Amy Barch is founder and executive director of Turn90, a nonprofit dedicated to working with men who have barriers to success after prison. Her program includes cognitive behavioral classes, supportive services, transitional work, and job placement. In 2017, Amy opened a print shop to provide part-time employment to participants with the most barriers to success. Mark Roberts, Terrance Ferrell, Amy Barch, Melvin Bell, Aulzue “Blue” Fields.
In Amy Barch’s junior year of college, she walked through the doors of the county jail, and the trajectory of her life changed forever. It certainly was not what she had planned. Amy was on track to go to law school to become an attorney. She still remembers flipping through pages of internships, but one in particular caught her eye — an educational program at the county jail. So, Amy, with a whole lot of grit, sat beside inmates and helped them with their homework so they could get their GEDs. Her internship ended, but Amy kept volunteering.
Now, almost 20 years later, Amy serves as the founder and executive director of Turn90, a nonprofit dedicated to working with men who have the most barriers to success after prison. Her program includes cognitive behavioral classes, supportive services, transitional work, and job placement. They fill in the gap of a broken system. The United States spends $80 billion on prisons each year with a 700 percent increase in the prison population since the 1970s. Sixty-two percent of people who enter prison are rearrested within three years of release. Amy recognized that America has a severe problem, and she planned to do something about it.
In 2006, Amy graduated from college and began working for a nonprofit reentry organization that provided essential emergency services for people coming out of prison and jail — things like food, clothing, and transportation. Amy would sit on one side of a desk and ask men questions in exchange for referrals, a bus pass, and a few necessities. She would smile and say, ‘Good luck!’ as they turned toward the door. “It felt so exploitative and superficial,” she says. It was like putting a Band-Aid on a massive hemorrhage.
Amy talked with the head of the nonprofit and pitched a more holistic model that focused on sustainable services for people coming out of prison. Her boss was reluctant and resistant, but Amy refused to back down. Something had to change, and she would be part of it.
Dispirited, Amy quit her job at the nonprofit after three years and decided to enter public policy. “I remember thinking that I was going to swim upstream; I was going to change the policies and have this big impact on our prison system.” But after some time in Washington, D.C., she had a brutal realization. “I hated it.” Amy felt more disconnected than ever from the people she wanted to serve.
Amy was at a pivotal crossroads. She remembers thinking, “If I’m not into nonprofits, and I’m not into public policy, then who am I?” She feels fortunate to have faced these crucial questions. “That’s just part of a journey that I think so many of us go through if we’re lucky,” says Amy.
She took stock of her circumstances and moved to Charleston, South Carolina. “I wanted to live someplace where I could get involved in prison and reentry work,” she says. After settling in, her first order of business was to start making phone calls. “I just remember how nobody would call me back for the longest time, but then I got a few meetings with people, and I would ask what support was available for people returning home from prison. I never wanted to start a nonprofit. I was looking for something meaningful I could get involved in.” Like a puzzle, Amy began piecing together all the parts and discovered a great need.
She decided to return to the basics and volunteer. It took Amy six months to get approval to step foot in the jail, but in 2011, she launched her first class. Six months later, Amy received a phone call. The woman on the other line summoned her to a meeting in Federal Judge Richard Gergel’s office. Amy’s heart sank as she presumed the worst.
Amy will never forget the judge’s words as she entered his office. “He said, ‘I’m so honored that I finally get to meet the woman behind all the conversation in my courtroom.’ I was astounded.”
Judge Gergel told her that the men in her class would come to court for sentencing and would talk about this class that was teaching them so much. A buzz was going on about what was happening behind the scenes, and Amy was just finding out about it.
Judge Gergel sat down across from Amy and said, “I think South Carolina is ready for something different. And I think that you could do more, and I’ll do what’s in my power to help you. Think about it.”
Amy went home, called her sister, and thought about Judge Gergel’s words. Until then, Amy had not seriously considered taking her volunteer work further. She enjoyed teaching classes and feeling re-connected to her passion. But something in the judge’s words struck a chord, and she knew he was right.
Amy decided to quit her full-time job and devote herself entirely to developing a reentry program. She waited tables at night and continued to serve the inmates during the day. And she continued to make calls, connections, and appointments — including a meeting with Charleston’s chief of police.
“Chief Greg Mullen is one of the wisest and most strategic people I’ve ever met,” says Amy. “I’ll never forget my first meeting with him. I told him I wanted to launch a community reentry organization because our prison system was broken, and we needed to do something different.” He patiently listened to Amy and assigned her homework to develop her plan further.
This interaction began a pattern for Amy and the chief. She would do her homework, schedule a meeting with the chief, and he would send her away with more homework. “I’m sure he was thinking, ‘Oh, no, here she is again!’ I think he would probably tell you that I was the person who would just never go away.”
In 2014, after countless meetings, Chief Mullen offered the persistent Amy a small amount of money from the Charleston police budget to begin a reentry program. It was the seed of what she dreamed would become a life-changing organization.
During this time, Amy negotiated sentences for 32 men, both on the federal and state side, in her alternative-to-prison program. Despite this tremendous success, Amy had a big problem — no one would hire the men. “I had no employment for anybody. It was just truly a wing and a prayer,” says Amy.
This predicament inspired Chief Mullen to introduce Amy to Charleston’s mayor, Joseph P. Riley, Jr., — one of the longest-serving mayors in the United States. “I still remember being so nervous to meet this legend. It was one of the most important meetings of my whole life.”
Amy sat at a long conference room table in the mayor’s office and boldly shared her thoughts on the prison system and her efforts to bring about change. “Listen,” Amy pleaded, “I’ve got 32 men getting out of prison this year, and I have no jobs for them. Nobody will hire them. I’ve pitched to every landscaping company in town. They’re all going to get out of jail. And not only that, they’re all getting out on the same day.”
Mayor Riley quietly listened to Amy as he peeked over his signature round-framed glasses. What she didn’t realize was that he had just returned from a conference — the main topic: reentry and recidivism.
Mayor Riley picked up the phone and dialed the head of his human relations department. “Kay,” he said. “I’ve got a lady named Amy Barch here. She runs this wonderful program helping men coming home from prison, and she needs employment for the men that she’s working with. Now, I’m going to talk to everybody about this, but I want to make sure that we help Amy figure this out.”
Amy sat, stunned. “It’s unbelievable what that man did for me at that moment,” she says.
Mayor Riley looked at Amy with approval and said, “We need to do more for people coming out of prison.”
“He made that call, and then we were off,” says Amy. Thirty-two men were diverted away from prison and into Amy’s organization as a condition of bond or probation. Each person was provided 150 hours of group therapy in jail before release, with wraparound services provided after discharge. All 32 men received jobs at the city of Charleston or North Charleston.
Almost a decade has passed since Amy’s first meeting with Mayor Riley. Since then, Amy has refined her organizational model and the permanent team has grown to 20 staff members, 13 of whom are program graduates. In 2017, her organization began leasing a building in North Charleston from the State of South Carolina for $1 per year. In this new space, the program opened a print shop to provide part-time employment to participants with the most barriers to success. In 2021, the nonprofit opened a second location in Columbia. Columbia’s enrollment took off, serving 65 percent of Turn90’s men.
Now, Amy strives to develop Turn90 into an evidence-based program that can be replicated nationwide. “The Department of Justice has set the standard for what’s considered an evidence-based program for reentry, and so far, no program has reached it,” Amy says. “You have to pass multiple high-quality evaluations showing that what you’ve done is working. It’s very difficult.” Despite the challenges of the evaluations, she is undeterred. “I’m never going to stop. I’ll either hit the goal, or I’ll die trying. I always tell myself that every setback is only a temporary defeat.”
Amy smiles and admits, “There has never been a day when this has ever been easy. It is such an uphill push all the time. It requires tremendous faith and a willingness to recommit when things are not going well. And at the same time, so many doors have opened and hands extended right when I needed them. I can’t help but feel I am on the right path.”
