Episode 21: Karen Lee — Changing Lives in the Face of Mass Incarceration & Racial Inequality
As Chief Executive Officer of Pioneer Human Services, Karen Lee leads one of the nation’s largest nonprofit social enterprise organizations in the United States. Under Karen’s leadership, Pioneer successfully operates several revenue generating businesses that provide living wage jobs to mission-related employees and help fund its mission of empowering people who have been involved in the legal system to build healthy, productive lives. Headquartered in Seattle, Pioneer serves over 10,000 people a year through its diversion, treatment, housing, and job training programs.
In this episode we talked about the dismal employment outcomes people with records generally face and how living wage jobs change lives. We explored the power of social enterprise in addressing complex social issues, such as mass incarceration, the death penalty, homelessness and addiction. We also reflected on the racial inequities in the criminal legal system both in the United States and here in Australia.
Karen is a graduate of the University of Washington School of Law and the U.S. Military Academy at West Point.
To learn more about the work of Pioneer Human Services visit their facebook page here & head over to their website pioneerhumanservices.org to read the amazing success stories happening everyday.
You can also follow Pioneer Human Services on Twitter @PioneerWA
Learn more about Justice Matters — justicematters.tv
Support the show — patreon.com/justicematters
Full Transcript
Karen Lee
The vision for our company is to have every single person, you know that we serve to have the quality of life that they choose for themselves, every single person. We don't want them to be living under a bridge, because they have a felony conviction in their background. And we don't want them to have a lower life expectancy, or to be unable to get the job of their dreams or to not have the relationships. They want her to feel stigma when they're walking down the street. So every single person in our society, whether you've been to prison or not, should feel like they belong. And have all the opportunity that everyone everyone else has. That's what we want for people.
Tim Buxton
Welcome to Justice Matters, the podcast inspiring a world where everyone belongs. I'm your host, Tim Buxton. Hi, everybody, welcome to season two of the Justice Matters podcast, I'm so excited to be back at the table back here, pumping out episodes, and Gosh, guys, it's been a wild start to 2021. There's been a lot of firsts. And for this first episode, we get to talk with our guests in the United States name is Karen Lee. She is the CEO of Pioneer Human Services, one of the largest social enterprises in the United States providing a wide range of services, and running several profit. profitable businesses that serve those that are formerly incarcerated, helping them to integrate into society from housing, from employment and healthcare services, it truly is handled was an inspiration to talk to her. But like I said, 2021 was one of the beginning of a lot of firsts, the first woman Vice President, in United States history. And as we talked about a lot of things that were happening in the us right now, which were really underlying some of the systemic racial injustice that have been plaguing that nation for over 400 years. Uh, we started to reflect on maybe some of the things that were happening here back home, and I brought up a statistic that I just want to check at the top of this episode, make sure there's a correction to that was talking about incarceration rates of Indigenous Australians here in Australia. And I said that that the Australian indigenous population was said 20%, what I meant to say it was 3%. So Australia only has 3% of our population that is indigenous, yet they make up over 29% of those that are incarcerated here in Australia. And as we made that comparison, and we talked a bit about these issues in the show, I just want to make sure that correction was made, because yeah, it even more underpins the same issues that we're seeing coming to the forefront within the United States, the same issues that we have to face here, also in Australia, and how we deal with those that are incarcerated, and how we can have a justice system that works in fairness and equality. And I would say in a restorative manner. Another first we had and we talked about in in the podcast was the US had its first female federal execution of in the last 70 years. And as we talked about the death penalty, and we talked a bit about that issue. Karen asked me and gave me some homework and really gave everybody that was listening some homework to go and watch Just Mercy, a movie that recently that had come out. And I did watch that and it was moving. And I encourage you, guys, if you're impacted by what you hear today is, as Karen shares some incredibly inspiring things of the work that is being done, but also the work that that's that still needs to be done. Go ahead. Definitely go away. And if you haven't watched it already watched Just Mercy, mercy. It's a it's a book as well that you can read. Guys, it's an honor privilege to be back with you and to introduce to you this episode with Karen Lee of Pioneer Human Services.
Tim Buxton
Hey, Karen, it is so great to have you on the Justice matters podcast. Thanks for joining me.
Karen Lee
It's a pleasure to be here. Thanks for inviting me.
Tim Buxton
Yeah. All the way in Washington State. So right now Washington DC is getting a lot of attention in the news. And, and I really think, gosh, there's just, there's just a lot that's happening in the world right now that's kind of come to the surface that I think really, in a sense, the work, the wonderful work that you do with pioneer Human Services is really working hard to get to the root of the issues and the problems and provide some amazing solutions. Karen, you work for pioneer Human Services, I'd love for you to kind of maybe introduce the work that they do and your role and and for, for the audience today.
Karen Lee
Certainly, my name is Karen Lee, and I'm the Chief Executive Officer pioneer human services. And our company was born and continues today, on its mission to help people that are involved with the justice system, have have a great life. It's it's really as simple as that. In the United States, people that are we're not like Norway, or Scandinavia, or a country that has the more enlightened approach to crime and punishment in the United States, there's still a heavy emphasis on incarceration. And on top of that, we have a racial overlay, where black, brown and indigenous people of color are incarcerated between five and eight times as much as a Caucasian person, a white person. So and I'm sure that the listeners have at least heard that out of all the Western countries. The The, the number of people incarcerated in the United States is something like, like we have something like 90% of the world's incarceration population. So it's a significant problem here in the United States. And we believe that it's just not right. So when a person is incarcerated in the US, after that experience, they have a record. And in crimes, here are misdemeanors and felonies generally, and, and a felony record, a felony conviction is like a scarlet a for the rest of your life. When you apply for a job, when you apply for credit, when you apply for a loan, when you apply for an apartment. One of the first questions is, have you ever been convicted of a felony within the past seven years? And when a person answers yes. A lot of times whatever benefit they're applying for automatically, their application goes into the bot into the trash. If they answer No. And then a background searches done later, they'll they'll be fired, or they'll. Because they lied on their application. So it's a significant, it's a significant problem. In addition to that, there's quite a bit of stigma. Yeah, that goes along with a felony conviction. And a lot of the people in the US that do have a felony conviction. It's for an act that occurred when they were 15 1617 or 18. And today, they're 35 4050 or 60. And we believe it's fundamentally unfair to punish someone for any event that occurred when they were 16. And they've already served their sentence. We're not even going to talk about sentencing reform today, we're just gonna say, we're going to assume for the sake of conversation, that sentencing is fair. And we know it's not,
Tim Buxton
Well, yeah...
Karen Lee
So umm, so if you were charged with breaking and entering, stealing, maybe a comic book, or no, that's misdemeanor, but let's say that you were charged with something related to stealing or and you might have been, um, hi, at the time. You had an eight year prison sentence. Then after that you might have had, I don't know a year or two of probation. Well, and then let's say you've even paid off all your fines. Why then when you're 40 Five, can you still not get a job or you can't have a place to live, we don't believe in that. So, pioneer, we're a social enterprise, which is a nonprofit that takes a market approach to its work. And we have businesses in our enterprise division that, you know, donate, for lack of a better word, their profits to our social services, and then our social services, have all the services that you would need to help a person transition from interactions with the justice system. Based on criminogenic thinking, or based on substance use disorder, or mental health, disease, yeah. And, and then to help them progress in their life. Yeah. So we have programs that run from jail diversion, which is basically programs that that that encourage people or start their detoxification process, because every time you're serving someone there, they're not in jail. We have residential, substance use disorder, treatment, residential, opioid use disorder, treatment, and co occurring treatment. And we also then have transitional housing, wow. Post treatment, we have outpatient clinics for substance use disorder and for mental health. And then we have employment training. And then we have the full range of housing, and housing support. So we have transitional housing, we have permanent supportive housing, yeah. And then we have landlord tenant housing, where you have an independent tenant. So we have all those services. And our results are outstanding, depending on the type of service and where that person is in their journey to what we call pro social behavior, in social and social service terms, or a great quality of life for you and me, but along that journey. And, you know, our service outcomes are just outstanding. And in our employment programs, our recidivism rates are less than 5%. Wow. So, yeah, we do a lot of good for the people that we serve.
Tim Buxton
Yeah, I mean, it is incredible. We did a little looking around your website, and I was just like, What don't you do, and I guess you are the largest, nonprofit social enterprise within the US, which is an incredible, you know, achievement. And we talked a little bit about social enterprises and their role in the nonprofit sector, in a previous episode, and, and I think, you know, it just offers such a powerful, sustainable model for for addressing, you know, the, the need for social impact in our world. What, yeah, what I would love to, I'd love to talk a bit about some of the successes and the programs that you you do offer in just a little bit. But I do want to dig in what, where you started out with really addressing and highlighting the issues because as people, it's not until people really, truly understand and are become fully aware of the need the problems that that there are. And, you know, as we saw last year, the resurgence of Black Lives Matter, protests throughout the US for, for very, you know, in response to some horrific deaths. But that occurred once again, and again, this isn't this was a resurgence. This has been an issue that has been around for a long time. But it got to a tipping point that it you know, quite frankly, many would say just needed to and so what what that highlighted was and I think in a greater awareness, which I think you can speak into, I'd love for you to have what what are the systemic issues that have been there and I watched a documentary on Netflix, it was called the 13th. I think it was and it just highlighted the systemic issue of incarceration of and it made me actually look into Australia here a lot more. And I discovered that 23% of Australia's population is indigenous, yet they, they are there. I think their number is almost one third of incarcerated. 30% of those incarcerated are indigenous people. And oh, From indigenous backgrounds, and that just until those numbers and statistics sink in, like the ones you said earlier, you're not going to realize we have a systemic problem. This is not just all fluke, or, or per chance. And so can you can you help unpack just a little bit? What, you know, what is, you know, a bit more the, the, the issue with incarceration of people of color black people, and and you mentioned indigenous as well.
Karen Lee
So, you know, in the US blacks were slaves up until the Civil War. I mean, there were some free black people, but I would say, you know, less than 1%, probably, of all the, the black people in the country were slaves. And so after the Civil War, the slaves were freed. So, you would think that it would all be, you know, Rosy, but it really wasn't because the set, the South didn't have that source of cheap labor. And it really needed that. And in Congress, there was still a desire to appease the south, they wanted the country to unify. And it wasn't like the northern. The Northerners really liked black people. They just didn't like slavery. Right. So it so there was this rise of, of deputizing people that had formerly been slave catchers, and enacting these laws that were easy to impose on black people. And it got in it started this cycle of indentured servitude. Yeah. That turned into jails and prisons. With the rise of the Jim Crow era, and, and so it's vestiges come from slavery. So So and, and, and part of it is that, you know, a black life is not the same as a white life. So there's over policing in communities that have dense population of black and indigenous people. And then over policing leads to being in court, more particularly as a juvenile, which leads to prison sentences. And the next thing you know, it's a, there's assumptions of guilt. There's lots of research that's done so. So all those issues become this big, huge snowball that we have today of mass incarceration. What,
Tim Buxton
What makes it that's just astonishing that 90%, let's say, of the world's incarcerated are in the United States, I mean, that policy and, and what happened just a few days ago, with the the execution of, of the first woman executed
Karen Lee
The first female in decades, yes.
Tim Buxton
Those kinds of policies and and as your organization highlights then that it's not just what happens when you're in cost, right? It's the stigma and the after effects of that for the rest of your life helped me understand, like, how did how does the us get to get there? Like, like, it's just astonishing to understand. And I know there's no simple answer to this, this is something that people are wrestling with, but but surely, I mean, yeah.
Karen Lee
It's a snowball effect it you know, Paula, you know, local politicians run online order campaigns, sheriff's run on public safety. So they have to prove that they're doing something good for their communities, and they're going to be tough on crime. Wow. And, and before you know it tough on crime is, you know, incarcerating profile 2.3 million people just in one country at any given time.
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Tim Buxton
Yeah, it's it's just it's it's a huge obviously. issue and problem and one that's going to take a lot of effort, a lot of time, a lot of systemic changes to overcome. And I'm excited, though to hear about organizations like yours that are at the forefront of dealing with that. talk a bit more about those those stigma issues that that that someone that has been incarcerated then they've finally earned their freedom. Yeah. Can you give us some examples of obviously going for a job you talked about? What other areas of of, you know reintegration to society to do they really struggle with
Karen Lee
I would say basic services. So housing is key. And housing is key. And right now in Washington, the state that I live in, but across the United States, housing is not a basic right for people that have a felony conviction, and in fact the Housing Authority, Department of HUD Housing and Urban Development. They have regulations that specifically prohibit landlords from public housing projects of renting their units to someone who has a meth conviction parks. sample, which is just a type of drug, right? So I would say that the very first barrier when a person, let's say, let's take a person who's been in prison for eight years, yep, they walk out of the prison door. And if they have a family, they'll go live with their family for several months, and try to restart their life. If they had a very long sentence, say their sentence was 30 years, their mother may have passed away while they were incarcerated. Some people have 40 year sentences and they get out, and there's no one that still knows them anymore. So they have $40. And they don't have enough money for a down payment, they don't have anywhere to go. And and then on top of that, they'll have a list of requirements that they have to meet for their community supervision requirements. So what we do is we offer low barrier housing, so they can come and knock on Pinter's door, we also have emergency housing, and and we will try to get them house, but we're often full Wow. And, and so they don't have to have that big downpayment. And then we have to start working with that individual to get identification, maybe a driver's license, maybe get them signed up for Social Security, if they've got it, and, and then make sure that they have the basics of what they need, so that they can survive till the next day. And so all in all those things, if they don't happen for that individual, then that individual may have to turn to crime, just to make ends meet the very next day. So they can come to pioneer. And we have a housing facility, we've got case managers, we have employment counselors, and we can work with that person as an individual to address their specific needs, and then help them enter the labor market as appropriate for them.
Tim Buxton
Wow. I mean, the fact that there's such a wide range of services that they can come at one places is important, because I can imagine having to go to several different places just to try and in, you know, get the help, could, again, be extremely overwhelming if they don't have that support network, like you said, a family or friends.
Karen Lee
Absolutely. And then, um, you know, if you're on a family member's couch or a friend's couch, that's not, that's not what we would call secure housing or stable housing, because after about three or four months, that person would expect to, for, you know, their couch surfer to have their own place. So oftentimes, the homelessness kicks in about three or four months after release, because they've kind of burned through all their relatives, where else can they stay? Yeah. And they may have, you know, been denied for so many job opportunities that they, they start to lose hope. Oh, yeah. So at pioneer we really work with folks on on employment services quite a bit.
Tim Buxton
Would you say that? Yeah. I mean, because having getting employment, and becoming financially independent, has got to be one of the, the most important. I mean, you talk about housing having permanency a sense of security, employment. Again, financial independence, you cannot necessarily get housing, if you can't afford to, or prove that you have that ability to to, to pay rent or whatever, then
Karen Lee
yeah, I think the housing is even more important than the employment. Because housing is a basic service. And and you're not going to be able to get employment, if you don't have a place especially now it's COVID people are working from home, right. So it's the housing is probably the most fundamental needs we have to address. And, and, and getting them attached to benefits is probably the second most important thing. Because, you know, we want if if a client has unresolved health issues, because it's not great health care when you're incarcerated, we need to get those addressed as well. Or they're not going to be able to work in a meaningful way.
Tim Buxton
They're just it's like everything. Everything is just stacked against you.
Karen Lee
Absolutely. Absolutely. It's. And that's why pioneer so broad. People ask me, why does Why is pioneer so broad? And? And my answer is that a person is is is, is a hole. And what we try to do is, is to give that person options to address where they are, they may not need every pioneer service, they might need to two services over here in one services over that one service over there. But they're going to need some set of services to help them along their way. And if you offer one service and you don't have another one, or your community doesn't have another one, then that service is not going to going to be able to fulfill its potential. A classic example of substance use disorder for in, in a residential setting. So that means that you go to a facility and you become clean and sober in about a three month period. Well, when you graduate from that program, you need to go someplace and then have stepped down outpatient services. So if if, if we if we do all this work in a residential setting, and then we lease someone into a homelessness, into homelessness, what good have we done with those three months of residential treatment? What's the likelihood that a homeless person, you know, that is struggling, you know, for a place to sleep every single night will stay sober? That's just not realistic.
Tim Buxton
No. How long is has pioneer service? I mean, it did it start so broad, or did it kind of add on the services as it as it went along?
Karen Lee
Pioneer added on it is probably almost 55 years old. It was it was started in 1963. By a our founders was a man named jack Dalton. And he was an attorney who was unfortunately convicted of embezzlement. And he was an alcoholic. And so he had a prison sentence in Walla Walla penitentiary here in the state of Washington. And when he was released, is he while he was in prison, he was very active in a Alcoholics Anonymous. And when he released from prison, he and several friends of his from prison decided that they were going to buy a house together, because they had nowhere else to live. And so they bought a house, we have that property still, it's in downtown Seattle, and it was called pioneer fellowship house, but they had to pay rent to live there. And so then he got some work with the Boeing Company. And that was our very first contract. That's how we became social enterprise. So the guys, they lived at pioneer fellowship house, and then they worked at pioneer industries, which had, which had a Boeing contract, and that one Boeing contract with that one house, wow, where they all live together and had a meetings at night, wow, was the beginning of pioneer.
Tim Buxton
I love that. It's so good to hear the beginnings of things and how it actually just takes a spark an idea, one opportunity that someone gives you can be the birth of an organization that is, you know, doing such incredible work in so many areas. That's
Karen Lee
phenomenal. Our founder was quite a visionary. And he, he was a big, big thinker, big dreamer. And he, he was able to attract people to his vision. And, and so, so pioneer was was born and we continue to, to grow with that same mission, which is to assist people that have been involved in the justice system. As they reenter society. Now that vision has grown since then, because now there's jail diversion, and a lot of other things which, which we didn't have then. So we've extended that focus to keeping people from being incarcerated by helping the you know, reduce the jail population, but it's all to the same end we don't want people to, to be to be in, you know, to be incapacitated by society's judgments when they should be living their life, especially if they live, they've served their punishment.
Tim Buxton
Yeah, and Exactly. It's like, why do we have to hold it against them for the rest of their life? I mean, this is for me, it's this idea of what what kind of society we know that, that just constantly holds everything against everybody. I mean, we, we we teach our children to forgive, you know, and to, and to not, you know, when someone does that, if you bring that up in their face every single time something happens. You can't move forward, you just, it's not right. And but you, I think I'd love to just dig into the hole. Because there's, there's the cure, right? There's How do we address the problem that we have? And you said, You've moving into like jell o version and the importance of actually prevention? And you can't, you need both right? You need a cure and a prevention? Yes, a few months ago, I was woken up at 4am in the morning, and to my car being stolen outside the front of my house, I woke up, I'm like, Sarah, my wife, I said, I think someone's taken her car. And I could see the pulling out and going away, and Hi, I just jump in my car, and I'm off to them. And I'm, like, trying to find where they are in my neighborhood. And there's quite a tricky neighborhood with lots of little side streets. You know, I'm on the phone to the police and letting them know, we'll eventually after, you know, a couple of hours, I was just driving home thinking oh, I guess the police will find it at some point it'll be abandoned or, or whatnot, or who knows. actually see my car being driven as I'm driving back straight. So I just again, I go on the go on the chase. And they scream off. It was quite an quite an eventful morning anyways, that the car was abandoned. It had been in a minor incident, it had kind of kind of scraped another car. And I guess they they were jumped out and ran away, but the kids will call it so there was a there was a couple of kids that were CT. One in particular, I think was it was a young 14 year old kid. And there's, there's an issue in this area that we live of young kids kind of doing petty thefts and crimes like that. I received an email after after a little while saying, hey, we've got this new criminal restorative justice process where you're going to have an opportunity to sit down with this young person with the police and with a parent or social worker, a representative of him Well, he didn't have any parents that were there. He was living on the street and tell you the story because I was just I was amazed that there was this opportunity for me to sit down and and I was able to sit down tell my side of the story to this child. Let him tell his side of the story admit that he was on ice that night and was with a group of friends and and was you know, coerced into doing this crime and and he wasn't all that remorseful. But he I can tell he was still probably not in a good state of mind at the moment. But we we dropped were able to drop this contract that said, Hey, I'm going to mentor you, I'm going to meet with you a couple times a week, we're going to do some there's a community center down the road, and we're going to sit, we're going to go there and do some work together to hopefully avoid that he would just be thrown into the juvenile detention justice system. And then that repeats, you know, that cycle of going in and out in and out like I had hoped, right? Unfortunately, it doesn't, it doesn't end so well, because he never showed up to any of the appointments, his phone number got lost. And to this date. I don't know where he is. But it was an amazing the fact that there was an opportunity for intervention that there was an opportunity for this young person to come face to face with someone like me. And it was like afterwards I was talking and after a meeting with him. I was talking with the social worker she says, you know, what we saw in that meeting was was somewhat rare. We don't often get to see a glimmer of hope in that child and to see like they were like able to tell and look you're lucky you have an opportunity to to change your your your life here and the fact that it was there was an incredible thing. And, and I say all that to, you know, just to, to kind of share how it how important it is for these kinds of opportunities to be available, it takes hard work, it
Tim Buxton
takes a lot more work, it's I guess it's just a lot easier for society to say, You've done a crime, let's just lock you up. It's certainly not more cost effective. Now, and you could talk into into that. But what, what, what avenues or ways are there to to kind of employ jail aversion strategies, I'd love to hear some of those.
Karen Lee
Well, a lot of it has to do with the place you live the community live, and in the mindset of the elected officials that live there, and and if they, if the elected officials in the community that you live, believe in restorative justice, that, you know, children shouldn't be tried as adults. If they're willing to, to try new ways to, to teach, you know, children that for whatever reason, they're running the streets in that way and stealing cars, then, then there's plenty of opportunity. So here in our state, I live in the Seattle metropolitan area, it's in King County, Washington, and we have a very progressive prosecuting attorney, we have a progressive King County Sheriff. And and when those two elected officials really want to see change, happen, change happens, particularly the prosecuting attorney. And I've seen it the other way, when the prosecutor with you know, we have some communities that we we support, and, you know, when they're, you know, when their local sheriff or they're when they're prosecuting attorney in particular, if they're if they believe that the constituents want crime and justice, then they will resist alternative sentencing type of programs and restorative justice.
Tim Buxton
So it's a leadership problem really essential.
Karen Lee
It really is. Yeah, and what I tell folks is, you know, I had, you know, when you've been a crime victim, and many of us have, unfortunately, and a lot of it for smaller kind of crimes, you know, like what you described, you know, stealing a car enjoy writing, you know, breaking into a car. And, and when those things happen to you, you're pissed, and you want something to happen. And what I try to impress on people is do you want, you know, a life sentence for someone that broke into your car broke the window to your car? And, and is there any forgiveness in your heart for this individual? Did you ever wonder why they were living on the street? Yeah, first place,
Tim Buxton
Ask why? Why-
Karen Lee
And may and we may never know, but any way that we can become more forgiving as a society as a society, I think is a, you know, is a good thing. And I mean, do we really need to lock people away for life?
Tim Buxton
Well, how's it going for us, anyway? how is that doing? How's that working for us? anyway? Like, until you realize that it's not working? It's not making society safer. It's not it's it? It's not you know, for cost effective it all in every point and way that you look at it. This doesn't make sense.
Karen Lee
Yeah. It really doesn't. And, you know, and, and the sad thing is, is that the people that we walk away, they have children. Hmm. They have loved ones. Yeah. And their child then grows up not meeting their father.
Tim Buxton
Well, let me just say-
Karen Lee
So it becomes a cycle.
Tim Buxton
-this young boy that stole my car. His father taught him how to steal he saw it, he can talked about this. Where's your dad? Well, he's in prison. And what What? What did He what? He do well, he, he was a thief and stole things. And he after he said, he taught me how to do it. I watched him I saw him. And, and you make a great point, like, what is the generational impact?
Karen Lee
It's significant. It's, we have, I mean, I mean, if you look at the numbers, I don't know, the numbers off the top of my head, but you know, something like one in eight, African American children have a parent in prison, that's way too many. And then those kids grow up without the stability of a parent. So there's so many other things that we could be doing, rather than locking people up, in my opinion, and I think about, you know, some of you know, I talked earlier that pioneer is a social enterprise. Yeah. And that we have businesses. Yeah. And, you know, some of the leaders in our, in our, our aerospace company, you know, just like most companies, we have general manager, we have floor supervisor, you know, we have all these leadership positions, and, and many of our leaders in pioneer industries, you know, had a rough start in life, they may have had an abusive parent or a parent that taught them to do drugs, encouraged them to drop out of school. And, and, you know, and they spent a lot of time incarcerated, and in how can they give their gift to the world when they're incarcerated?
Tim Buxton
Well, like it comes down to what dignity do we place on, on humans do we have categories that we give dignity to whether it be their color of their skin, whether it be they have a record? Or in it? Again, it is astonishing, until you when you come face to face with the reality that is, you realize how far away as a society we are from there being equality in there. Yeah, being freedom. And I think that is why the reckoning that we're all seeing on TV screens here in Australia and in the world, the the frustration, and the anguish and the pain, and that is being displayed. It starts to make sense.
Karen Lee
That's right. People are tired of being over policed people are tired of having a lack of economic opportunity. So if they if, if, if everyone has the same opportunity for a great job, yeah. There won't be so much frustration. There just won't.
Tim Buxton
Wow. I feel so you know, like, I want to get a lot more out of you. While while I've got you. Can I just ask one question. I mean, it just because it's so like, relevant right now. the death penalty. Why do we even have, Why that? Does that still even exist? I'd love to know. Why that seems to be a I mean, I know there's varying opinions, but it just doesn't again, as we talk to, you know? Yeah. Would you? Could you share a lot on that?
Karen Lee
Have you read the book, Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson?
Tim Buxton
I haven't and I know, it's been turned into a movie. Right? And maybe I need to do some homework and, and
Karen Lee
You watch that movie? And you read that book? And that'll answer all of your questions about whether we should have a death penalty. Wow.
Tim Buxton
Well, that's good homework for our listeners and for me,
Karen Lee
because we shouldn't have one. Yeah. But that, but that book, and the movie will bring those reasons to light.
Tim Buxton
It, you know, I'm a person of faith, and I follow a person that was crucified. And what and, and, and it just, it doesn't, it doesn't compute at least with with my idea of faith that I would want that form of punishment, to be the form of justice that we've still use to this. And yeah. And it. Again, it comes back to you said it before. What kind of society want to build where, where justice just means punishment without with from the key away or, or execution or just retributive or do we want to live in a society where when someone does something wrong as I discipline, my children, my my punishment, my, whatever discipline I give is in the hopes to restore them to make them a better human being to raise them as to you know, learn your lessons, you dance sequences, it's not, there's no consequences and you get away scot free. It's like in the process of there being consequences. Let me show you a path to restoration and how you can turn this and that's where mercy compassion, empathy, understanding it, it is a society, I think that we, you know, we've got to look at these issues, if we want to build a society that's more just and more, more. Better. Yeah.
Karen Lee
Yeah. I agree. Yeah, Agree. couldn't say it better.
Tim Buxton
Yeah. Karen. Before I let you go, your journey, I think is is incredible. And you talked a bit about in the little bio form that that was filled out how you had had, and I know you're here to talk about the great work of pioneer. But I would like to just for our listeners, just to hear a little bit about the incredible journey you've had in and when I saw that, that your efforts were honored and in in an incredible award of of being, I have to get it right, I knew I would say it wrong. But to be selected as the pew pew giant is huge into puget sound, sound Business Journal woman of influence, a prestigious award for any female that can be received within the Seattle area. That that's a phenomenal award. And what did that mean for you, when when you receive that,
Karen Lee
It meant a lot to me, I looked up to you know, they that award is only given to a few women a year and, and I looked up to the women that were selected before me as just giants, just giants, and just to be a part of that circle of incredible women doing wonderful things in the business community just meant so much to me, that it was surreal. So, um, you know, it really, because I feel like my career you know, it's, it's been one where, you know, you you give a lot and you don't always get the recognition for, you know, your efforts or, or the efforts of your organization. And plus, when it comes to helping people, it's so difficult to prove you don't have, you know, dollars and you don't have profitability to show you how you help someone right
Tim Buxton
A stock price for your company,
Karen Lee
Yeah, you don't have a stock price. So, you know, so it's so hard we could have, we're still trying to figure out, you know, what is the best way for us to, to measure our impact on society. But it's really difficult, and we might, you know, have been, you know, the only person to rent to someone, but that's what they needed. That's, you know, so. So it was very, it was just a wonderful feeling to be recognized here. So, yeah, thank you for
Tim Buxton
thank you for mentioning I did and I wanted to thank you for not giving up, you know, for taking on a role A lot of you know, you've got a law degree, you've successful career and to take on a role that serves those in the society that are are stigmatized, that are maligned for know that are vulnerable and to dedicate your career to serving others is what needs to be honored and recognized when it does and so, thank you for for not giving up on this. Thank you credible portion of society that as you mentioned, I have a gift to bring and need to be given the opportunity to give that. So thank you. Say, I do have one last question. And it's, it's got to do with the theme of the of the podcast for this season, it's this second season that we're on and, and I've kind of changed the colors and went with the yellow. And I thought, because I want it, I want to leave on a note where, for me, yellow just has this idea of, of hope, this idea of a bright future of opportunity. And in injustice. So often, that's the vision we have to have, you know, it's it's you can be so, neck, neck deep in such, you know, terrible injustices and the stories can be harrowing. But it's the vision that you have for hope for the future. And I want to ask you, what's your hope? What, what do you look on to the horizon for what gives you hope in the work that you do?
Karen Lee
The vision for our company is to have every single person, you know that we serve to have the quality of life that they choose for themselves, every single person, we don't want them to be living under a bridge. Because they have a felony conviction in their background, we don't want them to have a lower life expectancy, or to be unable to get the job of their dreams, or to not have the relationships, they want her to feel stigma when they're walking down the street. So every single person in our society, whether you've been to prison or not, should feel like they belong. And have all the opportunity that everyone everyone else has. That's what we want for people.
Tim Buxton
I love that. I'm so glad you you said that. And close with that, that they belong at the charity that we we started as you belong, and we wanted refugees and those that that are in a foreign land to feel that sense of belonging. I love that, that Yeah, world where everyone belongs. Is is so central to your mission. Thank you can again, they really appreciate your time, and it's just so wonderful to get to know you. And I really hope our listeners will just dig into this and and see how they can be part of the solution as well, wherever they are.
Karen Lee
I hope so too.
Tim Buxton
And is Is there any way people can learn more or follow or other than heading to your website?
Karen Lee
Absolutely. I think that they should head to the website because then they're connected with us and but we have social media, we post on Facebook about any injustice that we see. And we also post our success stories. There are tremendous success stories that would bring tears to your eyes. If I could tell it, tell them all to you. So come to pioneer Human Services and.org forward slash quiz. And we have a quiz on mass incarceration that we would love for you to take a test your knowledge of what's going on in the world and see what you know about mass incarceration.
Tim Buxton
Brilliant. Awesome. Well, thanks again, Karen. Make sure you go to those places guys that are listening and watching on. Hopefully, we'll get the chance to get in touch again in the future. Take care.
Karen Lee
Okay. All right.
Tim Buxton
Thanks for listening to this episode of Justice Matters. I'd like to take this time to thank my audio visual engineer, Jose Biotto, you help in producing the show. I'd also like to shout out to the Patreon community that financially supports this podcast. Guys, thank you so much for your support, you can join them simply by going to patreon.com/justicematters. Where a simple donation of $5 a month, you can become part of the Patreon community and get access to behind the scenes content and extras that are share just with you. Lastly, there's another really important way that you can help support the podcast and that simply by writing it or leaving a review on Apple podcasts or Spotify. Maybe by subscribing on YouTube. Yes, we are a video podcast as well. Guys, thank you so much for listening in to this episode of Justice Matters. Please come again soon. I can't wait to share more episodes with you. I'm your host Tim Buxton. Thanks for listening
