They are inpired to follow the example of the 18 students inmates actually, who early this summer completed the 10-week, 40-hour a week culinary training program in the Rikers Island Jail here in New York, now the opportunity is made possible by Elizabeth Gaynes, our food soldier of the week. Liz operates under a very simple promise about the inmates her program works with. 

“They can’t take responsibility for what’s happened, make a man’s for the criminal they’ve cost and then come back and be part of community. 

As a law student in the 1970s, the shock of Attica Prison riots where 29 inmates were killed, set Liz on the career path, dedicated to the lives and betterment of inmates. But she also has personal connection. For 25 years, Liz drove 6 hours each way between New York city and Virginia, bringing her two children to see their incarcerated(监禁) farther. Eliza learned first-hand how we prison sentence, applies to more than just the prisoner. And when Liz joined the Osborne Association, the non-profit that runs the Fresh Start program as executive director, the organization had two employees, they served 50 prisons inmates a year. 28 years later, Osborne has 200 employees and works 7,000 prisoners and family members a year. 

Fresh Start joints participants in their culinary training, but also offers computer literacy classes, job readiness and life skills. Inmates take part in their communities, cooking and serving holiday meals. And once inmate has completed the program and left Rikers Island, Fresh Start offers job and school placement assistance. Wonder if it works, since its ineption, 1,500 men have completed Fresh Start. The New York Times reports that the inmates who take part in the Fresh Start program, 90% do not return to jail within the year, cost the city $5,000 per participant. Many people come together to make Fresh Start possible but Liz gains the programs, life blood and driving force. And then she told us: “To be effective in this work you have to spend time in jail, to listen to what people need. It’s not a job you can do behind a desk.” For getting out from behind that desk and making a difference to those that so many would just soon forget. Liz Gaynes is our Foot Solider of the week.