Inside Out Re-Entry Summer Concert Event
Inside Out Community Center — Saturday, May 21 at 2 p.m.
At just over a year old, the Inside Out Re-Entry program is getting ready to celebrate in style, with a food and entertainment filled event on Saturday, May 21. The event is free to the community, but donations to the program are encouraged. Festivities will take place at the Inside Out Community Center (500 N. Clinton St., Iowa City) and include an opportunity for the public to tour the center.
The Inside Out Re-Entry program is a service for individuals re-entering the public sphere after having been incarcerated. It is run by a mix of long-time prison volunteers and former inmates, and aims to ease the transition process for returning citizens. One such individual is quoted anonymously on the program’s website as saying, “Inside Out has helped me to not feel ostracized and have a sense of belonging to the community (like I mattered to life itself).”
Among the program’s offerings are mentoring, a drop-in resource center and community meetings. That sense of community is crucial, and helps returning citizens get over one hurdle of re-entry, which is the social stigma that they often feel. This summer concert event is one way the program attempts to extend that sense of community out into the community at large.
Long-time eastern Iowa blues mainstay Kevin “B.F.” Burt headlines the event. He will be joined by Chicago’s Kenneth Davis and others. There will be free food, entertainment, games and activities from 2–6 p.m.
