Participant Startup

New Wellness Court participants face a variety of challenges as they struggle to meet the requirements of the court-ordered treatment plan and achieve sobriety.  Often they enter the program straight from jail, having sacrificed all their financial resources to feed their addiction.  Yet, in the program they must meet their own basic needs for food and shelter as well as the requirements of the court.  They must attend treatment and numerous sobriety groups and must gain and maintain employment.  If they are addicted to alcohol, they generally must take a medicine that quells their craving for alcohol and pay for a device that monitors their sobriety.  

Partners for Progress created the Startup Fund to assist participants in bridging the gap from indigence to self-reliance.  Generally, secure and sober housing and a degree of recovery from addiction must be achieved before participants are able to find a job and attain a measure of self-sufficiency.  At the beginning of the program participants work with Wellness Court Case Coordinators to determine their needs for assistance if any.  In turn Case Coordinators contact Partners for Progress to request and receive necessary checks to be spent on behalf of participants.  

Startup funds for housing, food, bus passes, medicine, monitoring and other essentials are available to participants who are making a good faith effort to follow the court-ordered treatment program to gain and maintain sobriety.  Funds are generally for use only at the beginning of the program, and for occasional emergency needs.  The Wellness Court Team and Partners work together to assure that funds are not used as a substitute for employment nor where other public or private resources are available to the participant.   

Partners for Progress has been able to provide startup funding to the Anchorage and Fairbanks Wellness Courts.  Funding from this source is often the essential ingredient making it possible for an indigent addicted offender to gain a foothold on sober, self-sufficient living and succeed in Wellness Court.