Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
The views and opinions expressed in the following programmer those
of the speaker and don't necessarily represent those of the station.
It's staff management or ownership.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Good morning, you'll find me out with Pete and the
poet Cold. I'm Peter Leonards and I'm the poet Gold
and we're on the air with Dennis Woodbine from Family Services.
But before we get to Dennis, we're going to go
right to the poet goal for her weekly poem prayer incantation.
Gold please let it roll.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
Okay, this morning, I'm going to share again one land.
We're always making up stories about us and them, them
and us. Lives appear distant, some divided by fences, not
quite within reach, misunderstood.
Speaker 3 (00:42):
Are we losing sight? We exist on one land.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
Amen's in one land, and that could be the world,
that could be the country, and one land is One
of the people on our one land is Dennis Woodbine
who's trying to extend our oneness. And I think that's
a fairly cool way of putting into that. You have
a new responsibilities to extend your striving for more unity
(01:09):
and Petepsari, you want to talk a little bit about.
Speaker 4 (01:11):
That, Yes, Peter, thank you. So yes, I do have
a new role working at Family Services. I am the
Family and Community Engagement Coordinator And with that, intels is
that I'll now be working alongside a social worker, a
license social worker, providing youth in our community with mental
health support. That is one of my roles. In addition
to doing that, I'll also be responsible for developing workshops
(01:35):
and programs tell it to youth and their families. And
I will continue to do some of my own responsibilities
of working with the partners and just enhancing services at
the Family Partnership Center, promoting it more and just opening
our doors more, welcoming more people and providing them with
more services that they need.
Speaker 1 (01:52):
And so let me ask you a question because I
think it's really important the partnership between also with social
worker for our audience is what exactly does a social
worker bring to the table in the role that you're your.
Speaker 4 (02:04):
New role mental health support, clinical mental health support. And
I think that's something that's really important because right now,
youth or experiencing a non precedent amount of mental health issues,
whether it be with depression or whether it be with
anxiety trauma. And unfortunately there's also a lot of stigma
(02:29):
surrounding mental health and seeing someone for your mental health.
I've struggled with depression, I've struggled with anxiety. I've been
through a whole great deal of trauma, and I've also
saw therapy. But in some communities, having mental health or
going to see somebody for mental health is taboo, and
those are stigmas, and those are barriers that need to
(02:49):
be overcome, and I look forward to speaking more about
that and hopefully shattering those barriers and making it something
that's okay. It's okay to not be a it's okay
to see somebody when you're not.
Speaker 3 (03:02):
Okay, absolutely, you know.
Speaker 1 (03:04):
And when you were talking about, you know, certain communities,
you know, a lot of people feel that it's it's
definitely prevalent in black and brown communities, but I also
look at it as a as a socioeconomic issue, because
it's also prevalent in poor white communities as well, you know.
So I think that when people have economic challenges and
and the way the construct has been set up, the
(03:27):
wealthy have always had upper middle class and wealth. They
have always had access and a broader exposure to understand what,
you know, what mental health is, and and the assistance
that they need in order to get well versus someone
on the opposite end economically, a poor person.
Speaker 3 (03:43):
You know, the stigmas are built in. It's not something
that you do.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
Yeah, Culturally, there are different attitudes was mental health? I
mean certainly, Uh, there's a stigma in the up middle
class community also, but it's it's I think it's lighter,
it's less intense, but it's still a stigma to it.
And you know, part of it, I guess I growing up.
(04:12):
You know, I most grew up in a white working
class family. And if somebody went for mental health services,
oh they're crazy. Yeah, so they were. And now you know,
my wife andend made an extra dollar and when we
go to a therapy. And by the way, I think
I'm the Dutchess County record holder for spending the most
(04:34):
money on mental health of anybody. But that's you know, sir,
But you know, there's not a stigma to it as
much of a stigma. So there are cultural parts to it.
But then I wanted to ask you when you mentioned
working in conjunction with a social worker. My sense is,
(04:55):
and I'll be interested in your opinion, if a teenager
is depressed or anxious of having mental health issues. That's
not only a private issue, that's a public issue because
that that young person lives in the one land and
you get a little disruptive when you have issues. Am
I right on this? Yeah?
Speaker 4 (05:16):
I agree. So even before stepping into this role, as
you know, Peter, I was the found I am the
founder and executive director of Finished Strong Wellness Censer, which
is a youth program that up until recently was located
inside the Family Partnership Center. And a lot of the
kids that I work with, you know, some of the
kids had some issues with mental health, and some of
(05:36):
those kids. Sometimes when people struggle, they can internalize what
they're going through and you won't know they're just going
through this internally. Or sometimes a person could act out
with what they're going with and going through inside. And
so one of the kids that I was working with
was brought to me because of his struggles. His mother
was concerned about him, and at one point he did
get in trouble. He did begin to act out in school.
(05:59):
There was a gun threat that he had made and
he got in trouble with the law, and you know,
it was something that I had to talk to him about. Initially,
when I started Finish Strong, it was me and my
ex wife. She was a trauma specialist and she used
to do that component of providing the youth that we
saw with mental health support. Unfortunately, it was hard for
us to work together, so we separated and I continue
(06:19):
to provide services to kids. However, there comes a point
in time when I'm limited to what I'm able to
provide to a kid, and that's why you need a
license social worker to be there, somebody who could provide
that extra layer of support to somebody who may need it.
And that's why I'm excited to come back full circle
now once again, I'll be working with a licensed social
worker who could address it on those issues and that
(06:42):
higher level of support that some of our youth need.
Speaker 1 (06:45):
And that's so insightful for you to point out, you know,
because we all have limitations in some of the things
that we would like to do. But like you said,
you know you have now a licensed person who has
a different depth of knowledge, So you bring something to
the table. They bring something to the table because the
ultimate goal is still to serve our youth and our community,
to get it to a healthy place.
Speaker 4 (07:06):
And I like the way you word it that we
broth bring something to the table, because so we don't
have that person yet. We just put out the job
yesterday and so we're looking and so if anybody's interested,
reach out to Family Services. We all looking for somebody
to work with our young people. But I like the
way you worded that because it's going to be a
team effort, because as somebody will lived experience, somebody like
(07:29):
myself who was once involved with the streets, who once
served time, I'm what you consider a credible messenger. There's
certain lived experience that I have that maybe whoever we
hired may not have. There's certain ways that I'm able
to identify with our youth in a way that this
person may not be able to. You know, there's been
times when I've had a parent come to me and
because I was running a boxing program, they brought their
(07:50):
son to me and they wanted me to toughen him
up because they didn't like the way he was responding
to the bullies in the community. And because I'm a
big guy and they know that I serve time, they
expected for me to reinforce what they were teaching their child.
And it was actually so, and I did speak to
the child, but I actually had to sit down with
the mother and it was like, don't rob your son
of his innocence, don't make him out to what he
(08:12):
doesn't need to be. You understand, because so many of
us grow up in harsh environments and we're not allowed
to be who we are. Who we are naturally. Some
of us are loving and caring and kind. But if
you're growing up in a tough environment and they expect
you for you to be violent, and you could lose
who you truly are while adapting to your environment. And
a lot of her response was trauma based because she
(08:34):
would grow up in the bronx and she knew what
it was. She wanted to protect her son. But you know,
but you gotta be mindful. Yeah, I'm gona teach Hi
how to defend himself, but I'm alsto gonna teach him
to walk away first. I'm gonna teach him to speak
out first. I'm gonna teach him that it's okay to
tell somebody what's going on, and that you don't have
to take matters into your own hand because it could
end up really messy when you start doing that. Other stuff,
(08:55):
and then instead of you your son being instead of
you were as talking to the parent. Now instead of
you worrying about your son being soft, you might have
to worry about your son not being incarce reading because
you reinforced the wrong things to them.
Speaker 1 (09:07):
Or staying alive, Yeah, you know, staying alive once again,
if you're just tuning in to finding out with Pete
and the poet.
Speaker 3 (09:12):
Gold, I'm Peter, I know what I just and we're
here with.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
Dennis would buy for Family Services talking about his new
position as a family community Engagement coordinator. Peter, I just
wanted something that that Dennis was talking about that you
probably had. You had, I know, we shared stories and
you probably can contest to a similar sort of cultural
experience living out uh breezy point, you know, and growing
up and how how let's say dance was seen or
(09:39):
the arts were seen, and growing up an environment of
just you know, yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:44):
For me, growing up art was for girls, and I
mean even music, you know, like Elvis Presley was for girls.
You know, So I have really missed the boat on
music and a lot of art, you know. But culturally
you're going to go with the environment you grew up
(10:06):
in Yeah.
Speaker 3 (10:07):
Yeah, I mean.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
Nobody is more than ten percent better or worse than
their environment, you know, and that's a big deal. Then yeah, yeah,
you mentioned in passing that you did time. That's not
a phrase everybody's familiar with. You might want to explain that.
Speaker 4 (10:29):
Yes, I'm formally incarcerated. When I was nineteen, I was
involved in a situation in which I was jumped and
I was robbed, and unfortunately, my environment, my family, people
in my community, I learned through them how to handle that.
The incident that I went to prison for actually stemmed
fromn incident that happened when I was twelve. I was
going to the store for my mother, and I was
(10:51):
jumped and I was robbed by a gang in the park,
and I was assaulted repeatedly around that time, around the
age of twelve, me having violence done to me was
a common thing. I would walk down the street and
there was a game in Brooklyn that they played called
a knockout game, where somebody would just hit you to
see if they could knock you out with one punch.
I experienced that my junior high school. I had to
(11:15):
get a safety transfer. Safety transfers when you're no longer
safe in one school when you have to get transfer
to another school. Kid had pulled out a machete on
me in the bathroom, So me being jumped and rob
was a common occurrence. This time if for me it
was just too much to normally nothing would happen. This
time it was more severe, and I was just really hurt.
And I was tired of going home and telling my
(11:38):
family what happened to me and nobody doing anything. So
I called the police and one of the persons who
jumped me was arrested. Later, my grandmother told me to
leave it alone and to not go forward, and I didn't.
But I learned from that and that situation that what
I did was taboo, that I wasn't at twelve. I
wasn't supposed to call the police, you know, And so
(11:59):
I learned for my uncle who later came to live
with us. He taught me how to handle myself in
the streets, and if anybody jumped me, or for anybody
harned me, I could call on my uncle and he
would come with his people and they might take me
back to the school and I may be forced to fight.
But there was a retaliation, And this is how my
uncles taught me what it was to be a man,
how to handle myself, and to not go to law enforcement.
(12:22):
Fast forward, my uncle got killed when I was sixteen.
When I was nineteen, I got into altercation with those
same men. At nineteen, I'm not the same person that
I was at twelve. I'm not gonna if you harm me,
I'm not going to call police. I'm gonna handle the
situation myself. So at nineteen, I got into this incident
and I went to retaliate somebody that I went with,
(12:44):
who wasn't even a friend of mine, ended up shooting
somebody who I found out the next day was my friend.
But because of the code that I was forced to
live by that I later internalized, I refused to cooperate.
So there it is. I went to trial. The victim
is my friend, the shooter is not. But because of
this cold that I grew up and I couldn't tell,
(13:07):
I couldn't cooperate, I couldn't tell what happened, and so
the DA was like, yeah, okay, you're a gangster. You
want to live by that cold. Because they knew that
I didn't do it, it was like, all right, you're the shooter.
You don't want to tell us who the shooter is.
You're the shooter. And they made me the shooter and
I got twenty five the life. When I entered the system,
I was a ninth grade dropout with a sixth grade education.
(13:28):
I was fortunate enough to land in a prison that
had rehabilitative programs. Got my ged Socials degree, Baster's degree,
was halfway through completing my master's degree, and until I
received executive clemency. I came home after serving twenty two
and then I came out, came to Poughkeepsie, found that
my own youth program Finished Strong Wellness Center moved into
(13:49):
the Family Partnership Center, served the hundreds of kids free
at free after school program, free summer camps, got a
bunch of kids' jobs, collaborator with a lot of organizations
in the community, Vasa College, Maris College, Precision Boxing and MMA,
you name it. And you know that was something that
(14:10):
I did out of passion. I never really made a
lot of money doing Finish Strong. But then it came
a time with I needed money and I got a
job working for Family Services, and then I was doing
two things. And then Brian Doyle, the CEO who hired
me told me, he's like, how are you going to
do both? You know, you you know you're burning yourself
at both ends. But I did it as long as
I could, and recently I made a decision to get finished, stronger,
(14:31):
break and to just put my all into what I'm
doing now in the family services where I'm still going
to be able to do what I what's my passion
working with youth and serving the community.
Speaker 3 (14:43):
I just want to know.
Speaker 1 (14:44):
And the audience is not in the room with us,
but you know, it was. It was very interesting to
watch your body language and physical transfer transformation as you
talked about your story and and go to the smiles
when you talked to about really serving and serving the youth.
You can you can see that it's in your heart.
(15:04):
You can see that, uh that there was a growth,
you know. And and I and I totally relate to
what we're what we're told, you know, growing up particularly
as a as a as a black or a brown person,
you know, in our in our communities, you know. And
I was when I was a kid moved into a
new neighborhood, same.
Speaker 3 (15:25):
Thing, you know, the gangs in the block.
Speaker 1 (15:28):
You know, we went to walk my dog for the
first time, put them on the street on the pole
in the street corner and uh and the kids were
just throwing stuff at them. And when I came back
to the house, my mom locked the door, you know,
and and said you you have to deal with it
because if you don't deal with it now, And that
was that was the type of response that that you know,
that we grew up with, you know, and it's and
(15:50):
it's like it is, it's going to be our journey
for the rest of our life.
Speaker 3 (15:53):
You know, what what is this? You know, you know,
and it's normal right right right, Nikolas is say that
to me.
Speaker 1 (16:00):
I didn't have to, you know, fight, you know, there's
a fear of God in me so to speak, you know,
but it was, you know, and I took box in,
I took karate just just so I wouldn't have to,
you know, step into that length. If you're just tuning in,
you're listening to finding out what Pete and the poet
gold I'm Peter Len and I'm the poet Golden. We're
here today once again talking with Dennis wood Behind from
Other Family Services and he's the new family Community Engagement coordinator.
Speaker 2 (16:25):
I noticed also that when you talk about the young people,
the kids, you really your smile was radiant and you know,
I mean you're and people also not knowing, not being
in the studio. When you talk about being twelve and
getting jumped by the time you're fifteen sixteen, people who
(16:46):
jumped you must have been pretty capable because you're a big,
strong person, and I would imagine some people might have
felt challenged by that, But you're not a likely victim
to me.
Speaker 4 (16:58):
Yeah, well this is who I am now at forty seven,
forty eight, you know, after doing twenty two and lifting
weights when I.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
Was twelve thirteen and all that. I was innocent.
Speaker 4 (17:11):
But it was like what poet spoke about, that intergenerational
trauma and violence and that learning. Because I'm sure the
kids who jumped on me were the victims at one
point themselves. But you grow up in that environment, you
internalize these social cultural norms and then you implement it
and you do it to other people like I did
you know, and yeah, so to say that they were
(17:34):
intimidated by me, those guys were pretty scary when I
was twelve, and I don't think it was just you know,
it was whatever learned behavior they learned, they internalized, and
they was passing it on. You know, they say hurt people,
hurt people. As I got older, I know now some
of those guys were dealing with stuff in their own house.
They was going up in poverty, They had mothers and
fathers that were either locked up or dead, mothers who
(17:55):
were addicted or struggling with depression or whatever mental health.
They had their own stuff going on. And there's a
saying that hurt people hurt people, So I'm quite sure
they took whatever they was going through out on people
like me. Luckily, though there's also another saying that hell
people also heal people, you know, And that's what I'm
looking to do now, And that's why I lit up
because so at Family Services we have our wise statement
(18:19):
right that we believe in everybody's right to throw, everybody
has the right to thrive. But my personal wise statement
is loving and supportive. Loving and supporting our youth heals
the part of me that didn't feel loved and supported
as a child.
Speaker 2 (18:33):
You very personal, very true.
Speaker 4 (18:35):
Also, loving and supporting our youth heals the part of
me that didn't feel loved and supported as a child.
Speaker 2 (18:44):
Yeah, yeah, I mean I don't know what else we
can say. Yeah, but at Family Services, you mentioned partners
before and you still have a role with partners. Not
everyone will know what a partner is a family partnership center.
Speaker 4 (19:02):
So the Family Partnership Center is a community center, but
it's a little different from your common community center, and
that is just not one agency that's operating throughout. Family
Services is the agency that manages the building and has
their own services in it, but they're also they are
also tenants, they are also partners. We have about twenty
different partners that all provide their own individual services to
(19:23):
the community. So we have for say Dutch's outreach, they
they're tackling food and security, so they have the lunch
box and the pantry. Lunch box you can come in
twice a day and get food the pantry, you could
go shopping and not have to pay for your groceries.
This is for people who are struggling financially. You have
organizations like Communal Life, they focus on Latina teens, source
(19:45):
how prevention. You have new tenants into the building like
Celebrating the African Spirit. They make sure that youth in
the community grow up understanding and knowing the history of
State of enslaved people in the city of Poughkeepsie. So
there are a bunch of different organizations, about twenty different
organizations at the FPC and also the building is open
to the community to host events. So this Friday will
(20:07):
be having our naturalization ceremony. We're about eighty to ninety
people who came here to the US looking for a
better life will become naturalized citizens.
Speaker 2 (20:16):
To your job, well, role has been we have the
agencies there, but then get them to collaborate or cooperate more. Yeah,
it's part of your role, and you're expanding that to
try to include more of the community, including or I
guess for you, especially young people. But to have partepsie
(20:38):
be a more coherent or cohesive place. Going back to
old poem about one Land. So you're a one Land pioneer.
You're out there and.
Speaker 4 (20:51):
Trying to be So one of the ways I've done that,
we've like last year and the year before, what I
started to do was host these back to school events
where for the partners who are interested come together and
collaborate and host these back to school events where we
give away school supplies, we have food, we have entertainment,
and then the agent, the partners in the building as
well as partners in the community could come out and
(21:12):
table and just let the community know all what services
are available. The year before last, the first time we
did it, we drew about like three hundred people out.
Last year in collaboration with some River Health because they
also had their National Health Center Week, we partnered with
them and we had about seven hundred people come out
(21:33):
for our back to School Week event. Yeah, a lot
of people. Yeah, shout out to some River Health. They
played that they were leading another partner.
Speaker 2 (21:41):
Yeah, I want to go a part of hope doesn't
seem wealth space. But when you say, the prosecutors knew
you didn't do the shooting, but because you wanted to
tell who did it, they decided, well, we're going to
get it out of here by making you the shooter.
That's the kind of not kind of to me that
(22:03):
strikes me as administrative violence. And how did that strike you?
I mean, other was when you want to sort of
give up the truth on things and they treated you
so harshly, basically said you no longer have a life.
How did that go into your heart?
Speaker 4 (22:20):
So we just recently had an event at the partnership.
This was done by the Poughkeepsie Public District Library, Sadie
Peterson Delaney African Roofs Library. I actually invited my friend
to come and speak. His name is Dan Slepian and
he's the author of the book The Sing Sing Files,
and what he talked about in his book and what
he talked about at the event was just wrongful convictions.
(22:41):
In his book, six people who had nothing, absolutely nothing
to do with their crimes were convicted and served decades
in prisons for crimes they didn't commit. My situation is
a little bit different because I made a horrible decision
and then my action still led to what happened. But yeah, Peter, Yeah,
absolutely right, the DA there's rules in place to stop
(23:03):
that behavior, but the DA didn't respect those rules. The
same way the streets get dirty and the same way
the streets don't play fair. Unfortunately, we have some systems,
and we have some people operating in these systems that
don't playfear who might feel justified. Well, we know you
were there, and we know you're just not speaking, but
we're gonna we're gonna hold you to this and you're
(23:23):
gonna wear this. How did I feel I felt, I
don't know, I felt like I would have preferred death
at that time. I couldn't imagine doing twenty five years
in prison. I just and you know, like I know
this person knows. I know that these people who are
testifying know that what they're saying isn't true. But unfortunately,
(23:43):
at my young age, with the choices that I made,
I helped to make that happen to myself. You know,
I put myself in a position where these people could
do what they did to me.
Speaker 1 (23:52):
That's a huge step of accountability, you know, just just
on your part, because sometimes that's it's challenging to get
one in life period, having nothing to do with being incarcerated,
just on on basic accountability in our lives for the
choices that we make. And uh and it's and it's
a brave choice and transformation. You know, I want to
(24:12):
ask you for a minute before we wrap up very quickly,
is the Track program affiliated with this and under the
vulner umbrella at all? The Track program at Family Partnership.
Speaker 2 (24:26):
It was attracted a long time program with Family Services.
Speaker 3 (24:29):
But you know, I know it's evolved, right, it's still evolving, right.
Speaker 2 (24:34):
But I also wanted to just mention without you going
to be down time for you to go into details.
You must have done very well in prison, I mean
to get an executive pardon. You must have. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (24:47):
I was a part of programs like Rehabilitation through the Arts,
where I learned how to do poke, spoken with poetry,
and then I took what they taught me about theater
and all that stuff, and I just I always felt
like I had something in me that needed to come out,
and through the arts I learned I felt my voice
because I grew up listening to hip hop, and I
know that there's a power there, you know, in the
spoken word and performance. And so rehabilitation through the arts
(25:11):
awaken something in me. And then once I once I awoke,
it was just a rap.
Speaker 2 (25:16):
It was just a rap.
Speaker 3 (25:17):
The arts matter, Yeah, they'll.
Speaker 2 (25:20):
Being woke is a problem, you know, but that's really important.
Speaker 3 (25:25):
No, you're absolutely right.
Speaker 1 (25:26):
The arts I always you know, if you follow me
on Facebook, I'm always saying the arts matter, you know,
because it it you said, it can wake up certain
things and you that puts you in a direction in
your life that you didn't even know was discovering my potential.
Speaker 2 (25:38):
And it's rehabilitation rather than the punishment. Right, it's a
citizens that's a whole other conversation.
Speaker 1 (25:45):
I don' would like to have you back, you know,
once you get into the position steady and hear how
it's grown and where you are and your reflections on it,
and just keep you know, just keep doing the good
work that you do. Thank you, right, and once again
we want to thank our listeners for listening to finding
out with Pete and the poet go.
Speaker 3 (26:04):
Thank you so much for dinnis, We're fine. Thank you
so much for being with it.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
Thank you for having me
The views and opinions expressed in the following programmer those
of the speaker and don't necessarily represent those of the station.
It's staff management or ownership.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Good morning, you'll find me out with Pete and the
poet Cold. I'm Peter Leonards and I'm the poet Gold
and we're on the air with Dennis Woodbine from Family Services.
But before we get to Dennis, we're going to go
right to the poet goal for her weekly poem prayer incantation.
Gold please let it roll.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
Okay, this morning, I'm going to share again one land.
We're always making up stories about us and them, them
and us. Lives appear distant, some divided by fences, not
quite within reach, misunderstood.
Speaker 3 (00:42):
Are we losing sight? We exist on one land.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
Amen's in one land, and that could be the world,
that could be the country, and one land is One
of the people on our one land is Dennis Woodbine
who's trying to extend our oneness. And I think that's
a fairly cool way of putting into that. You have
a new responsibilities to extend your striving for more unity
(01:09):
and Petepsari, you want to talk a little bit about.
Speaker 4 (01:11):
That, Yes, Peter, thank you. So yes, I do have
a new role working at Family Services. I am the
Family and Community Engagement Coordinator And with that, intels is
that I'll now be working alongside a social worker, a
license social worker, providing youth in our community with mental
health support. That is one of my roles. In addition
to doing that, I'll also be responsible for developing workshops
(01:35):
and programs tell it to youth and their families. And
I will continue to do some of my own responsibilities
of working with the partners and just enhancing services at
the Family Partnership Center, promoting it more and just opening
our doors more, welcoming more people and providing them with
more services that they need.
Speaker 1 (01:52):
And so let me ask you a question because I
think it's really important the partnership between also with social
worker for our audience is what exactly does a social
worker bring to the table in the role that you're your.
Speaker 4 (02:04):
New role mental health support, clinical mental health support. And
I think that's something that's really important because right now,
youth or experiencing a non precedent amount of mental health issues,
whether it be with depression or whether it be with
anxiety trauma. And unfortunately there's also a lot of stigma
(02:29):
surrounding mental health and seeing someone for your mental health.
I've struggled with depression, I've struggled with anxiety. I've been
through a whole great deal of trauma, and I've also
saw therapy. But in some communities, having mental health or
going to see somebody for mental health is taboo, and
those are stigmas, and those are barriers that need to
(02:49):
be overcome, and I look forward to speaking more about
that and hopefully shattering those barriers and making it something
that's okay. It's okay to not be a it's okay
to see somebody when you're not.
Speaker 3 (03:02):
Okay, absolutely, you know.
Speaker 1 (03:04):
And when you were talking about, you know, certain communities,
you know, a lot of people feel that it's it's
definitely prevalent in black and brown communities, but I also
look at it as a as a socioeconomic issue, because
it's also prevalent in poor white communities as well, you know.
So I think that when people have economic challenges and
and the way the construct has been set up, the
(03:27):
wealthy have always had upper middle class and wealth. They
have always had access and a broader exposure to understand what,
you know, what mental health is, and and the assistance
that they need in order to get well versus someone
on the opposite end economically, a poor person.
Speaker 3 (03:43):
You know, the stigmas are built in. It's not something
that you do.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
Yeah, Culturally, there are different attitudes was mental health? I
mean certainly, Uh, there's a stigma in the up middle
class community also, but it's it's I think it's lighter,
it's less intense, but it's still a stigma to it.
And you know, part of it, I guess I growing up.
(04:12):
You know, I most grew up in a white working
class family. And if somebody went for mental health services,
oh they're crazy. Yeah, so they were. And now you know,
my wife andend made an extra dollar and when we
go to a therapy. And by the way, I think
I'm the Dutchess County record holder for spending the most
(04:34):
money on mental health of anybody. But that's you know, sir,
But you know, there's not a stigma to it as
much of a stigma. So there are cultural parts to it.
But then I wanted to ask you when you mentioned
working in conjunction with a social worker. My sense is,
(04:55):
and I'll be interested in your opinion, if a teenager
is depressed or anxious of having mental health issues. That's
not only a private issue, that's a public issue because
that that young person lives in the one land and
you get a little disruptive when you have issues. Am
I right on this? Yeah?
Speaker 4 (05:16):
I agree. So even before stepping into this role, as
you know, Peter, I was the found I am the
founder and executive director of Finished Strong Wellness Censer, which
is a youth program that up until recently was located
inside the Family Partnership Center. And a lot of the
kids that I work with, you know, some of the
kids had some issues with mental health, and some of
(05:36):
those kids. Sometimes when people struggle, they can internalize what
they're going through and you won't know they're just going
through this internally. Or sometimes a person could act out
with what they're going with and going through inside. And
so one of the kids that I was working with
was brought to me because of his struggles. His mother
was concerned about him, and at one point he did
get in trouble. He did begin to act out in school.
(05:59):
There was a gun threat that he had made and
he got in trouble with the law, and you know,
it was something that I had to talk to him about. Initially,
when I started Finish Strong, it was me and my
ex wife. She was a trauma specialist and she used
to do that component of providing the youth that we
saw with mental health support. Unfortunately, it was hard for
us to work together, so we separated and I continue
(06:19):
to provide services to kids. However, there comes a point
in time when I'm limited to what I'm able to
provide to a kid, and that's why you need a
license social worker to be there, somebody who could provide
that extra layer of support to somebody who may need it.
And that's why I'm excited to come back full circle
now once again, I'll be working with a licensed social
worker who could address it on those issues and that
(06:42):
higher level of support that some of our youth need.
Speaker 1 (06:45):
And that's so insightful for you to point out, you know,
because we all have limitations in some of the things
that we would like to do. But like you said,
you know you have now a licensed person who has
a different depth of knowledge, So you bring something to
the table. They bring something to the table because the
ultimate goal is still to serve our youth and our community,
to get it to a healthy place.
Speaker 4 (07:06):
And I like the way you word it that we
broth bring something to the table, because so we don't
have that person yet. We just put out the job
yesterday and so we're looking and so if anybody's interested,
reach out to Family Services. We all looking for somebody
to work with our young people. But I like the
way you worded that because it's going to be a
team effort, because as somebody will lived experience, somebody like
(07:29):
myself who was once involved with the streets, who once
served time, I'm what you consider a credible messenger. There's
certain lived experience that I have that maybe whoever we
hired may not have. There's certain ways that I'm able
to identify with our youth in a way that this
person may not be able to. You know, there's been
times when I've had a parent come to me and
because I was running a boxing program, they brought their
(07:50):
son to me and they wanted me to toughen him
up because they didn't like the way he was responding
to the bullies in the community. And because I'm a
big guy and they know that I serve time, they
expected for me to reinforce what they were teaching their child.
And it was actually so, and I did speak to
the child, but I actually had to sit down with
the mother and it was like, don't rob your son
of his innocence, don't make him out to what he
(08:12):
doesn't need to be. You understand, because so many of
us grow up in harsh environments and we're not allowed
to be who we are. Who we are naturally. Some
of us are loving and caring and kind. But if
you're growing up in a tough environment and they expect
you for you to be violent, and you could lose
who you truly are while adapting to your environment. And
a lot of her response was trauma based because she
(08:34):
would grow up in the bronx and she knew what
it was. She wanted to protect her son. But you know,
but you gotta be mindful. Yeah, I'm gona teach Hi
how to defend himself, but I'm alsto gonna teach him
to walk away first. I'm gonna teach him to speak
out first. I'm gonna teach him that it's okay to
tell somebody what's going on, and that you don't have
to take matters into your own hand because it could
end up really messy when you start doing that. Other stuff,
(08:55):
and then instead of you your son being instead of
you were as talking to the parent. Now instead of
you worrying about your son being soft, you might have
to worry about your son not being incarce reading because
you reinforced the wrong things to them.
Speaker 1 (09:07):
Or staying alive, Yeah, you know, staying alive once again,
if you're just tuning in to finding out with Pete
and the poet.
Speaker 3 (09:12):
Gold, I'm Peter, I know what I just and we're
here with.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
Dennis would buy for Family Services talking about his new
position as a family community Engagement coordinator. Peter, I just
wanted something that that Dennis was talking about that you
probably had. You had, I know, we shared stories and
you probably can contest to a similar sort of cultural
experience living out uh breezy point, you know, and growing
up and how how let's say dance was seen or
(09:39):
the arts were seen, and growing up an environment of
just you know, yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:44):
For me, growing up art was for girls, and I
mean even music, you know, like Elvis Presley was for girls.
You know, So I have really missed the boat on
music and a lot of art, you know. But culturally
you're going to go with the environment you grew up
(10:06):
in Yeah.
Speaker 3 (10:07):
Yeah, I mean.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
Nobody is more than ten percent better or worse than
their environment, you know, and that's a big deal. Then yeah, yeah,
you mentioned in passing that you did time. That's not
a phrase everybody's familiar with. You might want to explain that.
Speaker 4 (10:29):
Yes, I'm formally incarcerated. When I was nineteen, I was
involved in a situation in which I was jumped and
I was robbed, and unfortunately, my environment, my family, people
in my community, I learned through them how to handle that.
The incident that I went to prison for actually stemmed
fromn incident that happened when I was twelve. I was
going to the store for my mother, and I was
(10:51):
jumped and I was robbed by a gang in the park,
and I was assaulted repeatedly around that time, around the
age of twelve, me having violence done to me was
a common thing. I would walk down the street and
there was a game in Brooklyn that they played called
a knockout game, where somebody would just hit you to
see if they could knock you out with one punch.
I experienced that my junior high school. I had to
(11:15):
get a safety transfer. Safety transfers when you're no longer
safe in one school when you have to get transfer
to another school. Kid had pulled out a machete on
me in the bathroom, So me being jumped and rob
was a common occurrence. This time if for me it
was just too much to normally nothing would happen. This
time it was more severe, and I was just really hurt.
And I was tired of going home and telling my
(11:38):
family what happened to me and nobody doing anything. So
I called the police and one of the persons who
jumped me was arrested. Later, my grandmother told me to
leave it alone and to not go forward, and I didn't.
But I learned from that and that situation that what
I did was taboo, that I wasn't at twelve. I
wasn't supposed to call the police, you know, And so
(11:59):
I learned for my uncle who later came to live
with us. He taught me how to handle myself in
the streets, and if anybody jumped me, or for anybody
harned me, I could call on my uncle and he
would come with his people and they might take me
back to the school and I may be forced to fight.
But there was a retaliation, And this is how my
uncles taught me what it was to be a man,
how to handle myself, and to not go to law enforcement.
(12:22):
Fast forward, my uncle got killed when I was sixteen.
When I was nineteen, I got into altercation with those
same men. At nineteen, I'm not the same person that
I was at twelve. I'm not gonna if you harm me,
I'm not going to call police. I'm gonna handle the
situation myself. So at nineteen, I got into this incident
and I went to retaliate somebody that I went with,
(12:44):
who wasn't even a friend of mine, ended up shooting
somebody who I found out the next day was my friend.
But because of the code that I was forced to
live by that I later internalized, I refused to cooperate.
So there it is. I went to trial. The victim
is my friend, the shooter is not. But because of
this cold that I grew up and I couldn't tell,
(13:07):
I couldn't cooperate, I couldn't tell what happened, and so
the DA was like, yeah, okay, you're a gangster. You
want to live by that cold. Because they knew that
I didn't do it, it was like, all right, you're the shooter.
You don't want to tell us who the shooter is.
You're the shooter. And they made me the shooter and
I got twenty five the life. When I entered the system,
I was a ninth grade dropout with a sixth grade education.
(13:28):
I was fortunate enough to land in a prison that
had rehabilitative programs. Got my ged Socials degree, Baster's degree,
was halfway through completing my master's degree, and until I
received executive clemency. I came home after serving twenty two
and then I came out, came to Poughkeepsie, found that
my own youth program Finished Strong Wellness Center moved into
(13:49):
the Family Partnership Center, served the hundreds of kids free
at free after school program, free summer camps, got a
bunch of kids' jobs, collaborator with a lot of organizations
in the community, Vasa College, Maris College, Precision Boxing and MMA,
you name it. And you know that was something that
(14:10):
I did out of passion. I never really made a
lot of money doing Finish Strong. But then it came
a time with I needed money and I got a
job working for Family Services, and then I was doing
two things. And then Brian Doyle, the CEO who hired
me told me, he's like, how are you going to
do both? You know, you you know you're burning yourself
at both ends. But I did it as long as
I could, and recently I made a decision to get finished, stronger,
(14:31):
break and to just put my all into what I'm
doing now in the family services where I'm still going
to be able to do what I what's my passion
working with youth and serving the community.
Speaker 3 (14:43):
I just want to know.
Speaker 1 (14:44):
And the audience is not in the room with us,
but you know, it was. It was very interesting to
watch your body language and physical transfer transformation as you
talked about your story and and go to the smiles
when you talked to about really serving and serving the youth.
You can you can see that it's in your heart.
(15:04):
You can see that, uh that there was a growth,
you know. And and I and I totally relate to
what we're what we're told, you know, growing up particularly
as a as a as a black or a brown person,
you know, in our in our communities, you know. And
I was when I was a kid moved into a
new neighborhood, same.
Speaker 3 (15:25):
Thing, you know, the gangs in the block.
Speaker 1 (15:28):
You know, we went to walk my dog for the
first time, put them on the street on the pole
in the street corner and uh and the kids were
just throwing stuff at them. And when I came back
to the house, my mom locked the door, you know,
and and said you you have to deal with it
because if you don't deal with it now, And that
was that was the type of response that that you know,
that we grew up with, you know, and it's and
(15:50):
it's like it is, it's going to be our journey
for the rest of our life.
Speaker 3 (15:53):
You know, what what is this? You know, you know,
and it's normal right right right, Nikolas is say that
to me.
Speaker 1 (16:00):
I didn't have to, you know, fight, you know, there's
a fear of God in me so to speak, you know,
but it was, you know, and I took box in,
I took karate just just so I wouldn't have to,
you know, step into that length. If you're just tuning in,
you're listening to finding out what Pete and the poet
gold I'm Peter Len and I'm the poet Golden. We're
here today once again talking with Dennis wood Behind from
Other Family Services and he's the new family Community Engagement coordinator.
Speaker 2 (16:25):
I noticed also that when you talk about the young people,
the kids, you really your smile was radiant and you know,
I mean you're and people also not knowing, not being
in the studio. When you talk about being twelve and
getting jumped by the time you're fifteen sixteen, people who
(16:46):
jumped you must have been pretty capable because you're a big,
strong person, and I would imagine some people might have
felt challenged by that, But you're not a likely victim
to me.
Speaker 4 (16:58):
Yeah, well this is who I am now at forty seven,
forty eight, you know, after doing twenty two and lifting
weights when I.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
Was twelve thirteen and all that. I was innocent.
Speaker 4 (17:11):
But it was like what poet spoke about, that intergenerational
trauma and violence and that learning. Because I'm sure the
kids who jumped on me were the victims at one
point themselves. But you grow up in that environment, you
internalize these social cultural norms and then you implement it
and you do it to other people like I did
you know, and yeah, so to say that they were
(17:34):
intimidated by me, those guys were pretty scary when I
was twelve, and I don't think it was just you know,
it was whatever learned behavior they learned, they internalized, and
they was passing it on. You know, they say hurt people,
hurt people. As I got older, I know now some
of those guys were dealing with stuff in their own house.
They was going up in poverty, They had mothers and
fathers that were either locked up or dead, mothers who
(17:55):
were addicted or struggling with depression or whatever mental health.
They had their own stuff going on. And there's a
saying that hurt people hurt people, So I'm quite sure
they took whatever they was going through out on people
like me. Luckily, though there's also another saying that hell
people also heal people, you know, And that's what I'm
looking to do now, And that's why I lit up
because so at Family Services we have our wise statement
(18:19):
right that we believe in everybody's right to throw, everybody
has the right to thrive. But my personal wise statement
is loving and supportive. Loving and supporting our youth heals
the part of me that didn't feel loved and supported
as a child.
Speaker 2 (18:33):
You very personal, very true.
Speaker 4 (18:35):
Also, loving and supporting our youth heals the part of
me that didn't feel loved and supported as a child.
Speaker 2 (18:44):
Yeah, yeah, I mean I don't know what else we
can say. Yeah, but at Family Services, you mentioned partners
before and you still have a role with partners. Not
everyone will know what a partner is a family partnership center.
Speaker 4 (19:02):
So the Family Partnership Center is a community center, but
it's a little different from your common community center, and
that is just not one agency that's operating throughout. Family
Services is the agency that manages the building and has
their own services in it, but they're also they are
also tenants, they are also partners. We have about twenty
different partners that all provide their own individual services to
(19:23):
the community. So we have for say Dutch's outreach, they
they're tackling food and security, so they have the lunch
box and the pantry. Lunch box you can come in
twice a day and get food the pantry, you could
go shopping and not have to pay for your groceries.
This is for people who are struggling financially. You have
organizations like Communal Life, they focus on Latina teens, source
(19:45):
how prevention. You have new tenants into the building like
Celebrating the African Spirit. They make sure that youth in
the community grow up understanding and knowing the history of
State of enslaved people in the city of Poughkeepsie. So
there are a bunch of different organizations, about twenty different
organizations at the FPC and also the building is open
to the community to host events. So this Friday will
(20:07):
be having our naturalization ceremony. We're about eighty to ninety
people who came here to the US looking for a
better life will become naturalized citizens.
Speaker 2 (20:16):
To your job, well, role has been we have the
agencies there, but then get them to collaborate or cooperate more. Yeah,
it's part of your role, and you're expanding that to
try to include more of the community, including or I
guess for you, especially young people. But to have partepsie
(20:38):
be a more coherent or cohesive place. Going back to
old poem about one Land. So you're a one Land pioneer.
You're out there and.
Speaker 4 (20:51):
Trying to be So one of the ways I've done that,
we've like last year and the year before, what I
started to do was host these back to school events
where for the partners who are interested come together and
collaborate and host these back to school events where we
give away school supplies, we have food, we have entertainment,
and then the agent, the partners in the building as
well as partners in the community could come out and
(21:12):
table and just let the community know all what services
are available. The year before last, the first time we
did it, we drew about like three hundred people out.
Last year in collaboration with some River Health because they
also had their National Health Center Week, we partnered with
them and we had about seven hundred people come out
(21:33):
for our back to School Week event. Yeah, a lot
of people. Yeah, shout out to some River Health. They
played that they were leading another partner.
Speaker 2 (21:41):
Yeah, I want to go a part of hope doesn't
seem wealth space. But when you say, the prosecutors knew
you didn't do the shooting, but because you wanted to
tell who did it, they decided, well, we're going to
get it out of here by making you the shooter.
That's the kind of not kind of to me that
(22:03):
strikes me as administrative violence. And how did that strike you?
I mean, other was when you want to sort of
give up the truth on things and they treated you
so harshly, basically said you no longer have a life.
How did that go into your heart?
Speaker 4 (22:20):
So we just recently had an event at the partnership.
This was done by the Poughkeepsie Public District Library, Sadie
Peterson Delaney African Roofs Library. I actually invited my friend
to come and speak. His name is Dan Slepian and
he's the author of the book The Sing Sing Files,
and what he talked about in his book and what
he talked about at the event was just wrongful convictions.
(22:41):
In his book, six people who had nothing, absolutely nothing
to do with their crimes were convicted and served decades
in prisons for crimes they didn't commit. My situation is
a little bit different because I made a horrible decision
and then my action still led to what happened. But yeah, Peter, Yeah,
absolutely right, the DA there's rules in place to stop
(23:03):
that behavior, but the DA didn't respect those rules. The
same way the streets get dirty and the same way
the streets don't play fair. Unfortunately, we have some systems,
and we have some people operating in these systems that
don't playfear who might feel justified. Well, we know you
were there, and we know you're just not speaking, but
we're gonna we're gonna hold you to this and you're
(23:23):
gonna wear this. How did I feel I felt, I
don't know, I felt like I would have preferred death
at that time. I couldn't imagine doing twenty five years
in prison. I just and you know, like I know
this person knows. I know that these people who are
testifying know that what they're saying isn't true. But unfortunately,
(23:43):
at my young age, with the choices that I made,
I helped to make that happen to myself. You know,
I put myself in a position where these people could
do what they did to me.
Speaker 1 (23:52):
That's a huge step of accountability, you know, just just
on your part, because sometimes that's it's challenging to get
one in life period, having nothing to do with being incarcerated,
just on on basic accountability in our lives for the
choices that we make. And uh and it's and it's
a brave choice and transformation. You know, I want to
(24:12):
ask you for a minute before we wrap up very quickly,
is the Track program affiliated with this and under the
vulner umbrella at all? The Track program at Family Partnership.
Speaker 2 (24:26):
It was attracted a long time program with Family Services.
Speaker 3 (24:29):
But you know, I know it's evolved, right, it's still evolving, right.
Speaker 2 (24:34):
But I also wanted to just mention without you going
to be down time for you to go into details.
You must have done very well in prison, I mean
to get an executive pardon. You must have. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (24:47):
I was a part of programs like Rehabilitation through the Arts,
where I learned how to do poke, spoken with poetry,
and then I took what they taught me about theater
and all that stuff, and I just I always felt
like I had something in me that needed to come out,
and through the arts I learned I felt my voice
because I grew up listening to hip hop, and I
know that there's a power there, you know, in the
spoken word and performance. And so rehabilitation through the arts
(25:11):
awaken something in me. And then once I once I awoke,
it was just a rap.
Speaker 2 (25:16):
It was just a rap.
Speaker 3 (25:17):
The arts matter, Yeah, they'll.
Speaker 2 (25:20):
Being woke is a problem, you know, but that's really important.
Speaker 3 (25:25):
No, you're absolutely right.
Speaker 1 (25:26):
The arts I always you know, if you follow me
on Facebook, I'm always saying the arts matter, you know,
because it it you said, it can wake up certain
things and you that puts you in a direction in
your life that you didn't even know was discovering my potential.
Speaker 2 (25:38):
And it's rehabilitation rather than the punishment. Right, it's a
citizens that's a whole other conversation.
Speaker 1 (25:45):
I don' would like to have you back, you know,
once you get into the position steady and hear how
it's grown and where you are and your reflections on it,
and just keep you know, just keep doing the good
work that you do. Thank you, right, and once again
we want to thank our listeners for listening to finding
out with Pete and the poet go.
Speaker 3 (26:04):
Thank you so much for dinnis, We're fine. Thank you
so much for being with it.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
Thank you for having me
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!