While he’s happy for the funding, Powell said the awards of six government contracts totaling about $400,000 in six months has pushed PowerNet to a crisis point. Most of the grants are paid on a reimbursement basis, and PowerNet doesn’t have the necessary up-front money to deliver services, he said. PowerNet served 981 different clients in the second half of 2009. More than 3,000 people return to Montgomery County from Ohio prisons every year.
Powell said PowerNet is facing “the greatest threat we’ve had to our existence,” after reviews of PowerNet’s paperwork by the city planning department and the state prison system found problems including poor documentation, invoicing errors and difficulties by PowerNet in maintaining staff and recruiting eligible ex-convicts for its programs.
Powell said his staff, many of them ex-offenders themselves, have inadvertently triggered concerns from funders because of their inexperience and lack of training in complying with grant requirements. He takes the blame for the training lapses.
That lack of training, he said, led a staffer to violate grant requirements by sending two ex-offenders with homes to a local homeless shelter so they could get become eligible for a federally funded PowerNet program for homeless ex-convicts. The men were at risk of homelessness, Powell said. PowerNet also served other people who weren’t homeless.
Powell plans to meet with city officials next week about the issues. Aaron Sorrell, manager of Dayton’s Division of Housing and Neighborhood Development, said the city probably will offer technical assistance to help PowerNet get on track. He agreed that most of the problems are due to PowerNet’s inexperience with federal paperwork requirements.
“If we suspected fraud, this issue would have been terminated instantly,” he said.
PowerNet also is in negotiations with state officials to straighten out problems related to its largest grant, $200,000 from the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction to help ex-convicts reconnect with their families. State officials declined to comment on the matter, but a report from Corrections noted problems with invoices and documentation lapses when PowerNet sought reimbursement of expenses. The March 19 report also said, “PowerNet of Dayton has requested reimbursement from the state of Ohio totaling $9,726.76 and have no (eligible) clients enrolled in their program.”
Powell said he has irritated Corrections officials by trying to find innovative ways to serve clients. He said the system has been slow to change despite the benefits prisoner re-entry programs like PowerNet provide through cuts in recidivism rates.
“We’re creating a little more work for the bureaucrats who are used to pushing the paperwork a little more quickly from one side of their desk to another,” Powell said. “There needs to be a shift in paradigm.”
PowerNet also is working to secure nearly $40,000 in Montgomery County Human Services Levy funds.
“We’re seeing 2,000 people a year,” Powell said. “We’re terribly underfunded and overburdened, and nobody wants to serve this population but us. Absolutely nothing illegal, illicit or undercover is going on.”
Among those in Powell’s corner is U.S. District Judge Walter Rice, who calls him a “visionary” in helping newly released ex-convicts make successful transitions from prison to free society.
“We’re going through some growing pains,” Powell said. “We’ve gone through a learning curve. We’re going to correct these problems and move on.”
Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2264 or
tbeyerlein@DaytonDailyNews.
com.
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