuss opportunities for the initiative and advise on concerns or areas for improvement, but this meeting is different.
In the aftermath of the murder of George Floyd, the shooting of Jacob Blake, and weeks and months of protests and demonstrations nationwide, Community Project Manager Kimeco Roberson is instead leading a restorative justice circle with the PAC and READI Chicago staff to talk about what’s going on with them and their communities.
“Restorative practices can bring enlightenment instead of chaos—help inspire change in a way that moves to renew and uplift and bring peace,” Kimeco says. “Racism, police brutality—that’s pure controversy, but we want to have this conversation. We need to have this conversation throughout the country.”
This is not the first circle held for READI Chicago participants this year. Restorative justice circles have become an important part of how READI Chicago builds and maintains trust, relationships, and an atmosphere of healing within our communities. These circles complement the critical cognitive behavioral therapy that sets READI apart, providing an additional healing space to address the generational trauma and decades of oppression and disinvestment facing our communities.
As our city, state, and nation work toward addressing racism and achieving equity and opportunity for all, we are also seeing how important these restorative spaces are for promoting open and trusting dialogue in a broader context. To promote that dialogue and bring access to men deeply impacted by decades of silence, READI Chicago is now partnering with the Illinois Department of Corrections to facilitate healing circles for people incarcerated in select prisons. This is a starting point for processing and changing the systems, policies, and attitudes that have impacted Black and Brown communities, resulting in their disproportionate representation in corrections systems.
“For a long time, there wasn’t enough unity in our communities of color—not enough conversations between people with different experiences,” READI Chicago Job Coach Kevin Holifield said. “Now, we have to have as many of these conversations as we can, so we can start to come up with some solutions.”
