December 2021 Newsletter

All of us at LINC are so grateful for the support you continue to provide in order that we can all help people turn their setbacks into comebacks! Without your help, we wouldn’t be able to make such a positive impact in Wilmington. In this month’s newsletter we give you information on how you can join our Local Reentry Council Orientation via ZOOM (TODAY), details on how you can be a part of LINC’s 2022 Milestones Event in February, we shed a spotlight on Kim Cook, as well as the story of a civil rights pioneer who recently had her court record expunged. If you want to do even more to support our mission – to educate and motivate youth to make positive life choices and to empower men and women returning from incarceration to be productive members of our community… please consider making a contribution online here.Thank you!

Local Reentry Council Orientation Join us for the Local Reentry Council Orientation on Wednesday, December 22, at 2:00pm.Get the Zoom Meeting information through the button below.ATTEND MEETING The LRC is here to help returning citizens successfully reenter the communityTickets Now On Sale For the 2022 LINC Milestones Event! 8th Annual Milestones DinnerMonday, February 7, 2022Reception 6:00pm | Dinner 7:00pmKeynote: Cory WrisborneHotel Ballast301 S. Water Street, Wilmington We are looking forward to having you join LINC at the 8th Annual Milestones Dinner. In addition to recognizing the accomplishments of LINC program participants and acknowledging our valued supporters, we will be celebrating the growing impact that LINC has in our community! This promises to be a very special evening and we hope to see you there! This year, we are excited that our keynote speaker will be Cory Wrisborne. Mr. Wrisborne plays an integral part in the Success of TRU Colors brewing. Not only is Cory savvy in marketing, he has won numerous Toastmaster competitions and continues speak to groups from all over. Mr. Wrisborne is part of the LINC/LITE Manhood Family. His message is so vital to Wilmington and echos the work we do at LINC.

The LINC Monthly Spotlight In this installment of the “LINC Monthly Spotlight” we spoke to long-time LINC supporter and Board Member, Kim Cook, to get to know her better. What is your proudest moment at LINC?There are so many to recall! But I will share one in particular…We were having restorative justice circle process with LINCresidents on a weekly basis. When Anthony Ray Hinton wasour keynote speaker for the Milestones dinner that year, hecame to our circle process. Having survived 30 years on deathrow in Alabama on a wrongful convictions, Hinton had beenexonerated and released the year before coming to visit. Hesurvived death row by maintaining his capacity for joy as ahuman entitlement. “They had my body, but they did not havecustody of my brain or my heart; that was still mine. So theycould not take my joy!” Our circle process that week was aboutfinding joy in difficult times, and he talked about his experiencein our circle. I think the LINC residents found it very inspiring tomeet him, and to learn about his story. I was deeply honored tobe in circle with everyone that day. If you could witness any historical event, what would you want tosee?I would try to stop the Salem Witch Trials. I have two ancestorswho were accused witches; one was hung, the other survivedand deeply traumatized. Tell us something about yourself that would surprise us.I am terrible at arithmetic What do you like to do in your spare time?I really enjoy birding and being out in nature; I have 304 birdson my life list and only 600 or so more to go for North America. What is your personal philosophy?Healed people heal people. It’s about restorative justice, it’sabout trauma informed care and practice, it’s about beinghelpful instead of harmful. What would you like to be famous for?Being kind.

Claudette Colvin refused to move bus seats months before Rosa Parks. At 82, her arrest is expunged A judge has approved a request to wipe clean the court record of a Black woman who was arrested for refusing to move to the back of a segregated Alabama bus in 1955, months before Rosa Parks gained international fame for doing the same. A judge granted the request by Claudette Colvin, now 82, in a brief court order made public Thursday by a family representative. Parks, a 42-year-old seamstress and activist with the NAACP, gained worldwide notice after refusing to give up her bus seat to a white man on Dec. 1, 1955. Her treatment led to the yearlong Montgomery Bus Boycott, which propelled the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. into the national limelight and often is considered the start of the modern civil rights movement. A 15-year-old high school student at the time, Colvin refused to shift seats on a segregated Montgomery bus even before Parks. Read more here.

Shine a positive light of hope and opportunities in our community!Your financial contribution will help change a life.Thank you in advance for your CONTRIBUTION