May Flowers 🌻

There’s a saying “April Showers Bring May Flowers,” which not only alludes to nature and her seasonal patterns, but also hints at what can follow a season of less-than-ideal conditions. 

At Benevolence Farm, it’s felt like November-December-January-February-March-April Showers Bring May Flowers. 

It’s been a rough few months. We experienced staffing instability, which came as a surprise to our team and beloved staff members who had to leave the Farm rather suddenly. 

These staff changes came at a time when we were sustaining the largest number of residents in our organization’s history, including individuals who recently left over a decade of incarceration and were experiencing complex mental health needs. 

It’s still taking us some time to get our footing back, but we are nearly there.

In the past two months, we’ve welcomed Cara Nance, our Reentry Wellness Coordinator, to the team.

Hannah Joyner agreed to support us this season as a farming advisor and, with the heavy lifting of our new Farm Manager, Kaya Henry, we have a beautiful and productive farming operation underway.

We hit our goal of $20,000 for our Spring Fundraising Campaign, thanks to y’all. 

As we plan for our 2026 Tiny Home Expansion, we will need to add staff members, volunteers, and board members over the next year.

But for now, this month of May, we are celebrating. This post focuses on some fun updates from the Farm, the “flowers” that have emerged from months of struggle. 

Thanks for sticking in there with us.

Our Wins 

We believe there is no such thing as a “small win.” Everyone deserves a little celebration. Here are the latest Benevolence Farm accomplishments.

• NG completed his first semester at Alamance Community College, and on an accelerated track no less. 
  
• CR earned her first ever driver’s license. 
  
• LC graduated from Wake Technical Community College with an Associate’s Degree in Addiction and Recovery Studies 

Flipping From Challenge to Success

Last year, we shared the below story written by a resident at Benevolence Farm. The format was developed in partnership with Hidden Voices.

This week, DB completed all forms of community supervision (probation and parole) for the first time in twelve years. 

We cannot stress how big of a win this is for DB.

As a person with cognitive disabilities, meeting the requirements of probation and parole was nearly impossible to navigate by herself.

And that wasn’t for lack of trying. 

She begged her probation officer for help finding housing, as you can read in her story.

She knew failure to find a place to live meant she would receive a violation and go back to prison…which is what eventually happened.

When she came to the Farm in 2023, she needed much more support than just housing and a job.

Thanks to her self advocacy, she has made incredible strides to get to the point where she is — as we like to say — free free.

We are so proud of DB.

Her Story: Compliance

Do people understand how easy it is to get violated? How easy it is for them to take our freedom, just snatch us up and send us back? Both times I’ve been sent back to prison for violating parole, when I’d served the time, they just released me back out with nowhere to go again.

I was in a bad relationship. The man put me out in the middle of the night by the hair of the head, and I didn’t have a home or a place to go to. Literally every day, I was in the probation office, every day in front of the probation officer’s face, but I still got violated for not having a home and residence. Even though I was at their office, and they knew where I was, and I was trying to be in compliance, it didn’t matter. At the end of the day, we might be out of prison, but we’re still looked at as offenders. In their eyes, we’re still the ones who will lie and manipulate. But that’s not the case. We’re begging for help. We want help. We need help. I was there asking and pleading for help — I was asking for a program, I was asking for a home, I was crying in their offices, but to be honest, sometimes not even the probation officers know how to help.

The last time I went to a mental health hospital, I was in there for three and a half weeks and I got violated again for not having a residence, not giving them my address. When I was in front of the judge, I was showing him the paperwork where I was in the mental health hospital, on the phone with my probation officer, trying to get help, begging for help, begging for somebody to help give me stability while I was homeless.

There’s not enough places out there for women to go into. There’s nowhere to give them the resources that they need. I was trying to make it out there, but I could not get the help in reentering.